On Thursday morning, September 10, 2026, copper on the London Metal Exchange touched $14,875 a tonne.
No one had ever paid more for it.
Before lunch in London, Reuters published two sentences from two unnamed officials: the White House has not decided whether to tax refined copper, because higher metal prices would raise manufacturing costs in the run-up to November's midterm elections.
By the close in New York, December copper on COMEX had settled at $6.5475 a pound, down 34 cents, or 5%, from the record it set the day before.
Freeport-McMoRan lost 6.6%. Southern Copper lost 7.2%. Teck lost 6.3%.
Nothing happened to a single mine, smelter or warehouse on Thursday. What changed was the odds on a signature.
So we want to show you what Washington actually said, what the trade it punctured looks like from the inside, and what the miners you own are worth on the far side of it.
What the White House Actually Said
Let's start with the document, because one clause in it is what spurred the rally.
On July 30, 2025, President Trump signed a proclamation under Section 232 putting a 50% tariff on semi-finished copper, the pipe, wire and rod that factories buy, from August 1 of that year.
Refined copper, the cathode that comes out of a smelter, was spared. But clause seven left the door open:
"By June 30, 2026, the Secretary shall provide the President with an update on domestic copper markets... so that the President may determine whether imposing a phased universal import duty on refined copper of 15 percent starting on January 1, 2027, and 30 percent starting on January 1, 2028... is warranted."
June 30 came and went. A White House official told Reuters on Thursday that Commerce delivered its update on time, and then gave the only on-the-record sentence in the story:
"The administration continues to evaluate all options to reshore copper and other critical manufacturing back to the United States."
The statement leaves both options open, committing the administration neither to imposing the tariff nor to ruling it out.
What the two unnamed officials added is the part that moved the price. Ahead of the midterms, they described the administration as:
"increasingly focused on affordability"
A tariff that lifts the cost of copper is being weighed against the manufacturers who would pay it.
The United States imports roughly half the copper it uses and has two working smelters, one owned by Freeport and one by Rio Tinto. A 15% duty on cathode is a 15% tax on every wire, motor and transformer maker in the country, in the year the governing party's message is lower prices.
Would you sign that in October?
Neither, it seems, will they. So the tariff the market spent a year trading is now, at best, a maybe. And a maybe cannot hold a premium.
The Trade That Ran on a Deadline
Why did the price of copper shoot to new highs on Thursday morning?
Because for more than a year the price in New York has sat above the price in London, on the expectation that a tariff would make copper inside America worth more than copper outside it. Traders bought in London, put it on a ship, and sold it in New York.
The scale of it is in the customs data. The United States imported a record 225,094 tonnes of refined copper in July, up 78% from June, Commerce Department figures reported by Reuters show. Chile sent 46% of it and Congo almost a quarter.
Stocks in COMEX warehouses rose for 53 straight days to 693,630 tonnes in the first days of September, and stood at 696,413 tonnes on Thursday, according to Reuters. ING puts that at roughly eight times what those warehouses held at the start of 2025, and estimates total American holdings above a million tonnes once metal outside the exchange system is counted.
London, meanwhile, held 234,475 tonnes on Friday. The record price in London was the price of the copper that was no longer there.
CRU had expected a global surplus of 639,000 tonnes this year. Treat the metal parked in America as gone, its principal copper analyst told Reuters in August, and you get:
"at best a balanced market."
Hedge funds were heavily long, and copper's correlation with the S&P 500 sat at multidecade highs, Mining.com noted on Thursday.
ING put the assumption underneath all of it in one line:
"Until now, the market had largely assumed that tariffs would go ahead."
A crowded trade on a single assumption, and the assumption just wobbled.
Where the Premium Went
The number to watch is the gap between New York and London, because that gap is the tariff, priced.
On Wednesday, September 9, December copper settled at $6.8885 a pound on COMEX, which is about $15,190 a tonne, while the LME's three-month official price was $14,632. New York paid roughly $550 a tonne more than London.
By Friday's settlements, COMEX was at $6.5480 and London at $14,233. The gap was roughly $200.
What New York paid over London for copper, US$ per tonne
Source: CME December settlements and LME three-month official prices via Westmetall; our arithmetic, and the two exchanges fix at different hours
| Label | Value |
|---|---|
| Wednesday, September 9 | 554 |
| Friday, September 11 | 203 |
The tariff premium fell by nearly two-thirds in just two trading days, but the copper traders had shipped to America was still sitting in warehouses there.
Will that copper go home now that the arbitrage is closed?
Glencore's Gary Nagle answered that before the tariff even wobbled. On an earnings call in August, he said the American stockpiles:
"over time will be drawn down for use... not to be exported again,"
The reason is the cost of moving them twice. Macquarie's Alice Fox was blunter:
"Based on our numbers, you're looking at years for that metal to get consumed."
So the copper stays, the premium goes, and American buyers stop importing because they are sitting on a two-year cushion. Morgan Stanley's Amy Gower told Reuters on Tuesday that she is:
"more cautious into 2027, where U.S. import demand is likely to be softer if tariffs are either in place or ruled out."
Notice the last five words. The import cliff arrives whichever way the decision goes, which means the only thing the tariff still decides is who owns the premium on the way down.
