BHP Group (ASX: BHP) reported a better-than-expected full-year underlying profit on Tuesday, fuelled by higher copper prices as the red metal cemented its lead over iron ore as the miner’s biggest earnings driver.
Copper prices have climbed to record highs above $14,000 a tonne this year, triggered by the rapid pace of energy-hungry AI data centre buildout and the global shift toward cleaner power, intensifying mining majors’ race to secure high-grade copper assets.
The red metal, including byproducts such as gold and uranium, generated $18.19 billion in operating earnings in the year ended June 30, surpassing iron ore’s $14.53 billion to become BHP’s top earnings driver.
“Copper is the engine that is driving BHP’s growth,” CEO Brandon Craig said.
“Demand for what we mine is building. Copper demand alone is set to grow from about 34 Mtpa (million tonnes per annum) today to more than 50 Mtpa by 2050.”
BHP, the world’s top copper producer, reported a full-year underlying attributable profit of $13.20 billion for the year, beating the Visible Alpha consensus of $12.66 billion. That compared with $10.16 billion reported a year ago.
It announced a final dividend of 99 cents per share, bringing in the full-year distribution to $1.72 apiece, the highest in four years, the miner said.
(Reporting by Sameer Manekar and Shivangi Lahiri in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)
