Buzz around gold has rippled through markets this year — but silver has been quietly going along for the ride, culminating in a new record high that analysts say could double in the coming years. Spot silver surpassed the $50 mark for the first time last week before paring gains. On Monday, the metal was 2.4% higher, trading around $51 an ounce at 6:20 a.m. in London (1:20 a.m. ET). Meanwhile, New York silver futures were up 4.5%% at $49. Spot silver has gained more than 78% since the beginning of the year, compared to spot gold's year-to-date gain of just over 50%. Both metals have benefited from a rush to safe-haven assets amid volatility in broader capital markets and, in silver's case, an underlying supply-demand mismatch. Paul Syms, head of EMEA ETF fixed income and commodity product management at Invesco, told CNBC that gold's record-smashing rally this year had driven investors to consider allocating capital to other precious metals. "Interest in silver picked up when the gold-silver ratio moved above 100x following the post 'liberation day' gold rally," he said Friday. "The only time the ratio has previously been above 100x this century was during the pandemic and was followed by a sharp reversal." XAG= YTD line Spot silver price However, Syms said investors were now looking at silver as a store of value for a variety of reasons, noting that, until this week, silver had not hit a record high since 2011. Gold has set 39 new records this year alone. And according to Syms, silver also offers practical uses that gold cannot rival. Gold's "industrial uses are limited," he explained. "From an investment case standpoint, silver is also perceived as a store of value but also has many industrial uses, particularly in electronics and renewable energy technologies." Although he said it was difficult to forecast where silver prices might head next, Syms stressed that its 2025 rally had exceeded expectations. "Sentiment toward gold and silver remains positive and investors generally have relatively low allocations so prices are unlikely to be affected by this being a crowded trade subject to profit taking, particularly while equities also remain at the highs," he said. "Indeed, if sentiment remains positive, it's quite conceivable that silver could continue to rally." $100 silver? Paul Williams, managing director of gold and silver supplier Solomon Global, attributed silver's rally to "powerful, real-world forces" as opposed to the speculation that drove it to a high in 1980. "A deepening structural deficit, record industrial demand and accelerating investment in green technologies are tightening supply and pushing prices higher," he said in a note. "While silver doesn't share gold's full safe-haven credentials, its dual role as an industrial and store-of-value metal continues to draw investors seeking stability and upside." Silver is a critical component in products across various industries, and is used in the production of electrical switches, solar panels, and cell phones. It's also used in the semiconductors driving the AI boom. Williams added that the underlying drivers of the silver market show no sign of tapering off, suggesting the bull run on silver could be sustained well into 2026. "Despite its record level, silver remains cheap compared to gold," he said. "Given the current climate, a $100 silver price is certainly possible by the end of 2026." It's a view shared by Philippe Gijsels, chief strategy officer at BNP Paribas Fortis, who has been predicting $50 silver for over a year and also believes its value could double from the new highs. "Big round numbers tend to attract [investors] like a magnet," he argued. "Once that price gets in the gravitational field of the big numbers, we typically see an acceleration and a buying climax." However, he said there could be a pause in the rally before prices surge once again. "What typically happens after a huge run like this is that we see a pause. We could see a brief but rather violent pullback, prices may flatline for quite a while, or it could be a combination of both. But somehow the technical overbought condition has to be worked off." Longer term, Gijsels said, the conditions that catalyzed the rally remain in place, which he believes means there is still room for further upside. "Investors have come on board since the beginning of this year. They have rightly understood … that in an inflationary world, a world in which volatility and uncertainty is the new normal and in which central banks will continue to print money to keep the system afloat, one needs to hold real assets to protects one's purchasing power. These real assets are real estate, equities, wine and maybe above all precious metals." "We are still closer to the beginning than to the end of what could well become one of the largest bull markets in recorded history," he argued. "I would not be surprised to see Silver well north of $100 in the not-too-distant future."
