Minerals, Mining and Industrial Ecology

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Silver Futures Soar 8%, Rise Above $29 As Reddit Hordes Pile In

Sunday - January 31st UPDATE

Update (1800ET): It was the one print everyone was waiting for, and here it is: silver futures opened up 7%, surging from $27/oz to a high of $29.095 following a weekend of speculation that the next big squeeze on WSB's radar is silver. And whether that's true or not, may no longer matter in a world where - as described below - there is virtually no physical silver to be purchased.

Silver miners are also getting the love:  Australian silver stocks including Argent Minerals and Boab Metals rise more than 20%.

So as silver approaches $30, keep an eye on major price slams, emerging either out of central banks who desperately need to keep precious metals lower, or the BIS itself, whose Benoit Gilson will have a busy day tomorrow.

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Kitco was working Sunday night.  Silver has been busy as hell.  Almost all available physical silver is sold out except for larger bars.

Sunday night videos...

 

 

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Overnight trading prior to Open in the U.S. on Monday morning February 1st

Spot silver leapt more than 11% in London to $30.03 an ounce, taking gains to about 19% since last Wednesday and the price to its highest since February 2013.

SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Silver prices surged to an eight-year high on Monday, silver-mining stocks leapt and bullion dealers were scrambling as small-time investors piled in to the metal, the latest target of a retail-trading frenzy that has set financial markets on edge.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-retail-trading-silver/silver-swept-up-by-gamestop-retail-frenzy-prices-soar-idUSKBN2A00WG?il=0

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/ce/qzjvqmlwxvx/ComexSilverCFTCPositions.png

Larger Graphic above

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Taken from a previous comment:

https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22083-researchers-are-harvesting-precious-metals-from-industrial-waste/#comment-140997

I want to mention a Canadian company which I have been keeping an eye on.  EnviroLeach Technologies   EVLLF on the U.S. exchange.

As a note, EnviroLeach Technologies also have a joint venture operation in Tennessee.

https://www.enviroleach.com/

Urban Mining -            E-Waste/PCBAs

Conventional Gold Mining

In-Situ Gold Recovery (ISL)

EnviroLeach is an industrial technology company focused on precious metals extraction formulas and technologies.

Our unique patented and proven technology offers a cost-effective, eco-friendly and domestic alternative to the use of cyanide and smelters for the recovery of gold from E-Waste and conventional gold ores and concentrates.

EnviroLeach is led by a first-class staff of scientists and engineers. Our extensive expertise in metals recovery and hydrometallurgy positions us with a unique knowledge set applicable to our target markets, which include the gold mining and the E-Waste sectors.

EnviroLeach, through its subsidiary, EnviroCircuit, operates a 28,000 sq ft, 3,600 tonnes per annum PCBA processing facility in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Recycled printed circuit board assemblies contain the majority of the value in E-Waste. These boards typically contain over $3,500 USD worth of metals per tonne. This is significantly higher than the typical $100 - $500 USD per tonne of conventional mining ores.

EnviroLeach offers a viable domestic alternate solution for the treatment of printed circuit boards. EnviroLeach is also developing hydrometallurgical recovery applications for tin, copper, and platinum group metals which present the potential for significantly increased operating margins.

• Effective recoveries of target metals

• Reduction in CO2e emissions

• Operates at ambient pressure

• Operates at ambient temperature

• No landfilling of solid waste

• No water effluent

• No off-gassing

• Small operational footprint

• Competitive costs to incumbent technologies

This new and unique formula is one of only a handful of chemical compounds known that can dissolve gold into solution, which is a critical step in gold mining. The leach kinetics, efficiency and safety of the EnviroLeach formula is superior to that of cyanide and its alternatives with no environmental consequences.

https://envirocircuit.com/

 

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Just now, Tom Nolan said:

Taken from a previous comment:

https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22083-researchers-are-harvesting-precious-metals-from-industrial-waste/#comment-140997

I want to mention a Canadian company which I have been keeping an eye on.  EnviroLeach Technologies   EVLLF on the U.S. exchange.

