If copper fails to rise above $4.18/lb at any point in the month of March, the rest of 2012 may be rough for copper and this will be particularly true if fulfills the $3.35/lb target of a Rounding Top showing in its daily chart.
Sticking with its monthly chart, though, it is showing a peaked out bearish Rising Wedge that may create the right shoulder to a classic Head and Shoulders pattern that would like to take copper down to the trendline marking its long-term uptrend at about $1.90/lb.
It is rarely this simple – for me – but this chart speaks in bearish deafening volumes that will be proven, or not, by levels and those are at $3.29/lb and $3.52/lb on the downside and $4.18/lb and $4.27/lb on the upside.
Above the latter levels and copper’s currently awful-looking monthly chart may look less bad at the beginning of April, but below the former levels and March’s monthly chart will look beyond awful.
It is for this reason, preparation around possible defense, that it seems to make sense to point out that copper’s monthly chart looks awful.