Copper fell for a third straight day on Tuesday, hit by currency-related selling and weak US data that raised concerns about global growth and industrial metal demand prospects, already down from China's engineered slowdown and Europe's debt crisis.
In New York, the benchmark March COMEX contract fell 3.65 cents to settle at $3.7900 per lb, near the bottom end of its $3.7650 to $3.8760 session range. It hit a four-month peak last Friday at $3.9390. Volumes reached 66,000 lots in late New York business, up about 40 percent from the 30-day norm, according to Thomson Reuters preliminary data.