Silver

Stubborn Gold & Slumping Silver – Crazy Man, Crazy

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The declines in gold and silver are continuing, although gold has exhibited stubborn resistance to silver’s downside lead. Gold’s potential for a huge price decline is not obvious to most investors because they focus on the assumed strength of the yellow metal, as evidenced by its refusal to stay below $4000.

I expect that to change soon, and it might already be happening. Currently, gold is well below $4000. This comes after several spikes higher, which have not held.

Silver, on the other hand, is stuck below $60 and seems ready to give up the ghost. The white metal has been unable to poke back above $60 for nearly two weeks, with closes below that mark for eight consecutive trading days.

IF GOLD BREAKS DOWN 

If/when gold breaks down, there isn’t any technical support until $3400-3450, so it is reasonable to expect a sharp price drop of $500 oz. After that, there might be some stabilization, but it should be temporary.

Silver would follow suit, possibly stopping at $50. There is no technical support below $50 and nothing to stop a plunge straight to $40.

CRAZY MAN, CRAZY

With a nod to Bill Haley and The Comets, yes, the projections above may very well sound crazy to some. But these are crazy times, and crazy markets…

The gold price more than doubled, and the silver price quadrupled over 9 months last year. That’s crazy, and it’s not unreasonable or crazy to expect something similar on the downside.

CAVEATS AND CONCLUSION

Crazy is as crazy does. As long as investors and others continue to respond crazily to the crazy actions of others and a world full of crazy events and circumstances,  the markets will continue to reflect crazy results. This should not be a problem unless you have been dragged into the fray, where participants allow crazy emotions to displace common sense.

If you are dependent on explosively higher gold and silver prices for investment success and personal gratification, you might want to review your expectations and prepare for a longer period of lower prices.

A longer period of lower prices could last for months or years.

 

Silver Rhythm & Blues – “Can’t Do Sixty No More”

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After more than one full week of trading, silver has failed to break above $60 and stay above it. In morning trading overseas (10pm NY), silver is down 2.46% at $58.28, less than one dollar above its recent closing low of $57.30.

Billy Ward and the Dominos recorded a song in 1955 called “Can’t Do Sixty No More“. It was a follow-up to their big hit “Sixty Minute Man”, released several years earlier in 1951…

 

Billy Ward & His Dominoes

Silver, as it has done in the past, has lost considerably more (twice as much) on the downside than gold since their respective peaks earlier this year. The silver spot price is down 50%, while gold is down merely 25%.

I expect the gap to widen as both metals continue to decline. The lower the eventual bottom(s), the worse it will be for silver.

HOW BAD CAN IT GET FOR SILVER? 

Pretty bad. After both metals peaked in 2011, silver lost more than 70% over the next five years, dropping from $49.00 to $14.00. The decline in gold was comparatively smaller at 45%, dropping from $1900 to $1050.

After gold began to climb the price ladder higher, silver struggled and eventually fell as low as $12 in April 2020, a decline of 76% from its 2011 high. Even at its concurrent low point, gold was up almost 30% from its low of $1050 several years earlier.

In 1980, the price of silver fell from $48 to $5.70 in less than two years. The decline of 88% was much worse than gold, which dropped from $850 to $290 for a loss of 66%.

Silver’s case worsened after that. Its price dropped as low as $3.57 ten years later, for a cumulative loss of 93%.

WHERE’S THE BOTTOM? 

We don’t know. But I expect the selling to accelerate, and it could take silver as low as $30 oz. That would represent a 50% decline from its current price and a cumulative decline of 75% from its peak price in January 2026 at $120. 

To whatever extent the decline in the silver price continues, it will be worse than that for gold. If you own gold, though, that should not make you happy. Look for gold at $3000 oz. on the downside. 

(also see Silver Surfers Hit By Killer Wave and New Closing Low For Gold – Again)

 

 

Gold, Silver, Bitcoin, et al.

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New lows for gold, silver, and bitcoin continued last week.

Gold (spot) broke below $4,000, dropping as low as $3959 on Wednesday before closing at $3998. A small rebound brought the yellow metal up to $4088, where it closed in New York on Friday/26th.

Silver price action was more dramatic, closing solidly below $60 for three straight days, finishing the week at $59.05. The new intraday low for silver was $55.53. (see Silver Surfers Hit By Killer Wave)

At their respective lows, gold has dropped 27% since its peak of $5414 in January, and silver has declined by 54%. Bitcoin broke below $60,000 and reached a 52-week low of $58,075, matching silver’s decline of 54%. Bitcoin was sitting at a peak of $127,000 only 10 months ago.

