Miners pace gains as copper hits 20-month high

Shares in miners were boosted in early trading on concern that simultaneous disruptions at the world´s two largest copper mines might lead to a sharp reduction in supplies.

On 11 February, roughly 300 protesters illegally entered the premises of BHP Billiton´s Escondida copper mine - the world´s largest - in Chile, forcing some contract workers to leave.

Some reports indicated that it only had one week´s-worth of stockpiles to meet demand whereas indications on the ground were that the strike might run for as long as two months.

The day before BHP had already declared 'force majeure' on shipments from the site.

Events at Escondida came as exports were halted from the second-largest mine in the world at Grasberg, Indonesia.

Combined, the news sent the Stoxx 600´s sub-index of Basic Resource shares higher by 2.43% to 452.18 as March 2017 copper futures on COMEX shot up 1.41% to $2.8070 a pound.

In parallel, shares in BHP advanced 3.61%, alonsgide gains of 2.32% for Rio Tinto and of 2.9% in Anglo American´s stock.

Should work at Escondida be blocked for 20 days and exports from Grasberg halted for a month that would result in nearly a 100,000 tonne reduction in global supplies, Goldman Sachs said in a research note sent to clients on 8 February.