New York copper futures declined in early business on Thursday, after a large injection into London Metal Exchange warehouses scared some participants off the record high levels, traders said. "After they put about 3,000 tonnes into the LME warehouses it looks like some long liquidation and some technical selling - people who were nervous at the time using that as an excuse to sell," said one copper broker.
At the New York Mercantile Exchange's COMEX division, benchmark September futures were down 1.65 cent at $1.6550 a lb. Overnight it set a contract high at $1.6740.
Spot August copper fell 2.10 cents to $1.6880 per lb., after closing Wednesday at the all-time high of 1.7090.
Most of the rest of the board was slow, with a few contracts trading 1.75 to 0.60 cent lower. COMEX estimated 10 am copper volume at 4,000 lots.