Crypto woes extended to Ethereum (ETH) and Ripple (XRP), which are both at 52-week lows. Ripple (XRP) leads the crypto carnage with a loss of 72% since its peak price of $3.65, less than one year ago. Ethereum (ETH) isn’t far behind, sporting a loss of 70% since its peak last summer.

Collateral damage from Bitcoin’s collapse extends to Strategy (MSTR) stock, which dropped as low as $81 on Friday/26th, before closing at $82, a decline of 82% from its peak price last year at $457.

$REALITY OF THE LOSSES 

The damage that has occurred to investors should be apparent, but when talking about financial matters in percentage terms, the actual relevance is sometimes lost. To be clear about the numbers, below are the specific dollar amounts of losses for each of the investments above. Calculations are based on the same percentages cited above and refer to an investment amount of $100,000.

GOLD        $100,000      $73,000       ($27,000)

SILVER     $100,000      $46,000       ($54,000)

BITCOIN   $100,000      $46,000       ($54,000)

MSTR         $100,000.     $18,000       ($82.000)

If you owned Strategy (MSTR) stock worth $1,000,000 last summer, that same amount of stock is now worth $180,000.

FINAL THOUGHTS 

People are usually quite willing to share details of how well their latest investment has performed, implying that their own results are similar. It is not a one-way street, though, and the numbers above are offered in the hope they might provide some needed insight and provoke thoughtful consideration of the facts before jumping aboard the next rocket ship to the moon. (also see Silver and Bitcoin Both Aim For 60 After Peaking at 120 and New Closing Low For Gold – Again)

Silver Surfers Hit By Killer Wave

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After an absolutely awesome crest, the silver wave has collapsed. In surfing vernacular, the action is referred to as a plunger –  “Plungers occur when the wave collapses in a short period of time. The energy release is sudden and can be highly dangerous.” (https://powerboatand rib.com)

Here is a photo (courtesy of Kitco) that depicts the damage done thus far…

Live silver chart

This evening, at 8:49 pm in New York, the bid price for spot silver touched $56.99. More damage could be ahead, as the potential for spillers exists, which can release energy more gradually but still in a negative fashion.

GOLD BOAT CAPSIZES

Heavy damage was inflicted on others in the immediate vicinity of the killer wave. A large boat of gold traders was capsized, but reports indicate there are fewer casualties and the damage, while heavy,  appears less severe than that suffered by the silver surfers…

Live gold chart

ANALYSIS AND COMMENTARY 

Both silver and gold are in the throes of an unwinding that is mostly attributable to a reversal of previous excesses. When you ask someone about the fundamentals for either of the two metals, the common answer includes lip service to snippets about gaps in consumption vs. supply, the Fed and interest rates, revaluations (repricing) to “absorb” debt loads, etc.

Unfortunately for those who bought at higher prices, those same “fundamentals” aren’t keeping the sinking ship afloat. Talking about them now might assuage hurt feelings after the fact, but it doesn’t restore price losses of 30-50 percent.

Investors are price-conscious and fickle. They are usually not interested in value. They want to know when the price of something is going up, and by how much. Sometimes they want to know the reasoning, i.e., why. The ‘why’ is mostly an afterthought. Usually, ‘why’ enters the conversation after the price goes down when it was expected to go up.

That is when investors and their advisors start talking a lot more about fundamentals. Since the fundamentals they talk about don’t always apply to gold and silver, whatever logic they use tends to be faulty because it is based on incorrect assumptions. This leads to unrealistic expectations.

Some of those unrealistic expectations were fulfilled, albeit temporarily, when silver surpassed $100, and gold exceeded $5000. The aftermath can sometimes reverse the entire excess of those unrealistic expectations.

How much of silver’s leap from $30 to $120 in 9 months was unrealistic? (see Do The Fundamentals Justify $100 Silver?) How much of the gold price increase from $3500 to $5500 in 5 months was unrealistic? (see  New Closing Low For Gold – Again)

 

Silver And Bitcoin Both Aim For 60 After Peaking At 120

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Last August (2025), Bitcoin’s price topped $120,000.  Silver touched $120 briefly in late January (2026). Both silver and Bitcoin hit respective lows of $60 and $60,000 a few months ago.

Regardless of the number (or lack) of zeros, the two disparate objects of financial interest have experienced losses of 50% and will likely test possible support at the aforementioned price points again.

The two non-partners are experiencing the reality of “the morning after”. It might be presumptuous, but I do not expect any sizeable or lasting rebounds in silver or Bitcoin.

