Copper Price Action is Just Fine Right Now

I know that prices at scrap yards have gone down a fair amount in the past 30-60 days or so, but want to look at things a bit differently.

The price of copper has actually gone up about 4% in the past 6 days (from $2.73/lb. to $2.84/lb. per kitcometals.com (historical 30-day chart).

I remember hearing from a stock trader that I highly respected that in his opinion the best time to buy something was on a pullback after a breakout. Last month copper hit a 4+ year high (hard to believe, isn't it?). This was after about a 65% move up since early 2016 when it was briefly below $2 a pound. We then got a 16% pullback before the quiet move up over the past week or so. So a pullback after a breakout is precisely what this is- even though it doesn't feel good when you have to sell for less than what you did the last time.

To me this is positive for longer-term price action in spite of the Trump vs. China tariff wars. If I could afford to just let the copper accumulate in my back yard, I would (betting on higher metal prices down the road). I need to keep things a bit cleaner- that's just the way it is.

I took my copper Saturday to the closest scrapyard by me since they pay a better price for it than the one I usually go to that's open late weekdays + Saturday and open Sunday till 4:30PM. I got 12.60 for 6lb. of #2 bare copper wire. It wasn't much I know but just wanted to see what that scrapyard was like and it was a week's worth of copper. I didn't bring my insulated wire, just the stuff I stripped. I will wait till Saturday to sell the wire and the new copper I have stripped/collected since they are not open when I am ready to sell - besides Saturday (8-2).

I want to add an update to this post from roughly 2 years ago. Copper again is acting well. Kitco says it was up 21% for 2Q20, the best quarterly gain since 3Q10. Remember what else happened then? Silver was in the high teens and went to $49 by April, 2011.