NEW YORK - U.S. copper hit four-month highs for a second straight day yesterday on encouraging home sales and factory orders numbers, but the market settled off its peaks ahead of key U.S. jobs data.

Copper for December delivery finished up US$1.80, or 0.5%, at US$3.4955 per pound on the COMEX metals division of the New York Mercantile Exchange.

December copper soared during the session to US$3.5435 a pound, a high dating back to April 27. The session low was US$3.4620.

Pending sales of previously owned U.S. homes rose unexpectedly in July, an industry group said, suggesting a tax credit-related housing market decline was close to bottoming.

New orders received by U.S. factories edged up in July after two straight months of decline on robust demand for new transportation equipment.

Investors had been encouraged lately by U.S. manufacturing and other macroeconomic data suggesting the country may not be headed for a doupledip recession. Attention is now on August jobs numbers, due today, for proof of this.

* "What we see in the home sales data and factory orders is all evidence that we are not going to implode and won't go into a double dip, for now. We know we are weak and we are not coming out of this in a 'V' shaped recovery. At best we will have an 'L," said Howard Simons, strategist at Bianco Research in Chicago.

London Metal Exchange (LME) copper warehouse stocks were up 700 tonnes at Wednesday's close to 399,475 tonnes. Benchmark copper for three-months delivery on the London Metal Exchange ended at US$7,653 a tonne compared with a close of US$7,606 a tonne on Wednesday.