There is little support for either of them if the 60/60,000 price points are violated.

HOW LOW CAN THEY GO?

In August 2022, silver bottomed at $17.92 (average closing price) after dropping from a high of $30 in August 2020. After moving back up and trading between $20 and $25 for another two years, silver began a relatively steep, uninterrupted ascent to its eventual peak of $120.

The move accelerated after silver broke through $30 in February 2024.

It would not be surprising to see silver drop straight back to $30 if it breaks down at $60. That is possible even if the fundamental argument for much higher silver prices is justified. (see Do The Fundamentals Justify $100 Silver?)

Should other factors (recession, stronger dollar, panic selling) exacerbate the selling, silver could fall back to the $20-25 range, or as low as $18-20.

The situation for Bitcoin is similar in that its most recent move to stratospheric heights started in 2022 as well. Its price in December 2022 was $17,000 , and its eventual peak above $120,000 ($127k) corresponds reasonably with silver’s peak at $120.

The steepness of Bitcoin’s price increase leaves no downside targets for possible price support, so if it breaks down at $ 60,000, it could drop back to $17,000 very quickly.

CONCLUSION

A close friend and former work associate of mine, when both of us were trading silver in the 1970s for ourselves and our clients, said that there is no better feeling than being out of a market that is going down.

Investors in silver and Bitcoin won’t know if that is true or not – unless they sell. (also see New Closing Low For Gold – Again)

 

New Closing Lows For Gold And Silver

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Spot gold closed Friday in New York at $4490, and spot silver closed at $67.69. Both prices were new closing lows for the two metals. See the charts below, courtesy of Kitco…

Live gold chart

Live silver chart

Both gold and silver peaked earlier this year and within 24 hours of those peaks, both metals experienced serious price implosions. The respective lows of close to $4600 for gold and $72 for silver occurred on February 2nd, 2026. At their worst points, the damage amounted to a 15% loss for gold and a 40% loss for silver – in one day! (see Silver Price Implosion – What About The Fundamentals?)

Both prices held up until Friday (March 20, 2026). After two months of consolidation, any technical support appears to have given way. That cannot be a good sign if you are expecting a quick turnaround to the upside and much higher prices. Gold actually did run back up to its old high on the back of concerns about the war with Iran; however, it has lost a considerable amount of air in the past week.

ANALYSIS AND COMMENTARY 

There is a great deal of posturing about the “fundamentals” for both gold and silver. This is meant to assuage and comfort those who have seen a large portion of their metals values disappear – 19% for gold and 44% for silver in short period of time. It is also intended to justify previous predictions of much higher prices for both gold and silver.

There have been various attempts to downplay the significance of the declines. After all, silver had quadrupled in price (up 300%) after just nine months. Is it really so bad that it declined  “only 44 percent” after such a stellar run? The depressing reality of the math should startle anyone awake who might be sleeping – if you owned silver on January 29th when it peaked at $120 oz., you have lost nearly half of your money in less than two months.

In other words, $100,000 in silver at its January peak is now worth $56,000. That might not matter to you if you are in at $25 oz., but another halving of the silver price would erase most of your profits. Will you be able to hold on for the “long term” if silver drops to $25 or lower?

FINAL THOUGHTS

As far as gold and silver prices are concerned, I think we are seeing something quite similar to 1980.

Irrespective of all the 1) fundamentals, 2) proclamations about what is different now, and 3) justifiable arguments and expectations for much higher prices, etc., the price action in gold and silver coupled with the attitudes and behavior of investors leads me to the conclusion that $5500 for gold and $120 for silver are major price peaks and are not likely to be exceeded for several years. (also see Gold vs Silver – Gold Still Wins)

Gold vs Silver – Gold STILL Wins

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GOLD VS SILVER 

The past year has been wild and crazy for both gold and silver. After peaking at about $120 oz. scarcely one week ago, silver gave up almost 40% of that in one day, with an intraday low at $73. A strong reversal to the upside brought the price back to $84 at the close (January 30, 2026). Silver closed today (February 6, 2026) at $77, down 8% since last Friday’s collapse.

Gold, after peaking at $5500, dropped below $5000 with a loss of about 11% (January 30th) and closed today (February 6th) at $4966, a few dollars below last Friday’s close.

Rather than try to predict what might or might not happen next, let’s take a look at where we’ve been. More specifically, we will compare gold and silver performance since 2016, 2011, 1999, and 1980. As good as silver’s price performance has been, gold STILL wins.

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Silver Price Implosion – What About The Fundamentals?

