Gold and Silver: Crazy Start to 2016

For those who thought 2025 was crazy for gold and silver, 2026 is saying, “Hold my beer.”

So far this year, we’ve seen silver reach for the skies and top $100 for the first time here today, a number that seemed like a fantasy...or fanatical... just a few weeks ago.

And during that amazing run for silver, gold has been relatively well behaved, advancing steadily but in a less spectacular manner in comparison to silver -- which right now is more than triple the price it was trading at just one year ago.

Each of silver's pullbacks or pauses have been quickly bought over the past few weeks. And since we recently saw a breakdown in the gold:silver ratio -- and breakout in mining stock indexes -- we could actually be closer to the beginning of the silver move -- rather than the end!

One major driver is the growing realization in the market that silver mining output cannot increase in the short to medium term, no matter how much the price of silver rises.

Limited silver refining capacity, especially outside of China, makes it difficult for scrap silver to be processed back into the pure silver form required by investors and industrial users.

Volatility is increasing, but upward momentum in both gold and silver remains strong. And so does retail demand in the United States.

Money Metals continues to staff up while expanding operating hours to handle record-level volumes -- on both the buy and sell side. As of today, we've hired 60 employees since just before Christmas to handle the dramatically expanded activity in all areas of our operation.

Our inventory position remains exceptionally strong – even as most of Money Metals' competitors are out of stock or quote long minting delays on many (if not most) silver products.

That said, we still have multi-day processing delays with respect to our shipping, receiving, and depository -- these delays are communicated over the phone and in various places on the website so that there are no surprises. We remain confident we can maintain reasonable service levels – especially in comparison to the operational struggles we see building across our industry.

Meanwhile, Money Metals has not followed other dealers in cracking down on small customers by imposing order minimums and/or jacking up order sizes required to receive free shipping. There is no guarantee we will not be forced to take steps at some point, depending on market conditions. This would be a last resort, however, given how much we value smaller customers generally... as well as first-time precious metals investors.

Thank you for your business, your patience, and your trust! We will not let you down.

Well before we turn it over to the interview segment of the podcast, let’s turn to the price action this week.

Gold is up nearly $400 to come in at $4,992 an ounce, good for a weekly gain of 8.7%. The yellow metal is now on the verge of $5,000 an ounce for the first time… and may have already gotten there by the time you’re listening to this.

Silver of course is stealing most of the headlines in our space here, with the white metal still white hot. As of this Friday midday recording silver trades at $101.80 – up nearly $12 on the week. And on the heels of last week’s 12.8% increase (and the 10.0% increase the week before that), silver is up another 12.9% this week. We truly are running out of adjectives to describe what we’re seeing in the silver market

Turning to platinum, there is some real action happening there as well. The industrial metal is up 19.1% this week, or nearly $450 to come in at $2,787. And finally, palladium is up 10.8% to come in at $2,037 an ounce.

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