Copper Steel Ratio
In plain terms
Copper outpacing steel = capex cycle accelerating → long industrials.
How it works
Copper/steel ratio is a forward indicator of industrial-cycle leadership.
Data dependencies
- Fred macro
A data feed this strategy reads, refreshed on its normal schedule.
- Daily prices
Adjusted-close OHLCV for every US-listed ticker; primary price feed.
Expected edge
- Reported return
- Granger-causal 1-2mo
- Tested over
- 1992-2012
Mu-Ye 2014: Granger-causal at 1-2mo.
Example tickers where this is likely to fire
Illustrative only, the signal fires based on the live data, not a fixed list.
Related families
Uses Fed-funds, term spread, and credit spread (FRED data) to flag risk-off vs risk-on regimes and scale exposure accordingly.
Steep curve → favor cyclicals (XLY/XLF/XLI); flattening → favor defensives (XLU/XLP/XLV).
Industry-level: when BLS-JOLTS openings YoY surge >+20%, that industry's stocks outperform 1-2 quarters out — hiring leads earnings.
Explore Copper Steel Ratio on alphactor.ai
See which tickers this family is currently firing on, with live signals and rankings.