US MIDDAY: copper rises

Copper ended up over one percent on Friday, as demand prospects brightened in top-consumer China after comments from Premier Wen Jiabao signalled a potential shift in the country's monetary policy trends. Copper's bullish week-end momentum bucked wider downturns in many other commodity markets like gold and crude oil, which buckled under the weight of a firmer dollar, weaker equities and persistent concerns about Europe's debt crisis.
The fact that copper was able to withstand the outside market pressures reflected its relatively strong underlying fundamentals and its heavy dependence on the economic health of China, the world's second-largest economy responsible for nearly 40 percent of global consumption of the red metal. In New York, the key September COMEX contract settled up 5.90 cents at $4.1155 per lb.