The Great Copper Boom Is Running on Scrap
Car parts, pipes, and wires arriving by the truckload could dampen prices.
Traders around the world are betting on a post-lockdown economic rebound. You can see that in stock prices and oil futures—but also in the copper scrap piling up amid the twisted screen doors and burst radiators at Regional Metal Services’ processing plant off Interstate 75 near Knoxville, Tenn.
With the price of copper surging—it rose 26% in 2020 on the London Metal Exchange, to $7,766 a metric ton on Dec. 31—more trucks full of discarded wire, pipes, and car parts have been showing up at operations such as those of RMS as sellers look to cash in. RMS buys the scrap and resells it as a cheaper substitute for the refined metal used in everything from autos to electronics. Garey Rittenhouse, the company’s president, says he frequently gets calls from smaller dealers, such as junkyards and electronic waste centers, asking whether they’re likely to hit a “jackpot” if they bring in metal today.