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The London Metal Exchange (LME) announced that it launched new Asian Benchmark reference prices for LME copper, LME aluminium, and LME zinc. The exchange said that new unofficial three month futures prices for the above contracts will be published at the end of the Asian trading day. As published on 24th January 2011, the first LME copper Asian Benchmark price was US$9,550.00/t. The LME attributed the introduction of the new benchmark prices to the increasing futures trading volume on LMEselect, the exchange's electronic trading platform, during Asian time zones. It is expected that the new reference prices will provide a transparent view of the sentiment across Asian key metal and financial markets.

""What is happening now is not related to supply-demand in copper - it's more related to the economic crisis in Europe," Mr Hernández told the Financial Times in a video interview on the sidelines of LME week, the largest annual gathering of the metal and mining industry."

SINGAPORE, Sept 8 (Reuters) - Shanghai copper fell around 2 percent on Monday but it lagged behind a 4.5 percent slide in London prices after big jumps in inventories on Friday. But prices in London bounced on Monday, lifted by gains in other other commodity markets as the dollar lost ground against the euro after the U.S. government on Sunday seized control of mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae (nyse: FNM - news - people ) and Freddie Mac (nyse: FRE - news - people ), which own or guarantee half of all U.S. mortgages. LME copper rose $75 or 1.1 percent, to $6,975 at 0232 GMT, while Shanghai November copper dropped 1,030 yuan to 55,630 yuan ($8,130) and earlier touched a nine-month low.

"In my personal opinion, most plants are unlikely to actually cut back because of profit factors. The smelters agreed to cut back mainly because of tight power and high power costs, but for some, supply is not much affected, only costs have gone up. But the cost of shutting down and restarting might be even higher than the increased power prices," a source from Shaanxi Tongchuan aluminum said July 11. A source from Chuangyuan aluminum said, "We also signed the agreement, but that's just a piece of paper; there is no definite ruling to say we must cut output. We have no plans to cut output at the moment or in the short term, but we may consider cutting back in the future." The Chuangyuan source also cited the power versus shutdown cost ratioand noted that in any case the company has its own power plant. "We don't expect many of the other smelters at the meeting to cut either, including Chalco ... everyone will wait and see," he said. "Domestic prices have risen slightly, but mainly affected by the rise on the LME yesterday - there seems to be little fundamental impact within China itself," an analyst from Beijing Antaike said July 11. "People are all very uncertain and maybe confused now since there are no definite details on what the cutbacks will be." A Chinese trader said domestic demand and trade activity were also expected to slow due to the Olympics, and those plants that actually shut may be able to restart in the fourth quarter, so the impact on domestic prices would be minimal.

Aluminium prices at LME and SHFE have stopped slumping at a low level since mid October, after major aluminium enterprises reduced production on the market downturn. Under the current economic recession and financial crisis, outputcut is not big enough to reverse the situation of surplus supply, said market analysts here, adding that it is hard to improve aluminium price in a short period. Currently, the whole aluminium industry is losing money

According to the United States International Trade Commission, US copper imports in November rose by 2.5% m-o-m to 50,992 tonnes, compared with 49,737 tonnes in October. The rise in the imported quantity of copper is not attributed to an increase in physical demand for the red metal, but to the narrowing Comex-LME arbitrage ratio that favoured imports. The physical demand for copper is suffering from ongoing weakness due to the downturn in the US construction, manufacturing and automotive industries. As a result, in the first 11 months of 2008 US copper imports have contracted by 14.2% to 661,918 tonnes, compared to 771,125 tonnes in the same period of 2007.

It is believed that a cash crunch is reducing orders in the Chinese power sector, which accounts for 60% of the country's copper demand. Analysts predicted strong copper demand in H1 as the country was eager to repair the damages to power networks caused by the heavy snow in the early part of the year. However, repairs have so far mainly been made to aluminium and fibre-optic cables. Cash flow problems at copper rod and wire plants have occurred following the government's tight credit policy and high copper prices. Some 30% of copper wirerod production capacity is being reported idle. The cash shortages have also delayed copper buying from active copper fabricators, further dampening consumption of the metal. China, a net importer of copper, exported 31,000 tonnes of refined copper in April, up 227% year-on-year, with the possibility that the country might have been re-exporting the metal since late February. China's General Administration of Customs reported that 14,000 tonnes were exported to South Korea, six times that from the same period last year. This perhaps confirms that traders were re-exporting copper it has imported to LME-approved warehouses to take advantage of the discount between Shanghai and LME copper prices.

Neans focuses on "priority markets"

In the past few days world leading cablemaker Nexans has announced one acquisition, one new joint venture and one asset disposal. On the 30th May, Nexans acquired Intercond a leading Italian manufacturer of special cables for industrial equipment and subsea applications. The company had sales of €90m and employs 150. "This [€90m] acquisition fits totally in the Group's strategy by increasing the proportion of its business in high value-added special cables", said Gerard Hauser, Chairman and CEO of Nexans. On the 2nd June, Nexans released a press report confirming that it has formed a joint venture to create a wire and cable plant in Qatar, the country's first manufacturing facility. Qatar International Cable Company (QICC) is owned 29% by Nexans with the balance being owned by Special Projects Company and Al Neama Industrial Co. The new plant in the industrial city of Mesaleed, 40km from Doha, and will employ 210 people. By the end of 2009 it will begin manufacturing low and medium voltage cables for buildings and energy infrastructure as well as special cables for the oil and gas industry. This JV will generate sales of $150m per year by 2010 at current copper prices. Finally, Nexans confirmed that it has completed the pre-announced sale of its copper telecom cable plant at Santander in Spain to the British company B3 Cable Solutions for €17m. These three actions continue to refocus the group's strategy on priority market segments.

Chinese imports of copper and copper products in February increased by 42% m-o-m to 329,311 tonnes. Bloomberg reported that this is the highest increase in inbound shipments since 2003. LME copper prices have jumped by 19% since the beginning of the year, reaching US$3,667 per tonne on March 10th. Copper prices have been supported by optimism regarding the Chinese and the US government spending packages. Infrastructure projects will boost the demand for copper semis, especially cables and tubes.

Intraday copper three-month prices on the LME rose by 4.1% to US$ 2,940 per tonne on December 29th compared to the closing price on December 24th, affected by higher oil prices and the weaker US dollar. Increases in oil prices are correlated with increases in copper prices since investors see oil as a barometer for the entire commodity class. Then, the weaker US dollar makes metals cheaper for holders of other currencies. However, analysts remain pessimistic about the red metal due to plunging demand as the ongoing economic slowdown will continue to take its toll on the demand for copper.

Positive expectations for copper producers have been generated by the recent increases in copper prices that reached US$4,725/t on the LME on 17th April. In Germany, copper smelter Aurubis expects that backed by rising prices the company will achieve oparating profits in the current fiscal year. Due to writedowns, the group suffered net losses in Q1 2009. In Poland, copper miner KGHM said that higher than expected prices may support the company to surpass its forecast. As a result, the company is updating its budget assumptions.

Copper traded on LME fell after opening higher in Asia as prices came back under pressure after yesterday's gains.