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The price of silver literally collapsed Friday, declining more than $45 oz. from its intraday peak of just over $120 oz. the day before. The spot price intraday low had a $73 handle, and in less than one day the silver price implosion amounted to 39%. On a net closing price basis ($115 oz. to $84 oz.) the decline ($30 oz.) is more moderate at 26%.

In my previous article Do The Fundamentals Justify $100 Silver?, the price of silver was perched at $94 oz. At the time, it had not broken through the $100 mark, but it appeared that it could/would do so shortly…

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Do The Fundamentals Justify $100 Silver?

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Silver closed at $98 oz. on Thursday (1/22/2026). Momentum could take it right through $100 and higher. Projections of $120,  $500, and even $1000 oz. are plentiful. We are told that the fundamentals indicate and support such lofty projections. But, do they?

Only a couple of weeks ago, silver was closer to $70 oz. At that time, I posed a question to my friend at Chatgpt:

“How much of a factor is pure price speculation in the higher silver price increase from $30 to $70+ vs. real fundamentals? In other words, do real fundamentals justify current price of $70+ and predictions of $100 or more? Please be specific when using percentages and price levels.” 

Here is the complete answer I received followed by my own comments…

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More Downside For Gold And Silver?

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You can bet that most vocal proponents for spectacularly higher gold and silver prices will see Tuesday’s huge intra-day reversals as just another dip in price before the next jump to warp speed.

The longer and more severe the “correction”, the more frequent use of the phrase “temporary setback” can be expected. After all, the fundamentals demand higher prices, right? A day of reckoning is at hand.

The euphoria surrounding higher gold and silver prices seems to know no bounds. I remember how it was in 1980, as those of us in the trade at that time experienced a similar situation.

Notwithstanding the grim circumstances of double-digit interest rates (fed funds at 17.6% in April 1980), consumer prices averaging increases of almost 12% annually for three consecutive years, and enthusiastic calls for the “death of the dollar”, there was a pronounced peak to the price action in hard metals in January 1980.

In 2011, a government shutdown began on July 1st and lasted for twenty days. The gold and silver price peaks in 2011 came amidst similar sentiments regarding government debt, inflation, and the dollar.

Now, here in 2025, we can only wonder whether a similar situation is unfolding. If it is, it might be worth considering what happened after the peaks in 1980 and 2011.

GOLD AND SILVER AFTER PEAKS IN 1980, 2011

The price peak for gold in 1980 came on January 20th at $843 oz. Within a few days, gold was priced in the mid-$600s – a drop of almost $200. That might not sound like much, but it was a decline of more than 20%. A similar decline now would take the gold price below $3,500.

After a few more weeks, the gold price had broken the $500 level. In less than two months, gold had declined by more than 40%. Measuring from its recent intraday peak of $4,355, a similar drop at this time would take gold down to $2,600.

Silver fared worse. After peaking at close to $50 oz. on January 20th, 1980, silver’s price dropped by more than 30% in two short weeks. By February 3rd, silver was priced at $34.75. A similar decline at this time would take silver down to $37.80 by the end of next week.

Gold found temporary stability around $500, but silver continued to plummet, losing 76% in less than four months. Measuring from its recent peak of $54 oz, a similar drop now would take silver down to $13 oz.

Prices for gold and silver declined in nominal and real terms over the next two decades, reaching respective lows of $260 for gold and $4 for silver. The cumulative declines totaled 70% for gold and 92% for silver.

The gold price decline after its 2011 peak amounted to 45 % and the silver price decline was approximately 80%. Similar declines at this time could take gold as low as $2400 and silver as low as $11.

MORE DOWNSIDE FOR GOLD AND SILVER?

Quite possibly, yes, especially when considering what has happened in the past. The specific conditions are not necessarily the same, but they are similar. Also, there are other factors that are more important as to whether gold and silver continue to decline, how quickly, and by how much.

Liquidity concerns and deflation are the bigger forces at work that could stop in a heartbeat the relentless march of inflation-fueled higher asset prices (see No Winners When The Inflation Balloon Pops). As far as gold and silver are concerned, their price increases have outrun the fundamentals for now.

That does not mean they cannot go higher at this point. They could. You might not want to bet against that possibility, but you would be foolish not to be prepared for some sizeable declines. (also see The Case For Gold Has Nothing To Do With Its Price)

Kelsey Williams is the author of two books: INFLATION, WHAT IT IS, WHAT IT ISN’T, AND WHO’S RESPONSIBLE FOR IT and ALL HAIL THE FED