Copper futures climbed on Wednesday as supplies of the red metal stored in London Metal Exchange warehouses fell.

Inventories of copper controlled in the LME dropped 2,800 metric tons or 1.6 percent to 171,975 metric tons today. The most recent Comex supplies information was unchanged at 13,978 short tons late Tuesday.

U.S. copper futures for March delivery rose 9.7 cents or 3 percent to $3.309 a pound on New York Mercantile Exchange Comex division. Copper futures for delivery in three months rose $200 or 2.8 percent, to $7,330 a metric ton.

Estimated Futures volumes ended with 20,692 lots compared to 18,895 on the previous session's final count.

Open interest increased 1,744 lots to 90,375 contracts as of Feb. 5.

Copper fell slightly over 3 percent yesterday, after the Institute for Supply Management's non-manufacturing index dropped in January to 41.9, the lowest in seven years.

Copper