METALS-Copper little changed ahead of contract expiry; US-Russia talks in focus

Updates prices

SHANGHAI, Feb 18 (Reuters) - Copper traded in a narrow price range on Tuesday as traders rolled forward positions ahead of a contract expiry this week and market attention shifted towards U.S. efforts to end Russia's nearly three-year war in Ukraine.

Three-month copper on the London Metal Exchange (LME) CMCU3 traded flat at $9,398 a metric ton by 0716 GMT. The contract hit the highest in three months on Friday at $9,684.50.

"If the discussions between the U.S. and Russia proceed favourably, the likelihood of lifting the ban on metals sourced from Russia will increase, subsequently leading to an influx of Russian metals into the western market," a trader said.

Russia is a major producer of aluminium, nickel and copper. The LME banned from its system Russian metals produced on or after April 13 last year.

Senior U.S. and Russian officials will meet in Saudi Arabia later in the day for the highest-level in-person discussions between the nations in years, ahead of a meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The spread between the cash LME copper contract and benchmark three-month futures CMCU0-3 spiked to a premium on Friday for the first time in 19 months, surging to as much as $249 a ton.

It flipped to a discount of $74.5 on Tuesday, after investors and traders finished rolling forward positions ahead of a contract expiry this week.

Meanwhile, three sources told Reuters on Saturday that the U.S. had proposed taking ownership of 50% of Ukraine's critical minerals.

Aluminium CMAL3 on the LME was down 0.3% to $2,637 a ton, zinc CMZN3 slid 0.3% to $2,864, tin CMSN3 was unchanged at $32,670, lead CMPB3 lost 0.2% to $1,988 and nickel CMNI3 shed 0.7% to $15,385.

SHFE aluminium SAFcv1 slid 0.2% to 20,665 yuan ($2,839.18)a ton, SHFE copper SCFcv1 slid 0.8% to 76,850 yuan, nickel SNIcv1 was down 0.2% to 123,730 yuan, zinc SZNcv1 gained 0.3% to 23,880 yuan, lead SPBcv1 rose 0.1% to 17,150 yuan and tin SSNcv1 lost 0.8% to 261,060 yuan.

($1 = 7.2785 yuan)

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