As a note, EnviroLeach Technologies also have a joint venture operation in Tennessee.

https://www.enviroleach.com/

Urban Mining -            E-Waste/PCBAs

Conventional Gold Mining

In-Situ Gold Recovery (ISL)

EnviroLeach is an industrial technology company focused on precious metals extraction formulas and technologies.

Our unique patented and proven technology offers a cost-effective, eco-friendly and domestic alternative to the use of cyanide and smelters for the recovery of gold from E-Waste and conventional gold ores and concentrates.

EnviroLeach is led by a first-class staff of scientists and engineers. Our extensive expertise in metals recovery and hydrometallurgy positions us with a unique knowledge set applicable to our target markets, which include the gold mining and the E-Waste sectors.

EnviroLeach, through its subsidiary, EnviroCircuit, operates a 28,000 sq ft, 3,600 tonnes per annum PCBA processing facility in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Recycled printed circuit board assemblies contain the majority of the value in E-Waste. These boards typically contain over $3,500 USD worth of metals per tonne. This is significantly higher than the typical $100 - $500 USD per tonne of conventional mining ores.

EnviroLeach offers a viable domestic alternate solution for the treatment of printed circuit boards. EnviroLeach is also developing hydrometallurgical recovery applications for tin, copper, and platinum group metals which present the potential for significantly increased operating margins.

• Effective recoveries of target metals

• Reduction in CO2e emissions

• Operates at ambient pressure

• Operates at ambient temperature

• No landfilling of solid waste

• No water effluent

• No off-gassing

• Small operational footprint

• Competitive costs to incumbent technologies

This new and unique formula is one of only a handful of chemical compounds known that can dissolve gold into solution, which is a critical step in gold mining. The leach kinetics, efficiency and safety of the EnviroLeach formula is superior to that of cyanide and its alternatives with no environmental consequences.

https://envirocircuit.com/

 

 

https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/EVLLF?p=EVLLF

EnviroLeach Technologies Inc. (EVLLF)

0.4668    +0.1469 (+45.92%)

As of 1:42PM EST. Market open.

 

 

 

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

RELATED to this THREAD is a sister THREAD...

https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22549-silver-short-squeeze-it-aint-stopping-smash-the-big-banks/

Kitco News has an update for TUESDAY  February 2nd

DESCRIPTION

The silver price dropped 10% on Tuesday as the CME raised margin requirements for silver contracts. Peter Hug, global trading director of Kitco Metals, said that the silver squeeze attempt has now “backfired” as bullion inventories have run dry as a result, and with premiums up and few physical products to sell, it is now even more difficult for retail investors to push the price up. 

(15 MINUTES)

 

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

IMPORTANT ARTICLE BY James Stafford is the Editor of Oilprice.com

Naked Short Selling: The Truth Is Much Worse Than You Have Been Told

By James Stafford - Feb 02, 2021, 3:20 PM CST

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Naked-Short-Selling-The-Truth-Is-Much-Worse-Than-You-Have-Been-Told.html

There is a massive threat to our capital markets, the free market in general, and fair dealings overall. And no, it’s not China. It’s a homegrown threat that everyone has been afraid to talk about. 

Until now. 

That fear has now turned into rage.

Hordes of new retail investors are banding together to take on Wall Street.  They are not willing to sit back and watch naked short sellers, funded by big banks, manipulate stocks, harm companies, and fleece shareholders. 

The battle that launched this week over GameStop between retail investors and Wall Street-backed naked short sellers is the beginning of a war that could change everything.  

It’s a global problem, but it poses the greatest threat to Canadian capital markets, where naked short selling—the process of selling shares you don’t own, thereby creating counterfeit or ‘phantom’ shares—survives and remains under the regulatory radar because Broker-Dealers do not have to report failing trades until they exceed 10 days.  

