Copper Scrap

Millberry, Candy and Birch/Cliff to ISRI/ReMA grade

Copper scrap grading is a language, and the words carry prices. Millberry is No. 1 bare bright copper wire: clean, unalloyed, uncoated and untinned, minimum 16 gauge, running 99.9% copper — the top of the book and the grade secondary refiners and rod mills want most. Berry covers No. 1 copper wire and nodules of the same chemistry in different form. Candy is No. 1 heavy copper solids — clean unalloyed tube, bus bar, clippings and heavy sheet, minimum 1.6 mm thick, free of solder, paint and coatings. Birch/Cliff sits below at No. 2: copper of 96% minimum content that may be tinned, soldered, painted or slightly oxidised, and which the trade almost always buys as the mixed Birch/Cliff designation rather than as separate lots. The distinctions are not cosmetic — tinned wire alone drops material out of No. 1 and into No. 2, and a single drum of tinned or soldered content in a Millberry container is enough to reprice the box.

Pricing is arithmetic off the exchange. Copper scrap trades as a percentage of the LME Grade A cash settlement — Millberry in the mid-to-high nineties, Candy a step below, Birch/Cliff in the high eighties to low nineties — with the discount reflecting refining loss, moisture and the recovery a refiner expects from the grade. That is why we quote against a stated pricing date and LME reference rather than a flat number, and why the assay matters: we XRF at purchase, verify gauge and coating at loading, and take a sample on volume lots. Free-of clauses cover moisture and burnt material, iron and other metallic attachments, and any radioactive or hazardous content, with radiation scanning certified at stuffing. Sourcing runs through yards, electrical and telecom contractors, transformer and motor dismantlers and industrial decommissioning across Europe, the UK and North America. Copper is dense and valuable, so containers load out on weight and on insurance limits rather than on volume — typically 20–24 MT in a 20ft box — and we work LC at sight, CAD and part-payment structures on FOB, CFR and CIF terms.

Need the ship as well? Our chartering desk prices Misurata to Izmir scrap freight on LaycanDesk.

Excluded origins are not offered, including product re-exported, blended or re-processed through a third country. Every lot moves with a certificate of origin naming the producing plant, mine or grower country, and nothing is quoted before the seller and loading point are known.