Chart of the Week: The long term headwinds facing copper shares
The key factors challenging the bull case for copper demand.
The week’s insights come from equity analyst Jon Mills latest analysis on copper in the Mining Industry Landscape June report.
China a long term headwind for copper demand
Prior to China’s rise around the year 2000, global demand for most commodities was largely stable for decades. However, economic reforms and China’s investment-focused growth saw rapid demand growth for commodities such as iron ore and copper. Prices also rose materially during the 2000s and 2010s. Major miners such as BHP (ASX.BHP), Rio Tinto (ASX.RIO), Vale, and Anglo American responded by dramatically increasing supply. This led to a downturn in the mid-2010s as supply caught up and demand from China weakened cyclically. As prices fell, weak balance sheets forced deleveraging, and then shareholder returns were prioritised over new large investments to increase supply.
China is likely to remain the main source of copper demand, given its dominance of global fixed-asset investment in housing, infrastructure, and manufacturing. New demand for copper is coming from the energy transition, including electric vehicles, the rollout of renewables such as solar and wind, and increased investment in electrical grids. To a lesser extent, artificial intelligence and data centers are other sources of incremental demand. Based on our estimate of the longrun marginal cost of production, we assume a midcycle price of around USD 3.80 per pound from 2030.
The growth in global copper consumption from 18 million metric tons in 2009 to 25 million in 2020 came from China according to data from Goehring & Rozencwajg. Given China now has the highest copper intensity of the major economies and accounts for more than half of global refined copper demand, Morningstar sees its likely transition to a more consumption-focused, less commodity-intensive economic growth model a headwind for copper.
Data centers and electric vehicles not so bullish for copper
AI and cloud computing are leading to a surge in data center construction. As well as being used within the center in coolers and lighting, servers, and network wiring, copper is also used in connecting the center to the power grid. S&P Global estimates that around 1.1 million metric tons of copper were used in data centers and in connecting them to the grid in 2025, about 3% of total global copper demand. Assuming no constraints on access to power, S&P Global projects demand to rise to about 2.5 million metric tons by 2035 or around 7% of current global copper demand. But we expect their rollout to be slower than generally expected due to community pushback, along with delays in construction and in connecting them to the electricity grid. Substitution and thrifting across the copper industry is also likely to offset much of the incremental demand from data centers.
EVs currently use much more copper than internal combustion engine vehicles, or ICEs. However, driven by cost, we think EV manufacturers are likely to reengineer vehicles to reduce copper use. For example, the adoption of smart vehicle architecture is likely to lower copper use in electric vehicles outside the battery. Similarly, we think car manufacturers likely reduce copper use in EV batteries to lower vehicle weight and increase range. However, “range anxiety” likely remains a headwind to the adoption of pure battery electric vehicles, or BEVs, with plug-in hybrid, or PHEVs, rapidly growing in popularity. PHEVs contain both an ICE and a battery, albeit smaller than a BEV battery, contributing to PHEVs using about 25% to 33% less copper overall than BEVs.
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