New York, Jan 23, 2026, 19:56 EST — After-hours
- Freeport-McMoRan shares climbed 2.65% to finish Friday at $60.41, hovering close to a recent peak.
- The copper miner expects to sell roughly 3.4 billion pounds of copper in 2026, with most of the volume coming in the latter half of the year.
- Bernstein cut the stock to market perform, pointing to valuation risks linked to its copper-price forecasts.
Freeport-McMoRan shares climbed 2.65% on Friday, closing at $60.41. The copper miner edged closer to its recent highs as investors weighed fresh guidance and repair plans for its Grasberg mine in Indonesia.
This move is crucial since Freeport’s 2026 outlook depends heavily on the pace of Grasberg’s underground output recovery. Traders have lately viewed copper as a play on growth, supply constraints, and U.S. policy shifts. Much of Freeport’s planned metal sales are stacked in the second half of the year, leaving little margin for delay.
Freeport reported Thursday a Q4 profit of $406 million, or 28 cents per share. Adjusted earnings, excluding charges mainly linked to the September mud rush at Grasberg, came in at 47 cents a share. The company sold 709 million pounds of copper during the quarter. It noted average realized copper prices of $5.33 per pound, while unit net cash costs—which deduct by-product credits—stood at $2.22 per pound.
During its earnings call, Freeport flagged a restart of the Grasberg Block Cave set for April, aiming to reach 100,000 tonnes per day by the latter half of 2026. It also outlined a leach initiative, a method extracting copper from previously mined rock, with a 2026 target of 300 million pounds and a longer-term goal of roughly 800 million pounds annually by 2030.
Reuters reported that the company surpassed Wall Street profit estimates despite reduced output at Grasberg, where a September incident trapped and killed seven workers. It lowered its 2026 copper production forecast by 50 million pounds, now expecting 3.4 billion pounds. Copper prices, however, rose during the quarter, reaching record highs in late December, driven by tight supply and strong demand cues.
Supply headlines lingered late this week. At Capstone Copper’s Mantoverde mine in Chile, production mostly stopped after its desalination plant was shut down due to a labor strike. This incident underscores how swiftly disruptions can ripple through the global copper supply chain.
U.S. trade policy is casting a shadow over copper prices. President Donald Trump declared a 50% tariff on copper starting Aug. 1, 2025. The goal: boost domestic production by making imports pricier. That could give U.S. miners a leg up as import costs climb.
Bernstein downgraded Freeport to market perform from outperform on Friday, while nudging its price target up slightly to $54 from $53.50. The firm flagged that the stock’s current valuation “embeds a much higher copper price than we are comfortable with.” TipRanks
But the situation works both ways. Freeport’s guidance banks on a strong second-half bounce at Grasberg and relies on steady metal prices; any hiccup in repairs or a drop in copper and gold prices would quickly pressure cash flow forecasts, especially with significant capital expenditures still looming.
Traders are turning their attention to copper’s moves heading into Monday and the Federal Reserve’s policy meeting on Jan. 27–28. All eyes will be on Chair Jerome Powell’s press conference on Jan. 28 for hints on rate changes or dollar shifts that could ripple through metals and miners.
