Commodities: WTI and copper jump

Energy and base metals futures pushed higher at the start of the week, helped by the apparently positive news-flow regarding the prospect for reduced tensions between the US and China on trade.

At the weekend, and after being briefed by his top negotiators on the progress made in talks with Beijing over the course of the previous week, the US President reportedly said that they had been "very productive".

Against that backdrop, as of 1946 GMT the Bloomberg commodity index was standing 1.25% higher at 80.96, as the US dollar spot index drifted lower by 0.13% to 97.7780.

West Texas Intermediate and copper futures were especially strong.

In attendance at a meeting held at Trump's Mar a Lago residence, in Florida, on Saturday, were 10 top US administration officials, including Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and White House trade advisor, Peter Navarro.

Talks between the two economic powers were set to continue over the course of the following week, in Washington DC, at the ministerial and vice-ministerial level.

Those headlines came alongside a report from Reuters, citing position records for the week ending on 12 February published by ICE, that hedge funds and other money managers had increased their net long position in Brent oil futures and options by 32m barrels - a six-month high.

Since 4 December, that net position had risen by 130m barrels.

West Texas Intermediate for March delivery rose 0.85% to $56.06 a barrel on NYMEX, bit April Brent was ahead by only 0.33% to $66.47 a barrel.

Weighing on Brent perhaps, on the previous Friday, consultancy Baker Hughes reported that the number of US oil rigs in operation rose by three over the week ending on 15 February, hitting 857.

Supporting copper futures meanwhile were reports that a Supreme Court ruling had led Vedanta to shutter its operations.

Three-month LME futures for the red metal ended the day at $6,275 per metric tonne, up from the prior session closing level of $6,218 per tonne.