Silver: Still Shiny, Maybe Worth a Buck

Right, silver. The other shiny metal. Not gold, which frankly, is showing off. Now, this year has been…a ride. A bumpy, chaotic, “hold onto your hats” kind of ride. We had silver, this unassuming little metal, shooting up like a caffeinated squirrel in 2025. From a perfectly respectable $31 an ounce to a frankly preposterous $115! A historical rally, they called it. I call it a temporary lapse in sanity. Then, poof. February happened. Down it went, faster than a vaudeville comedian dodging tomatoes. Under $74. Ouch. That’s what happens when you get above your station, silver. Hubris, I tell ya!

The analysts, those sober suits, blamed it on simple economics. Demand cooled, people got nervous about all this AI hooey… which, let’s be honest, is mostly just really fast adding. But here’s the thing: silver, bless its little metallic heart, is climbing again. Back near $88 as of Monday, February 23rd. And that, my friends, is where things get interesting. Like a Marx Brothers movie, it’s unpredictable, chaotic, and occasionally involves a chase scene.

Why the Sudden Shine? And Should You Throw Your Money At It?

Look, the fundamentals are still… well, fundamental. Tight supply. Strong demand. It’s not rocket science, although, frankly, rocket science is involved in building these AI data centers. Which, by the way, are sucking up silver like a thirsty camel. Silver, you see, is a fantastic conductor. Like a tiny, metallic maestro directing the flow of electricity. And these hyperscalers – the big tech companies – are planning to spend a cool $625 billion this year on AI infrastructure. That’s a lot of servers. A lot. And they all need silver. It’s like a medieval king demanding all the silver for his goblets – only with more transistors.

And it’s not just AI. Solar panels? Silver. Electric vehicles? Silver. Fancy electronics? You guessed it. Silver. The problem is, nobody’s been mining enough of it to keep up. It’s like trying to bake a cake with only half the flour. You’re gonna have a bad time. Of course, silver is volatile. More so than gold. Why? Because the market is smaller. A few nervous investors can send the price on a rollercoaster ride. It’s like a tiny boat in a very large ocean.

Now, I told you to buy silver when it was at $80, and I still think it’s a decent bet. Especially if stocks decide to take a nap. A little insurance, you see. A hedge against the inevitable market shenanigans. And if you do want to get in on the action, the iShares Silver Trust (SLV +3.59%) is a pretty straightforward way to do it. They stash the silver in vaults guarded by JPMorgan Chase in New York and London. It’s like Fort Knox, but with slightly less gold and a lot more paperwork.

SLV itself has bounced back, hitting a low around $67 in February and climbing back to $79. JPMorgan is forecasting an average price of $81 for 2026, which is… polite. I think it’ll go higher. The imbalance between supply and demand is too great. So, the current price? Seems like a perfectly reasonable entry point. Just don’t blame me if it turns into another rollercoaster. After all, in the world of finance, as in life, you get what you pay for… and sometimes, you get a little bit of chaos thrown in for good measure.

2026-02-25 19:33

Why the Sudden Shine? And Should You Throw Your Money At It?

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