From Bloomberg:
Copper for delivery in December added 7.8 cents, or 2.1 percent, to $3.875 a pound at 8:30 a.m. on the Comex in New York. Prices touched $3.8895, the highest level since July 2008. Copper for delivery in three months climbed 2.2 percent to $8,515 a metric ton on the London Metal Exchange. All of the six main metals traded on the LME gained.
.....Zinc and lead for three-month delivery on the LME both touched $2,600 a ton, the highest price for each since Jan. 11. Shenzhen Zhongjin Lingnan Nonfemet Co., China’s third-largest zinc producer, shut its main zinc and lead smelter as of Oct. 21 after breaches of environmental rules.
“The lead and zinc smelter closure is way overdone, but being used as a convenient excuse for their strength,” RBC’s Heath said. “Both lead and zinc had lagged behind the likes of copper, nickel and tin because their short- to medium-term fundamentals had not matched those of their peers. As result, they are now outperforming and playing catch-up as some of the investment ‘value’ trades are unwound.”
Zinc rose 2.6 percent to $2,577 a ton and lead added 1.8 percent to $2,576 a ton.
Aluminum gained 1.1 percent to $2,391 a ton on concern colder temperatures in China, the world’s largest producer, will worsen power cuts to energy-intensive industries including Aluminum Corp. of China Ltd.
Part of this rise is a reaction to the US' interest rate policy; as the dollar drops, commodities prices in dollars become cheaper. However, some of this is also demand driven, especially from Asia.
Consider the following charts from Kitco:
