Base metal price movements were mixed in official trading on the London Metal Exchange (LME) today, as buyers and sellers remained largely sidelined in response to rising hostilities between Iran and Israel and the continuing G7 summit in Canada.
The conflict between Iran and Israel continued to escalate on Tuesday, with the two countries trading missiles and air attacks for a fifth day. Several countries, including Japan and India, urged their citizens to evacuate Tehran, including China which encouraged its citizens to leave Israel "as soon as possible."
The G7 leaders' summit in Kananaskis, Canada continues on Tuesday without US president Donald Trump, who returned to Washington early on Monday.
Canada and the US plan to strike a new trade deal within 30 days, Canadian prime minister Mark Carney said on Tuesday after meeting with Trump. Carney and Trump met at the G7 summit to discuss a new economic and security relationship between the two countries, who have been locked in trade negotiations for months.
Trump and Japanese prime minister Shigeru Ishiba have failed to come to an agreement during their trade talks, Ishiba said on Tuesday, leaving continued uncertainty over the tariff measures imposed by Washington. The two leaders held a bilateral meeting for the first time since February on the sidelines of the G7 summit to discuss Trump's tariff measures, but the countries have failed to come to a solution as disagreement remains over a "package deal," Ishiba said.
Some parts of the trade deal agreed between the US and the UK last month have now come into effect, such as the reduction of tariffs on UK cars being shipped to the US, but the expected removal of tariffs on steel imports has not yet come into force.
US Federal Reserve policymakers are widely expected to hold their target rate unchanged after their meeting Wednesday, according to futures markets, while signaling they may remain on pause for longer as they monitor the impacts of US trade and fiscal policy, together with the impacts of mounting geopolitical tensions.
Elsewhere in the US, the Census Bureau reported that retail sales fell by 0.9pc in May from a revised 0.1pc drop in April, as consumers pulled back on spending as tariff-related pressures began to set in. Last month's decline was worse than estimates of a 0.7pc decrease from economists surveyed by Trading Economics. Domestic industrial production fell by 0.2pc in May after rising by 0.1pc in April, weighed down by a 2.9pc decrease in the utilities subindex, the Fed reported on Tuesday. Still manufacturing output ticked higher by 0.1pc on the back of greater production of vehicles and auto parts.
Benchmark copper and aluminum increased on Tuesday, while the rest of the complex fell back. Three-month LME copper rose by 0.4pc to $9,710/metric tonne (t), and three-month LME aluminum was up by 0.9pc at $2,530/t.
In the US, the copper contract for the next active month — July — on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange fell by 0.6pc to $4.81/lb.
Three-month LME nickel was the largest mover on the day, falling by 1.4pc to $15,020/t, while three-month LME lead was down by 0.9pc at $1,984. On-warrant lead stocks in LME warehouses climbed by nearly 14pc overnight to 212,100t.
Three-month LME zinc fell by 0.6pc to $2,642/t, and three-month LME tin fell by 0.8pc to $32,475/t.
The July forward contract for WTI, the US crude benchmark, climbed by $3.07/bl to $74.84/bl.