This is an egregious act against capital markets, and it’s caused billions of dollars in damage. 

Make no mistake about the enormity of this threat: Both foreign and domestic schemers have attacked Canada in an effort to bring down the stock prices of its publicly listed companies. 

In Canada alone, hundreds of billions of dollars have been vaporized from pension funds and regular, everyday Canadians because of this, according to Texas-based lawyer James W. Christian. Christian and his firm Christian Smith & Jewell LLP are heavy hitters in litigation related to stock manipulation and have prosecuted over 20 cases involving naked short selling and spoofing in the last 20 years.  

“Hundreds of billions have been stolen from everyday Canadians and Americans and pension funds alike, and this has jeopardized the integrity of Canada’s capital markets and the integral process of capital creation for entrepreneurs and job creation for the economy,” Christian told Oilprice.com.

The Dangerous Naked Short-Selling MO....

[LONG ARTICLE FULL OF FACTS AND DETAILS.  CONTINUE READING AT THE LINK.]

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Wednesday morning - February 3rd -

Smoking!

EnviroLeach Technologies Inc. (EVLLF)

0.5006    +0.0406 (+8.83%)

As of 9:34AM EST. Market open.

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

OILPRICE.COM VIDEO

(8 Minutes)

Why & How To Trade Lithium

https://youtu.be/S9nclelUIzM

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Is This The Tipping Point For Electric Vehicle Adoption?

By MINING.com - Feb 06, 2021, 10:00 AM CST

New research shows that in 2020, a total of 134.5 GWh of battery capacity was deployed globally into newly sold passenger electric vehicles, with an additional up to 40 GWh already in sales channels and automaker assembly lines. In 2020, a total of 134.5 GWh of passenger EV battery capacity was deployed globally into newly sold passenger BEVs, PHEVs and HEVs, an increase of 39.6% over the year prior, according to a bottom-up model-by-model analysis by Adamas Intelligence, which tracks demand for EV batteries by chemistry, cell supplier and capacity in over 90 countries. 

According to the Toronto-based research firm, this figure excludes an additional 15 to 20 GWh of installed passenger EV battery capacity idling in sales channels and a further 15 to 20 GWh in pack and automaker assembly lines.

LG Energy Solution (battery spin-off from LG Chem) took the top spot in 2020 by passenger EV battery capacity deployed onto roads, thanks in large part to its supply agreement with Tesla in China, coupled with its broad book of clients in Europe, including VW, Renault and Mercedes, among others.

CATL claimed a distant second place in 2020, propped up by its dominant presence in China and strong entry into the European market in the second half of the year, courtesy of Tesla and Groupe PSA, among others.

Trailing CATL by a thin margin was last year’s leader, Panasonic, which posted virtually no growth in deployment year-over-year, while LG Energy Solution, CATL, Samsung SDI, SK Innovation and numerous others posted significant gains.

Source: Adamas Intelligence. Click on chart for more

“In looking at EV sales channels and pack/automaker assembly lines, we believe that CATL currently has the greatest volume of cells percolating through the supply chain and is poised to see a spike in battery capacity rolling onto roads in the first half of 2021,” Adamas says.

Tesla hit by battery shortage

In a call to investors last month, CEO Elon Musk says Tesla doesn’t have enough cells to put new products like the Semi truck into production.

In a call to investors following disappointing financial results released last week, CEO Elon Musk says Tesla doesn’t have enough cells to put new products like Semi truck into production.

“Prototypes are easy. Scaling production is very hard.”

“The main reason we have not accelerated new products like the Tesla Semi is that we simply don’t have enough cells built. We could easily go into the production of the Semi, but we don’t have enough cells for it right now.”

Musk said while the Semi does not cost five times more than a passenger car it does require five times the number of cells which means the company will focus on producing cars until it could bring its own battery technology, announced last year, into production:

“We’ve been very clear with our cell suppliers, whether it be CATL or Panasonic or LG that we will take as many batteries as they can produce.”

