\n
SELL<\/a>\u00a0BUY<\/a><\/p>\n Copper prices have risen above US$14,000 a tonne after gaining around 40% during 2025. Strong demand has combined with disruptions at several major mines and years of limited investment in new production.<\/p>\n Large copper projects can take more than a decade to move from discovery to production. They require substantial capital, water, energy, permits and agreements with governments and local communities.<\/p>\n The difficulties are visible across the existing industry. Chilean state producer Codelco reported an 11% fall in first-half production after operational problems at several mines. A fatal accident disrupted its El Teniente operation, while cash costs increased 7%.<\/p>\n BHP and Rio already control large deposits and established mining districts, giving them an advantage over companies trying to build new operations from scratch. But their projects still face construction, political and cost risks.<\/p>\n High copper prices can also weaken demand, encourage recycling, and make aluminium more competitive in selected applications. The long-term shortage argument does not guarantee that prices will rise continuously.<\/p>\n For BHP and Rio, the challenge is to turn valuable resources into production without overspending at the top of the commodity cycle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SELL\u00a0BUY Copper prices have risen above US$14,000 a tonne after gaining around 40% during 2025. Strong demand has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":117242,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[20718],"tags":[26238,21219,47880,12991],"class_list":["post-117241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rio-tinto","tag-bhp","tag-copper","tag-copper-demand","tag-rio-tinto"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@UnitedKingdom\/117210643369142332","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117241"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117241\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/117242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/britain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}