Copper prices drop as LME extends trading hours

In the metals markets on Thursday, gold dropped 2 percent to $630.60 per troy ounce after going as low as $620.90 during the day. Silver was down 3.3 percent to $12.08 per troy ounce, while platinum declined by 1.7 percent to $1,227 per troy ounce.

Among base metals, three-month copper dropped 3.7 percent to $7,607 per tonne, but had been as much as 7.1 percent lower at $7,340 per tonne earlier in the day. Among the circumstances leading to the decline were the upcoming auction of as much as 100,000 tonnes of copper as well as the switch to longer trading hours for the London Metal Exchange, a change which was made in order to accommodate the Asian markets.

Elsewhere, aluminium dropped 1.9 percent to $2,600 per tonne and zinc was 4.4 percent lower at $3,510 per tonne. Nickel dropped 4.3 percent to $20,550 per tonne, but earlier in the day it had been 9.6 percent lower than Wednesday’s close and was trading at $19,800 per tonne.