Cop­per prices rose yes­ter­day on ex­pec­ta­tions that glob­al de­mand will re­main brisk and sup­plies will tight­en. Cop­per prices set­tled up 2.5 per cent, lead­ing most met­als high­er. Oil rose slight­ly while oth­er en­er­gy and agri­cul­tur­al prod­ucts were mixed. The im­prov­ing glob­al econ­o­my is ex­pect­ed to dri­ve more de­mand this year for cop­per, which is used in man­u­fac­tur­ing an ar­ray of prod­ucts from elec­tron­ics to con­struc­tion ma­te­ri­als.

While glob­al cop­per in­ven­to­ries have risen, over­all sup­plies are ex­pect­ed to re­main tight, BNP Paribas an­a­lyst Stephen Brig­gs said. An­a­lyst Nikos Kavalis with GFMS Ltd., a Lon­don met­als re­search firm, said in­vestor in­ter­est in cop­per has picked up be­cause of sup­ply-de­mand ex­pec­ta­tions. How­ev­er, he not­ed in a fore­cast is­sued Wednes­day that prices could fall if there is an im­pact on de­mand from Eu­rope's fi­nan­cial prob­lems, Chi­na's mon­e­tary pol­i­cy, in­dus­tri­al pro­duc­tion out­looks in key mar­kets or oth­er geopo­lit­i­cal events.

Cop­per and oth­er com­modi­ties ben­e­fit­ed from a weak­er dol­lar. Since most com­modi­ties are priced in dol­lars, they be­come more of a bar­gain for buy­ers who use oth­er cur­ren­cies. Cop­per for May de­liv­ery rose 10.55 cents to set­tle at US$4.37 a pound. Ju­ly plat­inum added US$1 to set­tle at US$1,797.80 an ounce . (Reuters)