#silversqueeze

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David Jensen said:
... The constancy of the level of the vault silver float while silver prices and now even the the 1-year silver lease rate (Figure 2) has surged indicates that large part of this silver float is privately held and merely located in London vaults - there appears to be very little liquid silver in London available to market.
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jensendavid.substack.com

How Much Silver Is Liquid and Really Available To Market As A 'Free Float'

The Market Speaks Of Gross Shortage
jensendavid.substack.com jensendavid.substack.com
 


Solve Nettug said:
Oz of silver in SLV bar list not equal to information page – update.

The last 3+ weeks I have been tracking the silver held in the SLV according to their info page and compared it to the SLV bar list. Every day there was a small difference.

Now they have come up with an explanation of this on their web page: “Tonnes in Trust and Ounces in Trust quoted on this webpage are based on trade date activity on the as of date. Tonnes in Trust and Ounces in Trust quoted on the bar list are based on accounting data on the as of date. There may be small variances due to trade activity.”

At the same time, I see they have removed the oz in the trust in the info page (see picture), so it is now only available in the SLV bar list!

Also, I don’t buy their explanation; If the reason was like they say, you would expect the difference to be more than 1 bar (1000oz) most days. It is not; the difference is less than 1 bar (1000oz) 16 out of 17 days.

The probability is extremely low, close to impossible. I don’t know the implications of this, but I will repeat that my impression is lack of control.
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There were 90 Platinum contracts purchased yesterday as well that probably wanted that metal. That had been pretty quite this month.
 
Voodoo said:
Rafi helps break this down and dispels the "because of tariffs and ETF's myth". That's the shit they want you to believe.
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Rafi missed the boat on the silver tariff issue. I explained it clearly here (looks like I forgot to cross-post to the forum here previously :oops: ):
pmbug said:
Silver bullion is likely exempt from USA tariffs.

I dug deeper into the silver tariff issue (see tweet quoted below for background). The CBP letter of July 31 explained that gold bullion bars - cast or extruded with stamps indicating purity and weight - were not classified under 7108.12.10 (bullion and dore), but rather 7108.13.55 (Rectangular or near rectangular shapes, containing 99.5 percent or more by weight of gold and not otherwise marked or decorated than with weight, purity, or other identifying information).

I found the page in the Harmonized Tariff Schedule (HTS) that lists silver classifications. Silver has comparable classification codes to the gold codes: 7106.91.10 (bullion and dore) and 7106.92.10 (Rectangular or near rectangular shapes, containing 99.5 percent or more by weight of silver and not otherwise marked or decorated than with weight, purity, or other identifying information)

It seems logical to me that silver bullion bars that are cast or extruded with stamps indicating purity and weight - such as 1,000 ozt London Good Delivery silver bars used by the LBMA and COMEX and the basis for physically settling EFP trades - would be classified under 7106.92.10 given the CBP's guidance in the July 31 letter.

Curiously, the HTS lists 7106.92.10 rate as "Free". I did not see this code listed in the Article II exempt list provided with the most recent Executive Order, so it's not clear to me when this classification code was set to free, but it looks like it isn't going to be an issue for the COMEX~LBMA EFP trade.
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On the ETF issue - It's a matter of perspective and Rafi is looking at a window of time encompassing a year or more to make his point when the issue is more acute - occurring within the last few weeks. I broke down what has happened with SLV here:

pmbug

Post in thread '#silversqueeze'

pmbug said:
Is SLV is the canary in the silver mine?

On August 14, the Saudi central bank's 13F filing disclosed that they had invested in SLV to the tune of 932,000 shares / $30.58MM. This may have sparked additional institutional investment interest in SLV.

On August 18, SLV added a massive 9,172,079 troy ounces (285.2 metric tons) to their vaulted stock. When SLV adds, it really just takes ownership of silver bars already in LBMA vaults, reducing LBMA free float vault stock.