After a year, that may be in time seen as the tipping point for electric vehicle adoption, the price of lithium turned higher at the end of 2020 for the first time in three years and soared to an 18 month high last month.

By Mining.com 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

How Reddit Investors Shook The Silver Market

By MINING.com - Feb 03, 2021, 2:31 PM CST

Robinhood’s army of small retail investors may have failed to storm the silver market, but the online broker’s devotees certainly gave it an almighty shake.

The spot silver price surged by 20% between last Thursday and Monday this week, briefly hitting an eight-year high of $30.03 an ounce.

An increase in the margin required to trade silver on the CME exchange has curbed animal spirits and the metal has fallen back to $27.12, though a collective stampede for physical metal continues to deplete retail supplies of bars and coins.

The crowd has found that squeezing a commodity market such as silver is a very different proposition from cornering a short-seller in an individual stock such as GameStop. Particularly when the targeted big short doesn’t exist.

 

They’ll probably be back again, though, in silver or the next big thing.

Crowd surges organized through social media regularly rock Chinese commodity markets and the strategy is starting to catch on in the West, even if this particular silver squeeze seems to be fizzling out.

The big short

The rallying call for an attack on the silver market came on Thursday in the form of a post on the r/wallstreetbets Reddit message board, the same one used to spark frenzied buying of GameStop and other shares shorted by hedge funds.

The post urged investors to buy physical silver via exchange-traded fund (ETF) iShares Silver Trust SLV, the shares of which represent ounces of silver sitting in vaults.

Retail investors heeded the call and snapped up 37 million ounces worth of shares in the next 24 hours, with others rushing to their local bullion dealers.

But who is the “biggest short”?

Not the hedge funds that were targeted by Reddit traders in the stock market. The fund community has been net long of the CME silver contract since the middle of 2019.

Ironically, the silver squeeze may have benefited the very funds that have come in for vilification for shorting stocks.

That counterintuitive outcome seems to have sapped morale among the core Reddit crowd, with many questioning whom they are supposed to be squeezing.

Silver revolution

Chasing the big silver short has sucked the Robinhood stocks army into a whole different world of precious metals conspiracy theory and radical populism.

This is a world populated by those who believe that Wall Street is in cahoots with the US government to keep the price of gold and silver artificially suppressed to protect the existing economic order.

“Big banks have made big fortunes by manipulating the silver market for decades,” said the #SilverSqueeze Manifesto.

“This is a movement to help level the playing field between everyday people and the billionaires who control the big financial institutions that control the money, and thus control us,” it said, adding that the silver market is “the Achilles heel of the old system, and its time has come”.

Paper metal

This belief that the likes of JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs are using futures short positions to suppress the price of physical metal has been around a long time.

It is based on a binary world view that paper transactions contradict physical reality.

Commodity markets operate more holistically than that, however, with transactions in the futures market often deriving from the need to hedge holdings of the physical commodity.

The Reddit crowd may have bought up 37 million ounces of silver in one day last week, but at the end of December there were another 33,608 tonnes of the stuff sitting in London vaults, according to the London Bullion Market Association.

That’s more than a billion ounces valued at $28.6 billion. That stockpile is continuously being borrowed, lent, bought, and sold as banks interact with the industrial supply chain and the investment sector. Given its value, all of it will be hedged.

The biggest short on the CME silver contract is not the hedge fund community but the 52,750 contracts held in the “producer/merchant/processor/user” category.

The big paper short, in other words, is a big physical long. Squeeze it too hard and industrial quantities of silver may be coming your way.

Strength in numbers

While the Robinhood army’s energies seem spent for now, the ability of the crowd to move prices, even in markets as globally deep as silver, has been amply demonstrated. And some early movers on the silver squeeze will have made large profits.

Chinese retail investors have been using the same mass effect for many years, coordinating surges in WeChat rooms.

