Chinese Copper Plants Buy the Dip After Weeks Out of Market

Chinese copper fabricators and manufacturers are buying the dip to replenish stocks ahead of this month’s holiday, after a price surge driven by speculative trading in Shanghai kept them away from real-world purchases for weeks.

With futures down 12% from last week’s peak, some will continue to buy hand-to-mouth to meet their post-Lunar New Year production needs, so long as prices remain around the current level of 100,000 yuan ($14,400) a ton, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named discussing private deliberations.