By Sep 2 (from Aug 18), SLV vault stock has run down ~2.5MM troy ounces (~77.75 metric tons) and then...
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This isn't ETF demand. That helps the riggers and it HAS been much higher in the past. I think that can be stated as fact.

To me this is very different. This is people with big money who need/want the real stuff. And they are starting to find it's just not that easy to get. I also wonder how much of the real stuff has been siphoned from the bankers by China/India. I mean in the form of selling all the dore directly to refiners in China.
 
China is sucking up the metals in South America. One of the reasons they are building a port there. I think they are sucking as many resources out of SA as they can.

The other day Yankee stacking did a 2 hr show with SD bullion and they were saying there was someone trying to source 100 million in metals. Also saying there really is no shortage at the retail level RN. It's coming in fast enough to meet demand. One other thing they mentioned was the refiners were not taking anymore to refine. They are stuffed to the gills already. One of the reasons you can get deals at spot for some things like 90%. You can also get 100 oz and kilos at below spot.
 
COMEX vaults apparently having no problem adding new stock. They have averaged net inflow of over 1.8MM ozt over the last 3 days. I suspect refineries are sending them most of the scrap they are recasting into LGD bars.

Regarding my last comment - I didn't mean to imply that ETF demand was driving the bus. If you read my "canary in the silver mine" post, you should get the context. The ETF demand picked up in the last few weeks and it has visibly squeezed London's liquid free float stock of LGD silver.
 
This really looks like someone big, probably in the US, is methodically bidding for as much metal as they possibly can get. I mean this is Buffet sized buying. That's why they are methodically coming in and buying up contracts In the delivery month and why its been so consistent. This would also be a reason for the Comex prices to be bid higher than the London spot price (hence the EFP spread increasing). Anyway they did it again yesterday on silver. OI expanded in Sep contract.

1757694184633.png
 
India's silver imports are expected to gather momentum in the coming months, supported by stronger investment and industrial demand that has already absorbed the surplus from last year's elevated shipments, industry officials told Reuters.

Higher imports by the world's biggest silver consumer could give further support to global prices that are close to their highest level in 14 years.
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Silver imports are set to pick up in the coming months, with the annual total likely to be between 5,500 and 6,000 metric tons, Thakkar said.

The industry had expected a sharp drop in India's 2025 imports after shipments more than doubled in 2024 to 7,669 tons.

India's silver imports in the first eight months of 2025 more than halved to 2,580 tons from 5,695 tons a year earlier, provisional trade ministry data showed.

However, strong demand in recent months has depleted stocks, prompting banks and dealers to step up imports, Thakkar said.
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If I'm reading that right, it's saying that India is projected to buy at least 3,000 tons of silver between now and the end of the year.
 
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Open Interest in Silver contracts expanded again yesterday with not very many deliveries. I'm really curious to see what today's data will look like with the FED and the overnight smash. 592 +42 is someone buying almost 3.2 MOz yesterday asking for immediate delivery.

1758125917454.png
 
I forgot about the Fed today. I bought $500 of silver yesterday but I'm not worried. It was only $500 and was all a new customer discount/spot buy and junk 50 centers. Actually I'm still bullish. The world is still nervous which means the markets are and already were back up to $41.80. I think gold is more at risk then silver and gold isn't all that much at risk either.
 
Market is rotating now. Six months from now we should be at or past $50 silver and $4k gold. If you try to trade in and out you will probably get whipsawed.
 
Imagine if the Euro's were suddenly free of the VAT's on silver ? I bet it would be a stampede.

We Yanks gobble it up like Thanksgiving dinner. I think I'll buy a tube of Britannias today, just for the hell of it. Or maybe add 10 Perth Kangaroos to the mix cause I dont have any of them. I love coinage. Dont get me wrong I buy a lot of 10 oz'ers and 90% junk just because they make so much economic sense, that and the premiums are so low. But most of all I love coinage the best. I'm a coinaholic.
 
