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Copper prices rose reaching a four-month high amid strong Chinese demand London Metal Exchange inventories which continue to drop.

Copper for March delivery on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange climbed to its highest level since October 5 on Tuesday to $3.7325 a pound. Later, prices fell $ 0.3 or 0.08 percent to $3.7300 a pound.

A report last Friday shows demand from China - the top consumer of the red metal- is growing as the country had an increase of 4.6 percent of imports of copper and products made from the red metal, compared to a year earlier.

Contributing to a stronger demand, copper inventories on the London Metal Exchange continued to fall today, as they have been in recent weeks. Copper inventories fell another 4,025 metric tons to 140,350 metric tons. Yesterday, inventories fell 6,274 metric tons, bringing the year's total drop to more than 30 percent.

Inventories reached their lowest records since mid-October.

Copper on the London Metal Exchange for delivery in three months rose $230 or 2.87 percent to $8,238 a metric ton.