Grasberg Mud Rush Spurs Copper Price Surge

On Sept. 8 Freeport-McMoRan declared force majeure and suspended operations at its Grasberg mine in Indonesia after a mud rush that killed two workers and left five missing. The company said Q3 consolidated sales would be about 4% lower for copper and 6% lower for gold versus its July forecast and warned 2026 production could be substantially below pre-incident estimates. Grasberg supplies roughly 3–3.2% of global copper output and more than 70% of Freeport’s copper production, and markets reacted with copper futures jumping nearly 4% to about $10,400–$10,485 per metric ton — their highest in over a year. The accident is among several recent mine disruptions (including Codelco’s El Teniente and Ivanhoe’s Kakula) that have lifted the share of output affected by unplanned outages above 5%, prompting rallies in major miners while Freeport’s stock fell pre-market. Freeport is investigating the incident, aiming to restart unaffected operations by late 2025 with a phased resumption at Grasberg beginning in early 2026, and is pursuing insurance recoveries (coverage up to roughly $1 billion, with limits).