Base metals pushed higher on Wednesday when the dollar sold off after the U. S. trade gap widened slightly. In addition, the expectation of a robust economic outlook by Fed also triggered fresh buying in this complex.

Lead witnessed the sharpest gain on LME, rising by 3.6 percent. All the metals rose by over 2 percent on MCX on Wednesday.

The international trade deficit of U. S. widened in the month of June on the back of higher import cost following rise in crude oil prices.

Copper output at First Quantum Minerals' Kansanshi Mining Plc in Zambia fell to 45,073 tonnes in the six months to June
2009 from 52,952 tonnes in the same period last year, the company said.

China ended 5 months of record copper inflows in July, but imports of scrap surged by two-thirds and domestic production of refined copper continued to climb, showing that demand from the world's top consumer of the metal stayed hot in the summer.

We expect trend to remain sideways to down in this complex during the day. The downside could be capped on the back of any further weakness in the dollar. One can short Lead and Copper on rise.