Shanghai aluminium prices rose on Friday, buoyed by the first acceleration in China's GDP growth in seven years and by a pollution alert in a major industrial province. The most-traded March aluminium contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange (ShFE) closed up 1 percent at 14,765 yuan ($2,308.65) but posted a weekly drop of 2.3 percent.
Lead was the biggest gainer among base metals on the ShFE, rising 1.8 percent to 19,570 yuan a tonne at the close on the back of the Jiyuan alert. Deliverable ShFE aluminium inventories grew by 9,818 tonnes from a week earlier to a fresh record of 783,759 tonnes on Friday, according to ShFE data. Lead stocks, which have been tighter, rose by 1,433 tonnes to 43,572 tonnes.
The most-traded March copper contract in Shanghai closed up 0.1 percent at 53,710 a yuan a tonne. Three-month London copper rose 0.8 percent to $7,130.50 a tonne, building on Thursday's gain of 0.6 percent after a force majeure in Mongolia.