Analysts Highlight the Growing Disconnect in Silver’s Price
Following a more than 20% increase in December, silver ended the year as the top-performing asset. However, market participants caution that the move does not mirror past speculative spikes such as the quantitative-easing rally of 2011 or the Hunt brothers-driven surge in the 80s. While prices retreated once leverage was unwound because sufficient supply was available in the past, that isn’t the case today. Now, the silver market is marked by increasing geopolitical constraints on the movement of physical metal, rapidly growing industrial demand, and a sustained supply shortfall. In 2011, the surge was fuelled largely by investment inflows, particularly into ETFs, as investors sought protection from aggressive quantitative easing. Industrial demand was far lower then, and sizeable above-ground stockpiles in Western…
