Silver Speculators Gone Wild – Keith Weiner

by Keith Weiner, Sprott Money:

This week, the prices of the metals had been up Sunday night but were slowly sliding all week—until Friday at 7:00am Arizona time (14:00 in London). Then the price of silver took off like a silver-speculator-fueled-rocket. It went from $16.68 to $17.25, or 3.4% in two hours.

What does it mean? We don’t know. We would bet an ounce of fine gold against a soggy dollar bill that no one else does either. The old stories of silver shortage or manipulation have no power to explain this move. Why not? Because they are old. The explanation would have to say that earlier in the day there was a reason for silver to trade well under $17 but as of that moment, it was urgent that the metal trader well over $17.

As often occurs, once the move hits certain levels on a price or momentum chart, that’s all it takes. It’s of no use to say that in the long run this will be just another blip of noise. In the heat of the moment, these 60-cent moves are exciting.

Below, we will have an intraday silver chart that shows clearly something that is almost never available to the public. We have a plot of the basis against price. If other theories are right (e.g. manipulation, shortage) this chart should show nothing of interest.

We are at no risk of that.

But first, the price action and regular basis charts.

The Prices of Gold and Silver

Next, this is a graph of the gold price measured in silver, otherwise known as the gold to silver ratio. It fell this week.

The Ratio of the Gold Price to the Silver Price

Read More @ SprottMoney.com