Biggest reason for precious metal surges is simple. The USA is in debt over 39T$. To most, its a number, but remember what happened in Zimbabwe, all Mugabes fault. But also Weimar Germany, post WW1 Austria-Hungary, caused by reparations forced upon Central Powers. We all know how that ended....WW2. Now, wisedom has set in, the world has lost faith in FIAT paper money, BITCOIN, and are returning to the only real money/ precious metals. Germany, China are buying up gold, silver, platinum, while Putin is selling his to finance his crazy war. Meanwhile US is going ever deeper into the debt abyss.
Ran across recent articles about the US's top export is GOLD. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrob...-top-us-export-an-unprecedented-second-month/ or https://www.idnfinancials.com/news/60952/gold-tops-us-exports-as-dollar-falls excerpt: Forbes analyst Ken Roberts described the trend as “not good news”. The surge in gold shipments out of the US, he said, does not reflect industrial productivity but instead signals rising demand for safe‑haven assets amid uncertainty (of US policies).
Agreed and you make some excellent points and part of what you posted has come to fruition and that's why we saw a tripling in silver in 2025/2026. The problem is....we don't know at what point it might reverse and stockpiles come out. If the Chinese believe that solar is saturated and they won't subsidize their home producers any longer, there goes a few hundred million of ounces of demand. Or other big actors could sell. You want to be long something where it is rising or flat with a big seller...like gold, where Russia has been selling $200 MM of gold every day for the last 3 years. It's easy to rise when you have big buyers and no sellers. But what happens if you have buyers AND sellers....or even just sellers and not many buyers ?
Silver and PM's aren't going up for those reasons. We're not anywhere near Zimbabwe, whose GDP barely exceeds that of Vermont, the smallest state GDP at about $50 billion. It took 30 years for Greece's socialist and monetary stupidity to blow up. Anybody who thinks they'll be around for an implosion in the United States like that had better be a CoinTalk member who is short of their 5th birthday. What is more likely is that AI and other technological changes will drive the U.S. economy to higher levels of nominal and real GDP, allowing us to burn off the debt much as happend after WW II. That was also the beginning of the 35-year bear market in bonds, for those of you who follow stuff like that. 90% of all transactions involve the dollar. Anybody who wants Treasuries or American stocks has to have dollars. You want to buy real estate in the U.S. you need dollars. If you want to trust the Communist Chinese like Mark Mobius did, be my guest. Ditto Brazil....South Africa....or Russia. Like the Eagles said.....you can check in anytime you like...but you can NEVER leave.
On the flip side, where silver as an investment does matter - the U.S. and South Asia, and to some extent Europe - these nations are massive population-wise and immensely culturally influential in a globalized world. Much of the world also used silver in coinage up to the middle of the 20th century. It is possible we could see the remonetization of silver, but I could be wrong about that.
Remonetization will never happen. Last one to attempt it was Mexico in the 1990's. Problem is that currency need stability, and the PM market is anything but that. You say the rest of the world is used to it up until the middle of the 20th century, but that means 90% or so of the population of the world have no memory of this, (only 10% of the world's population is 65 or older). I love silver, always have. Never been a fanboy of gold, idk why. However, silver simply is more of an industrial metal, while gold is the preferred precious metal. As such, it will always have outsized demand. My wife is Thai and she has gold jewelry. She has absolutely no interest in silver. 2/3rd of the world are like her, not like me. Just my view.
I hear you. I love some gold coins, (see my avatar of course), but as a metal I just never was in love with the color. I don't know why it is, just a personal preference. I love the shininess and luster of silver, and I like platinum with the heaviness and silver with an almost untouchable hint of gold in the background. Everyone just has difference preferences. Some people love fish and I would rather have a plate of pasta.
A lot of sterling silver has historically been produced in Thailand, and sterling nielloware has been abundant on eBay for cheap for many years. I have maybe three pieces from Thailand in total, though my concern with the use of lead in nielloware dampened my interest somewhat. They had (and possibly still have) a good tradition of silversmithing.
Yes, I agree. They actually have extensive silver coin tradition because mines in that area of the world were not the traditional gold/silver/copper mines like we have, but silver/lead/tin mines. They produced coins in all metals, but especially silver. It was much later that gold was introduced, but I have been to Thailand about 6 times and there are gold stores EVERYWHERE, gold and land are the two most used stores of wealth in the country. Silver is not considered in that conversation at all, not today. Chiang Mai, where my wife went to school, is the center of the modern silver tradition. Many silversmiths still work there.
I don't mean to play devil's advocate here, but I'm a bit of a fan of both gold and silver, and like you I recognize that gold is king and silver is maybe a prince. At about $5,000 per troy ounce, I just don't see gold as attainable anymore among even most Americans (!!!). I just can't see many people in developing nations being able to afford gold jewelry, especially in the purity that it's been produced historically. So I skeptically asked ChatGPT if sterling silver jewelry is popular in Thailand, and I was told "yes," affordability being one reason provided. We know in the U.S. when gold skyrockets, silver is used as a substitute by buyers. In fact, if silver's price continues to rise, I wonder if they will start using alternatives to silver, like maybe stainless steel. To be clear, I have never been to Thailand, but again I can't see the average American even close to buying a quality gold necklace anymore.
No more Mr. Ts! You are correct. It is now very dangerous to go out wearing gold jewelry conspicuously, even and especially in the U.S. However, while I have heard of silver necklaces getting snatched, this is far less common. So wearing silver jewelry could be a way to mitigate (not eliminate) risk.