Two ships carrying copper concentrates from Ecuador dock at a port in East China's Anhui Province on February 29, 2020. Photo: cnsphoto

Prices of base metals stormed higher on Monday, with copper rallying above $9,000 a ton, putting the global economic bellwether on course for a record run of monthly gains on brightening market prospects and economic recovery hopes, experts said.

Benchmark three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange CMCU3 rose over 3 percent to over $9,200 a ton in Asia market on Monday, heading for an unprecedented 11th monthly rise streak in February. 

The most-traded March copper contract on the Shanghai Futures Exchange gained 5.99 percent to 67,370 yuan ($10,420) a ton during the Monday session, reaching a 10-year high to a level not seen since September 2011. 

Other industrial metals also advanced. During the session the main contract of Shanghai tin rose 8 percent, reaching a new high since its listing, and Shanghai nickel rose more than 4 percent to a new high in 18 months, and Shanghai aluminum rose 1.91 percent.

Driven by the metal's revival, A-share resource stocks rallied on Monday, with the Everbright nonferrous metals index soaring 8.28 percent.

During the Monday session in the morning, 36 of the 111 stocks in the nonferrous metal indexes of Everbright Securities hit the upper price limit.

The rally in base metals is driven by depleted copper inventory versus a strong post-COVID-19 demand as the world economy recovers from the pandemic and relatively low global inflation expectations, Shi Lin, an analyst from Huaan Securities told the Global times on Monday.

"The pandemic has impeded mining and investment. On the other hand, with the vaccines are broadly administered, there is a demand for work resumption overseas and the centralized procurement of industry materials have outstripped near term supply," Shi said.

Goldman Sachs Group also reinforced its bullish copper stance last week, saying that China's return from the week-long Chinese New Year break had heralded a burst of onshore investor copper buying.

Global Times