Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange fell to $7,406.25 a tonne by 0412 GMT, after touching $7,544.75, its highest since Sept. 28 ,in the previous session, and closing 3.2 percent higher.

LME copper has risen 7.2 percent from the start of the month to Wednesday's close, after losing a quarter of its value in the three months through Sept. 30.

"Copper is now moving sideways trying to consolidate in a new technical range. Equities went up slightly but not as much as yesterday so they won't be lifting base metals as much," CiFCO Futures analyst Zhou Jie said.

"Copper's spot demand remains steady and I think Chinese consumers are willing to restock in a limited way when we see more technical clarity."

The most-active December copper contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange edged down 0.1 percent to 54,860 yuan($8,627.821) per tonne.

A Chinese industry group has told copper experts the country's stocks reached a surprisingly high 1.9 million tonnes at the end of last year, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday, citing unnamed sources.

Analysts said that this will not dampen copper's outlook.

"The figures are not surprising to me, since the import numbers were quite low earlier this year, and all signs point to the fact that China had been drawing down from this high stockpile for most of the year. I believe that we have only 40 percent of those stocks left," Jinrui Futures analyst Zhao Kai said.

China's imports of copper rose 11.8 percent to 380,526 tonnes in September from 340,398 tonnes in the previous month, data from the General Administration of Customs showed.

Analysts said this was due to favourable arbitrage and spot premiums, as well as steady prices in August, which encouraged forward orders for delivery in September.

The euro zone's debt crisis continues to weigh on sentiment despite efforts to straighten out the region's finances and recent positive news.

The bloc is set to ask banks to accept losses of up to half on their holdings of Greek debt, officials said on Wednesday, as part of a plan to avert a disorderly default and stem a crisis that threatens the world economy.

Parties in Slovakia's fallen government struck a deal with the leftist opposition on Wednesday to ratify a plan to bolster the euro zone's rescue fund by Friday, effectively ending a crisis that had threatened the currency's main safety net.

Euro zone industrial production was much stronger than expected in August, data showed on Wednesday, indicating the economic slowdown in the third quarter might be smaller than feared.