US copper shipments are to set new records on risk of import tariffs

According to Bloomberg, from 100,000 to 150,000 tons of refined copper will be shipped to the US in the coming weeks. The volume may exceed the all-time record of 136,951 tons, recorded in January 2022.

Requests for moving the metal out of Asian warehouses of the London Metal Exchange (LME) have risen to the highest level since August 2017. Commodity traders including Glencore Plc, Trafigura Group, and Gunvor Group are diverting large volumes of copper to the US in an attempt to front run Donald Trump's imposition of import tariffs.

This is significantly depleting stocks in other markets, which includes China, the largest consumer of copper. Monthly shipments of the metal to the country’s ports in April and May are to fall by a third compared to the same period in 2024, the news agency says.

Bloomberg reports that the difference between copper prices on New York's COMEX commodity exchange and the LME surpassed $1,200 per ton on Wednesday, approaching the mid-February’s high.

Goldman Sachs and Citigroup expect the US to impose 25% tariffs on copper imports by the end of 2025. However, American buyers will have to keep purchasing imported metal, since the US consumes twice as much copper as it produces.