STOCKS:
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OK firstly - none of this is financial advice, etc. And my main 'this is not advice' is not a sexy startup. It's BHP. Long term, I think BHP is just a money making machine and I wish I had the resources to buy more than I have.
In Australia, BHP operate the largest (and longest lived) mine with the Olympic Dam. It mines 138 thousand tonnes of copper each and ever year, and is expected to continue to operate until 2079. That's more than the reasonable life expectancy of most stackers around here. The next four largest mines in Australia are expected to only run until 2052, 2026, 2032 and 2036 respectively (
https://www.mining-technology.com/marketdata/five-largest-copper-mines-australia/?cf-view)
They also have a significant stake (57%) in the world's larges mine (Escondida) that extracts around 1.4 million tonnes of copper per year (
https://www.bhp.com/what-we-do/global-locations/chile/escondida).
All up, BHP mines around 1.72 million tonnes of copper per year (
https://www.statista.com/statistics/274231/metals-production-of-bhp-billiton/). That's an enormous amount of anything and (IMO) if you're going to seriously invest in copper mining, I think you need to have at least some of your eggs in the BHP mining bin. It also pays a biannual fully franked dividend (most years) that you can always DRP (dividend reinvestment program) back into the shares.
One of the smaller companies that also may be worth a look is Sandfire Resources. A smaller market cap, but in 12 months it's up around 13%. It's also one that has a lot more volatility (like the overall copper market), so you could look at that as a potential shorter term trading stock. There's been a couple of times in the past 12 months where you could have made a fairly comfortable 30 - 50% profit in a few months (again, not trading advice).
ETF:
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ETF wise, I think you also have the option of something like WIRE. I haven't looked into it, but it *seems* to roughly track the price of copper.
PHYSICAL:
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Now, this is the one aspect of copper investing I *am* happy to go on the record.
You can, like possibly others here, look at stacking copper. While it may not be the most convenient of ways of making money from copper, I'd argue that it's (a) the most profitable and (b) the most fun. Copper is EVERYWHERE, and for a little bit of hard work, you can obtain it for free.
That microwave on the side of the road? FREE copper.
That non-working washing machine that someone wants to get rid of? FREE copper.
An old CRT TV that someone is desperate to get rid of? You guessed it....FREE copper.
Also, if you're looking at arbitrage, and want to 'trade' copper (ie, you think the price is on a cyclic low and will go higher in a few months, etc.) talk to your local air conditioning installers and electricians and see if you can negotiate a discounted bulk purchase of their offcuts, store it in your garage for a few months and then on-sell to a scrap dealer when the price rises. More often than not, they'll be more than happy to sell you copper at a discount to save them having to load it up and take it away themselves.
OK, you won't make a fortune with this last one, and you might make your partner pissed off with all the appliances that "follow you home", but it's a fun hobby and one that makes you money that you can then use to buy BHP shares lol....
DISCLAIMER: I absolutely love copper. I also own BHP shares and have a garage full of transformers, yolks, degaussing cables and God knows what I've pulled out of random household appliances.
