The reason I buy copper is this:
1) Large moat. Investing in copper mining does not yield huge return so capital does not flock in. If you start from scratch, it can take up to 10 years. Government approval, building infrastructure (desalination plant in Peru, Chile and pumping water for extraction).
2) Copper is cheap enough, ie even if it goes from $3.5/lb to $5/lb copper is still a fraction of the cost of an EV car, or solar project or wind project.
Sure there is plenty of copper, it is not cheap to get it out of the ground. I listened to the last 2 quarters of FCX earnings and the CEO sounds very confident of a long term demand with tight supply.
Just my opinion, of course, I am not a mining engineer
