US copper futures were steady in early business Thursday, with traders keeping a close eye on swings in equity markets, while macro-economic concerns continued to cloud the picture, traders said.
"I think people are still trying to get their bearings," said Larry Young, senior trader at Infinity Brokerage Services in Chicago, adding the uncertain environment had traders just "picking and choosing" their points to enter and get out. Copper for December delivery was down 0.10 cent at $3.3430 per lb by 10:43 am EDT (1443 GMT) on the New York Mercantile Exchange's COMEX division, dealing between $3.3105 and $3.3640. By 10:00 am, futures volumes stood at 4,701 lots.
The copper market continued to take direction from the volatile equity markets, with the Dow Jones industrial average coming off of its early lows after government data showed economic growth held up in the second quarter despite continued problems in the housing market.
The Commerce Department revised its estimate of gross domestic product - the measure of total goods and services output within US borders - up to 4 percent from a 3.4 percent rate last month. Copper, a commodity with close ties to the underlying economy, lost more than 18 percent of its value during the month of July amid broad-based risk aversion sparked by the US subprime mortgage meltdown and worries about its potential impact on the world economy.
These worries were seen stalling a late short-covering rally on Wednesday spurred by news of a potential strike by miners at Southern Copper's Peruvian operations. "I think because the demand outlook could potentially be less going ahead, it kind of nullified the news," Young said.
On Wednesday, workers at Southern Copper's Cuajone and Toquepala mines and the Ilo smelter in Peru planned to set down their tools on September 12, in search of better pay. Supply-side fundamentals showed London Metal Exchange-monitored copper warehouse stocks add another 275 tonnes, bringing total levels to 138,925 tonnes on Thursday.
COMEX copper stocks were flat at 20,705 short tons on Tuesday. Looking at production, Chile, which mines about a third of the world's copper, produced 453,724 tonnes of the metal in July, down 1.5 percent from the same month last year, the National Statistics Institute (INE) said on Wednesday.