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pmbug said:
SLV added a monster 8,895,963.50 ozt (~276.7 metric tons) to their vault stock today per the JPM bar report. Total vault stock is now 394,576,464.90 ozt which is the highest it's been since I started watching it closely in June. Maybe @GoldFishCharts or @mypreciousilver can tell us when it was last this high. Either way, that's gotta put a major hurt on the LBMA liquid free float!

The SLV vault stock action comes as the SLV shares available for borrowing are still scarce and lease rates are still elevated. Seems like the SLV canary is signalling that there is still major tightness in the 1,000 ozt LGD bar market.

PSLV also added another 999,902.00 ozt (after adding 1MM on Friday). That's another ~31 metric tons of 1,000 ozt LGD bars out of circulation.
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pmbug said:
The silver FOMO bull will overrun the paper exchanges.

Global free float vault stock at the beginning of September was around 19,702.296 metric tons (see link below for details). There are indications that not all of that is liquid either (see second citation below).

Let's be conservative and assume that it is all liquid. Let's even round up to an even 20,000 metric tons to be super conservative with our math.

20,000 metric tons is 643,014,900 troy ounces. Let's assume an average cost of $60/ozt as buyers rotate capital from money market funds and other liquid investments into silver as FOMO takes hold.

In that scenario, 20k tons represents $38,580,894,000. Let's call it $38.6B. That represents just 0.193% of the $20T that is purportedly currently available capital (see third citation below). That's all it would take to wipe out every troy ounce of silver that is currently available in the world's major exchange vaults (LBMA, COMEX and SGE/SFE).

The silversqueeze is going to be epic.
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So I’ve waited 13 years to be finally able to post this link to rock band Hawkwind
Thirteen bloody years to get back to break even and now in a few weeks, showing a25% profit



I first saw them in 1968 kinda more experienced than saw,as all you saw were 5 little red monitor lights to show the amps were switched on and a 3ft diameter strobe light pointing at the audience. A wall of sound to displace your inner organs and a very disorienting strobe that happily used frequencies that have since been made illegal for public use . Kin awesome and totally unforgettable.
I saw them several times in the following years and often Stacia , the dancer, would be naked with just a lot of body paint
Man those heady days ….
 
Voodoo said:
This really looks like someone big, probably in the US, is methodically bidding for as much metal as they possibly can get. I mean this is Buffet sized buying. That's why they are methodically coming in and buying up contracts In the delivery month and why its been so consistent. This would also be a reason for the Comex prices to be bid higher than the London spot price (hence the EFP spread increasing). Anyway they did it again yesterday on silver. OI expanded in Sep contract.

View attachment 16978
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The caveat is they are standing for delivery even if spot price is lower. Technically it does not make sense because theoretically you can buy silver cheaper, but not in the desired quantities. Game over.
 
Melting the scrap would remove impurities and make it easier to create .999 fine from the scrap dealer bars
Kinda filters out anything that was blended with the silver .
Just a guess …….
 
Exactly. The refiner is getting retail dealers to do the hard (or at least, time consuming) work of purifying 90% (and similar) silver into .999 as well as portioning it out into 1,0000 ounce bars. The refiner will be able to in turn produce 1,000 ozt LGD bars much quicker if the retailer bars pass specs.
 
90M ozt = ~2,800 metric tons = 1 year production (or maybe 4 months of ETF inflows at September's rate)

20M ozt = ~620 metric tons = less than a month of ETF inflows at September's rate

Basically, at the rate of demand that we saw in September, the free float run rate is anywhere from a few weeks to about 4 months if the assertion is correct.
 
SOme podcasters are claiming there is a physical silver shortage in China and spot is now $57? Plus there is a new silver ETF that gets stopped out daily at max gains. Who knows?
 
nickndfl said:
... and spot is now $57? ...
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That's not spot, that's the retail price for an ozt of "raw" silver from JD.com. @oriental_ghost on X reports it daily (when the markets are open). You can see it in the tweets I'm quoting in the fringe markets thread. It's spot + premium essentially.
 
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