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London copper climbed on Monday after Chinese data painted a slightly brighter picture of the world’s second largest economy, adding to supportive comments by China’s leaders about the country’s economic growth prospects.
China’s export and import performance in September easily beat forecasts, with imports showing unexpected buoyancy, helping to ease concerns about deteriorating domestic demand.
The turnaround in trade performance in the third quarter was a result of government measures and stronger foreign demand, the country's customs office said on Monday.
“It’s not an outrageously bullish print, but it might go some way to rebase sentiment towards global economic growth which had been getting very bearish... I would read this as mostly positive,’’ said analyst Daniel Morgan at UBS in Sydney.
Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange climbed 0.7 per cent to $6,691 a tonne by 0258 GMT, after ending down in the previous session. Prices are climbing away from 5-month lows of $6,600 touched on October 2.
The most-traded December copper contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange rose 0.4 per cent to 47,790 yuan ($7,802) a tonne in overnight trade.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang had said on a visit to Germany on Friday that he was confident his country’s economy would continue to grow at a “medium to high tempo’’, forecasting growth of about 7.5 per cent this year despite turbulence in the world economy.
China is watching its property market closely but sees no need for any big stimulus for the sector or the rest of the economy, its vice-minister of finance had said on Friday.
China’s import of copper rose 14.7 per cent from month ago to 390,000 tonnes in September, data from the General Administration of Customs showed.
“Since the market has really been quite bearish on the outlook and particularly restocking in light of the Qingdao investigation going on, I think it should be broadly positive,’’ said analyst Daniel Hynes of ANZ in Sydney.
But reflecting an overall negative view on copper, hedge funds and money managers slightly trimmed copper shorts in the week up to October 7, data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission showed on Friday.
The US Federal Reserve should rethink its forward guidance, potentially ditching its promise to keep interest rates near zero for a “considerable time’’ after it ends its bond-buying stimulus, a top Federal Reserve official had said on Friday.
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