Copper Tests Make-or-Break Support as Mine Supply Shrinks for the First Time Since 2017

Copper is testing its April support trendline, even as global copper mine supply fell 1.1% in the first half of 2026. The metal is up more than 15% this year. Yet the shortage sits in ore, not in finished metal, which complicates the bullish case. Why Can’t Copper Mine Supply Keep Up With Demand? Outages at Grasberg in Indonesia and Kamoa-Kakula in Congo erased about 600,000 tonnes of expected 2026 output, per Sprott . That equals roughly 2.5% of global mine supply. Morgan Stanley now sees mine supply flat or slightly lower this year, according to its revised outlook . That would mark the first annual decline since 2017. New supply is slow to arrive. Bringing a discovery into production takes 17 years on average, an S&P Global study found.

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