Cu hits new highs on weaker dollar

Spot copper edged up another 0.4% on the London Metal Exchange on Thursday to finish at US$1.5459/lb, a new all-time high according to Dow Jones. A weaker US dollar coupled with strong fundamentals helped push the red metal's price up despite light trading as the market waited for the new quarter to start, the report said. Three-month copper climbed 1.2% to US$1.4805/lb, while copper stocks added 75t to close at 44,775t. The same market conditions saw base metal prices creep up across the board. Lead added 2.5% to reach US$0.4640/lb. Aluminum gained 1.2% for a US$0.8949/lb close and zinc was up 2.7% to US$0.6119/lb. TIN Tin staged a recovery after several days of decline. The metal gained 2.1% to US$3.7059/lb despite another 70t rise in inventories to close at 5,220t. Tin inventories have gained 22.3% since March 16 when they closed at 4,265t, (spot tin was worth US$3.8896/lb at that time). NICKEL Nickel inventories shed another 42t again to close 10,002t. Stocks have slid since March 22, when they were at 10,842t. Nickel's price gained 3.3% to finish at US$7.3710/lb.