COMEX-approved warehouses now hold roughly 700,000 short tons of copper, according to CME Group’s latest metals update. At the same time, benchmark copper remains near historic highs, creating an unusual combination of record inventories and expensive metal.
September made the contradiction even sharper. Copper briefly moved toward $6.90 per pound before retreating toward $6.70 after reports that prospective U.S. tariff changes could be delayed. CME says tariff uncertainty has encouraged physical copper shipments into the United States, boosting both domestic inventories and regional price premiums.
Tariffs Are Pulling Copper Into America
The record stockpile does not necessarily mean copper demand has collapsed.
A major part of the inventory surge is geographic. Traders have been moving copper into U.S. warehouses because uncertainty around future import tariffs created an incentive to get material into the country before trade rules change.
CME previously noted that tariff expectations had pulled a large share of visible global copper stocks into U.S. reserves. That means rising American inventories can partly reflect where copper is stored, rather than a sudden increase in global supply.
AI and the Power Grid Are Supporting Demand
Longer-term demand expectations remain another reason prices are holding up.
CME specifically points to AI infrastructure and the energy transition as structural sources of copper demand. Data centers require large amounts of electrical equipment, while grid expansion needs cables, transformers and other copper-intensive infrastructure.
That connects directly with the AI power buildout Coinpaper has been tracking. U.S. data centers could require around $110 billion of new power infrastructure through 2030, adding pressure to already constrained electricity networks.
Copper’s surge has become large enough to affect even everyday objects. The recent record copper rally pushed the metal value inside a U.S. nickel above the coin’s five-cent face value.
