Copper Price Trends — Q2 2026 Review and Forecast

Abstract

Investing News Network's quarterly copper review, aggregating LME/Comex spot pricing with analyst forecasts (S&P Global, JPMorgan) and supply-side disruption tracking across the major mines relevant to the critical-materials LENS's Required Entities (Freeport-McMoRan, Ivanhoe Mines/Kamoa-Kakula).

Key Contributions / Findings

Pricing:

• LME copper: $13,371/mt (June 23, 2026); Comex: $6.13/lb.
• Q2 2026 range: opened at $12,434.50/mt (Comex $5.64/lb), peaked at $14,196.50/mt (Comex $6.72/lb) on May 13, before pulling back.
• S&P Global (Ruilin Wang) forecasts 2026 average LME price of $12,600/mt — a 26% increase over the 2025 average.
• JPMorgan flags a 15% US copper-import tariff (effective July 2025) that is keeping US warehouse stock as a "critical reserve" rather than triggering rapid destocking — a policy-driven distortion on top of physical supply/demand.

Supply-side disruptions (Required Entities):

• Freeport-McMoRan's Grasberg mine (Indonesia): targeting only 60% capacity by year-end 2026; full production now delayed to 2028.
• Ivanhoe Mines' Kamoa-Kakula (DRC): guidance cut by 22.5%.
• Chile's national production forecast to decline 2% in 2026 (vs. a prior projection of +3.7% growth).
• Strait of Hormuz closure disrupting sulfuric-acid supply — a critical input to copper leaching/extraction, not just a shipping-lane story.

Demand:

• Demand narrative explicitly named: "electrification, AI infrastructure and grid expansion" — though the piece cautions current forecasts are "more balanced" than prior years' "overly optimistic" copper-supercycle framing.

Why It Matters (lens: critical-materials — required numeric cells / end-demand drivers)

Populates the LENS's Required Numeric Cell ("Copper LME spot ($/t) + 12-month change") with a dated figure and the S&P full-year forecast, while supplying named-entity supply disruptions at exactly the two companies (Freeport-McMoRan, Ivanhoe Mines) the LENS requires coverage of. The explicit "AI infrastructure" demand linkage — alongside electrification and grid buildout — is the direct crossover point to the inference-thesis spine: datacenter power buildout (see the energy KB's GE Vernova/interconnection-queue sources) needs copper for the wiring, transformers, and grid interconnects that gas turbines and nuclear PPAs ultimately plug into.

Limitations

• Aggregator/syndication piece (Investing News Network), not a primary exchange data feed or a full S&P Global report — treat the $12,600 full-year average as S&P's forecast, not a realized figure.
• No separate figure given for copper demand specifically attributable to datacenters (vs. broader electrification/grid) — a genuine KB gap; a dedicated datacenter-copper-intensity study would need a different primary source (e.g., Wood Mackenzie or IEA, both currently blocked/summary-derived for this KB).

Source: Copper Price Trends: Q2 2026 Review and Forecast — Investing News Network, updated June 25, 2026.