This Morning in Metals: Potential Supply Disruption Drives Up Copper Prices While Gold Prices Drop

This morning in metals news, we’ve seen prices for copper and gold reach three-week highs and lows, respectively.
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Threat of Supply Disruption Has Driven Up Copper Prices

Copper prices reached a three-week high today, Reuters reported, driven by potential supply disruptions. This news comes after yesterday’s rally near the Grasberg copper mine in Indonesia. Thousands of workers from the Indonesian unit of Freeport McMoRan Inc. took part, protesting against layoffs that resulted from the company’s contract dispute with the government.
Freeport had laid off 10% of its workforce, with potentially more layoffs to come. As a response, the union representing the workers has threatened to strike for the month of May.

A Three-Week Low for Gold Prices

In contrast, gold prices fell on Monday as the threat of a U.S. government shutdown faded and the U.S. dollar edged slightly higher. The metal has dropped to $1,255.50 per ounce, the lowest gold prices have been since April 10, according to FactSet data. Political tensions in Europe had kept gold prices up so far this year, but that trend seems to have been reversed.
In related news, S&P Global Platts reported that gold production in China, the world’s top gold producer as well as consumer, fell significantly in Q1 2017. In this past quarter, China produced 101.2 tons of gold, which is a 9.3% drop compared with 111.6 tons in Q1 2016.

Bernanke Argues in Favor of a Border Adjustment Tax

Former Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke came out in support of the proposed border adjustment tax (BAT), suggesting to CNBC that the GOP had not presented the idea well. Bernanke argued that a stronger dollar would negate any negative effects of the BAT – which would tax imports and exempt exports – by increasing U.S. companies’ purchasing power and lowering the cost of overseas manufacturing.