Copper rallied sharply in 2025, with both COMEX (+41%) and LME (+44%) benchmarks delivering strong gains. While this year is only 12 days old, that strength has continued with both prices already making new record highs, and continuing their multi-year technical pattern of higher highs and higher lows (i.e. in place since mid-2022, fig 1).
With that, Copper has started to outperform gold (from around mid-December last year, fig 4).
In June we made the case for further upside in copper (see 10th June SHORT VIEW: “Copper: Upside Breakout Ahead”). We reiterated that view in September & October (see Market Positioning notes from 15th Sept & 6th October). The key question, therefore, is: How much more upside is there? And, is metal price leadership starting to rotate (from precious to base metals)?
In the near term, ‘long copper’ is clearly a crowded trade, with net speculative positioning rising rapidly to (around) record high levels this past year (fig 2). In a similar vein, measured sentiment readings are bullish (generating a contrarian SELL signal) while copper is technically over-bought (fig 3). From that positioning, sentiment, and technical perspective, therefore, some near term giveback is likely.
From a macro perspective, though, copper should trend up and continue making higher highs and higher lows in coming years. In particular we expect (i) the physical market to tighten significantly; and (ii) copper to take up leadership relative to gold (see 12th Nov ’25 Commodity Fundamentals Report “Copper: The Next Cyclical Upswing”).
Fig 1: Copper futures (COMEX, USD/lb), shown with 50 & 200 day moving averages
Fig 2: Copper net speculative positioning vs. copper price (COMEX futures, USD/lb)
Fig 3: Copper medium term technical scoring system vs. copper price (USD/lb)
Fig 4: Copper prices (LME & COMEX) relative to gold (ratio)
