Mining Profits...Investing In Industrial Metals

U.S. copper futures closed up nearly 1 percent on Tuesday, albeit in extremely thin holiday volumes, with a return of London trading expected to offer further insight into market direction, traders said.

The London Metal Exchange (LME) was closed Tuesday for the Boxing Day holiday. Regular trading will resume on Wednesday.

"It was really quiet down here, with locals jobbing it around. We pushed to the upper end of Friday's range but could not muster any follow-through buys. We'll have to wait and see what London does overnight. Will they play catch-up or will last week's bearish trend continue?," one copper broker said.

Copper for March delivery settled up 2.40 cents, or 0.84 percent, at $2.8780 a lb on the New York Mercantile Exchange's COMEX division, after dealing in a tight 4-cent range between $2.8450 and $2.8840.

Spot December rose 2.05 cents on day to finish at $2.8505.

Volume just before the close was estimated at 2,000 lots.

Dealers said the market derived some of its early strength from the gains registered overnight in Asia, where Shanghai copper futures reversed earlier weakness to settle higher on Tuesday.

Expectations that China's economy would continue to grow at break-neck speed offered some support to the copper market, as demand for industrial metals like copper would grow as the economy expands.

China's State Information Centre said the country's economy would probably grow by around 9.5 percent in 2007 as anticipated rises in domestic consumption offset slowing fixed-asset investment and foreign trade.

However, official customs data from China over the weekend showed the world's leading consumer of the red metal imported 4.2 percent less refined copper at 66,345 tonnes in November compared with year-ago data.