If less copper is shipped to America, more stays available elsewhere, easing the supply pressure that helped push London prices to a record. Thursday's report did not change the physical supply of copper, but it did give traders a reason to rethink where that copper will be needed.
The International Copper Study Group's first-half figures, cited by ING, already showed refined production up 2.4% and a preliminary surplus of about 131,000 tonnes. Those numbers suggest the problem was not an overall shortage of refined copper, but that so much of it was sitting in America while buyers elsewhere had less available.
What It Does to the Miners You Own
Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE: FCX) is the name that carries the premium, because its American mines sell into COMEX prices.
Its own second-quarter release says US mine sales are:
"generally based on prevailing COMEX monthly average settlement copper prices,"
It expects about 1.4 billion pounds of US copper sales this year, and realized $6.25 a pound from those mines in the second quarter against $6.17 for the company as a whole.
Put Wednesday's gap and Friday's gap on those pounds. At roughly 25 cents a pound the premium was worth about $350 million a year to Freeport; at 9 cents, about $130 million. That is our arithmetic rather than the company's guidance, and Freeport's own sensitivity says each 10 cents on the copper price moves second-half operating cash flow by about $150 million.
So the stock fell from $76.23 to $71.21 on Thursday and closed Friday at $71.07, per Nasdaq, a drop that Mining.com counted as taking its market value to about $101.7 billion. It is still up 39.9% in 2026.
Southern Copper (NYSE: SCCO) mines in Peru and Mexico and has no COMEX premium to lose, and it still fell 7.2% to $194.14. Teck (NYSE: TECK) fell 6.3% to $65.90. The Global X Copper Miners ETF (COPX), which holds each of the three at roughly a tenth of its assets, fell 7.0%.
That tells you the market sold the copper price rather than the tariff. Which is the opening, if there is one.
Because at Friday's $14,238 in London, copper is still up 13.9% on the year from the $12,504 it settled at on December 31, and Freeport's consolidated cash cost for 2026 is $1.90 a pound against a metal at $6.55. The tariff was a bonus on top of that margin. The margin is the business.
The risk is that the trade is not finished unwinding. If the White House says no out loud, the remaining $200 goes to zero and London falls further as the hole fills in. If it says yes, Macquarie's word for the price was:
"massively spike."
Either way the miners now trade on one man's calendar rather than on cathode, and we told you in Trump Pauses 50% Canada Tariffs as Keystone Returns to the Investment Map how that goes: relief, not resolution.
Let's put the whole picture in one place:
- The tariff on refined copper was never signed. Clause seven of the July 2025 proclamation only asked Commerce for an update by June 30, 2026, and the White House has sat on it since.
- The market priced it anyway, pulling a record 225,094 tonnes of imports in July and 696,413 tonnes into COMEX warehouses by Thursday, eight times the level of early 2025.
- Reuters' report that affordability now outweighs the tariff cut the New York premium over London from about $550 a tonne to about $200 in two sessions.
- The copper in America is staying there and will take years to consume, so US imports fall in 2027 whether the tariff comes or not.
- Freeport carried the premium on about 1.4 billion US pounds; Southern Copper and Teck never had it and fell as hard.
What to Watch, and When
Three dates and one number.
November 3. The midterms. Every week between now and then without a decision is a vote for affordability, and the officials Reuters quoted have told you which way that leans.
January 1, 2027. The day the 15% phase was meant to start. A proclamation takes weeks to draft and publish, so if December arrives without one, the schedule in clause seven is dead and the market will price it as such.
Freeport's third quarter. The company has guided 750 million pounds of copper sales for the quarter, and the release will show the realized US price against COMEX for the first full period since the premium broke.
The COMEX count. The exchange publishes warehouse stocks every day. Fifty-three straight days of increases built this trade; the first week of steady draws is your proof that the metal is being used rather than re-exported, and that the American import cliff is real.
Washington never signed anything. The market traded the signature for a year anyway.
The copper stayed. The premium did not.
Seek the truth and be prepared,
Equedia
Sources
- Reuters, White House copper tariff plan stalls amid affordability concerns, sources say
- The White House, Adjusting Imports of Copper into the United States
- CME Group, Copper Futures Settlements
- Westmetall, LME Copper official prices and stocks
- Nasdaq, Freeport-McMoRan historical data
- Freeport-McMoRan, Freeport Reports Second-Quarter and Six-Month 2026 Results
- Reuters via Kitco, US July copper imports hit highest level on record
- Reuters via Business Recorder, Copper set to snap 10-week winning streak on White House tariff hesitation
- Reuters, US tariff threat upends copper surplus as prices test all-time peak
- Reuters via Mining.com, Copper price set to test $15,000 as investors await US data, tariff clarity
- ING, Tariff uncertainty tests copper's record rally
- Mining.com, Mining stocks rally comes to abrupt halt as copper, silver prices plummet and gold slides
- 24/7 Wall St, Copper Stocks Tumble as Tariff Doubt Reverses Record Rally
- The Equedia Letter, Trump Pauses 50% Canada Tariffs as Keystone Returns to the Investment Map
Disclaimer: This letter is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice. Past predictions and performance are not indicative of future results. Please see our full terms of use and disclaimer at equedia.com.
