Copper price spikes on Freeport’s Grasberg force majeure

Copper prices jumped Wednesday after Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE: FCX) declared force majeure on contracted supplies from its Grasberg Block Cave mine in Indonesia.Three-month futures traded above $10,496 per ton ($4.7710 per lb.) on the CME, up 2.74% for the day. In London, copper for delivery in three months rose as much as 2% to $10,172 a ton on the London Metal Exchange.Click on chart for live prices.Freeport’s shares fell as much as 10.4% in New York, while rivals Glencore PLC (+3%), Teck Resources (+5%), and Antofagasta (+7.4%) climbed.Two workers died after the Sept. 8 accident at Grasberg. According to Freeport, a sudden rush of approximately 800,000 metric tons of wet material entered the mine and traveled rapidly across multiple levels, including the service level where the missing team members had been conducting development activities. The company is continuing to search for five other workers. Production at Grasberg—the world’s second-largest copper mine—has been halted following the accident.The Grasberg Block Cave ore body represents 50% of PT Freeport Indonesia’s estimated proven and probable reserves as of December 31, 2024, and approximately 70% of the company’s previously forecast copper and gold production through 2029. The incident occurred in “PB1C,” one of five production blocks in the Grasberg Block Cave, but caused damage to infrastructure required to support other production areas in the district.Freeport also issued updated third-quarter guidance on Wednesday. Consolidated sales are now expected to be about 4% lower for copper and approximately 6% lower for gold compared to its July estimates.In a separate disruption to the copper industry, Hudbay Minerals Inc. said late Tuesday it was shutting operations at a mill at its Constancia mine site in Peru due to ongoing political protests.Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com Weiter zum vollständigen Artikel bei Mining.com