Shares of miner Freeport-McMoRan (NYSE: FCX) declined by nearly 4% by midday today. The move comes on the back of a few negative pieces of news. First, in a bad day for commodities in general -- cyclical commodities like oil, nickel, and aluminum prices declined -- Freeport-McMoRan's key mineral, copper, fell a few percentage points to about $3.68 per pound.

Second, Scotiabank analyst Orest Wowkodaw downgraded the stock to sector perform from outperform, citing valuation and highlighting the downside risk to the price of copper coming from a slowing economy.

The analyst downgrade highlights the near-term risk to the stock. Of course, there's no shortage of macroeconomic risks around right now, whether it's from the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, rising interest rates, lockdowns in China, or the pressure on the European industrial sector from sanctions applied on Russian energy. As such, Wowkodaw's downgrade is a reminder that demand for an industrial metal like copper depends on growth, particularly as it's widely used across the economy. 

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Source Fool.com