The crowd moves from one hot market to the next, using its strength in numbers to generate a giant momentum machine. The target is often less important than the potential to catch a moving trend.

The Zhengzhou ferro-silicon contract was squeezed in 2019 simply because retail traders had been pushed out of the bigger steel market by exchange margin increases.

Shanghai copper has been crowd-shorted a couple of times in the past few years, in one instance in a collective battle of strength against a major fund long position.

Social media facilitates the same bewildering mix of mutual exhortation, snippets of genuine information, and lots of wild rumor-mongering, as is evident in the #SilverSqueeze meme.

The phenomenon is spreading. In South Korea, they’re called “ants”. In Thailand, they’re called “moths”. There’s a lot of people in this world of low-interest rates looking to make a fast buck in the markets.

Chinese regulators have been battling the problem for years. The first line of defense is to increase trading fees, the second is to issue increasingly strident government warnings and the third is to intervene directly, either by suspending some types of trade or mobilizing a team of state-owned banks to crush the crowd.

CME’s margin hike and US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s pending meeting with regulators to discuss recent market volatility conform to the standard Chinese operating procedure of how to deal with speculative excess.

Western regulators will need to catch up fast with their Chinese counterparts because the retail army is likely to resurface with new tactics.

“Reddit’s Wall Street Bets community (…) has set a shining example that other movements can follow,” according to #SqueezeSilver Manifesto’s anonymous author.

“A dedicated army of everyday people can leverage their collective skills and resources (…) to alter deeply entrenched power dynamics and level the playing field.”

Small investors from Shanghai to Seattle may well agree.

By Andy Home via Mining.com

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

New 2021 Design – Reverse Changes

For the first time in the history of the American Silver Eagle, the United States Mint has unveiled a change in the design of the coins in the silver and gold range. After an exhaustive comparison of as many as 34 different designs to possibly replace the John Mercanti image of the heraldic eagle. In the end, the US Mint and the Secretary of the Treasury selected a design from Emily Damstra that reimagines the American bald eagle on the reverse. The new design for the coin’s reverse starting in 2021 includes:

• The powerful American bald eagle is depicted flying back toward its nest with its wings spread out behind its figures and its talons clutching the branch of an oak tree, almost as if the bird is working to build its nest with that branch. The inscriptions remain the same as previous American Silver Eagles and are arranged with “United States of America” along the left and top design rim, with “One Dollar” and “1 oz Fine Silver” inscribed along the right and bottom design rims. Just above the weight and metal content is an interior inscription of “E Pluribus Unum.”

The release of a new design on the reverse of the American Silver Eagle and American Gold Eagle in 2021 is not random. The 2021 release of the coins marks the 35th anniversary of the series and marks the perfect time for the US Mint to transition the visuals on the coin to help the Silver Eagle continue to dominate well into the 21st century.

Please note that these designs will not be available right away in 2021. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020, release schedules at the mint were thrown into disarray. As the 2021 production schedule starts, the US Mint will issue 2021-dated Silver Eagles with the existing design of the heraldic eagle on the reverse with plans to replace it by July 2021.

https://www.jmbullion.com/silver/silver-coins/american-silver-eagles/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIp4_l5NbV7gIVBdbACh301AEeEAAYASAAEgKPjPD_BwE

 

The physical silver inventory is very tight now.  This coin is going for close to $40.  ($39.77)

On January 27th (Wednesday) I paid spot $25.19 plus a $4.25 premium for the same coin ($29.44)

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

RELATED THREAD...

https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22549-silver-short-squeeze-it-aint-stopping-smash-the-big-banks/

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Ya know... It doesn't take a genius to figure this out...

With the major push towards Green Technologies and Carbon Reduction schemes, many minerals will have an incredible, almost impossible demand.

There's over a billion vehicles on the planet.  To replace them with Electric Vehicles by 2050, there is not enough available silver to do it.  EV is the primary industrial use for silver.  2nd is solar. 

These authoritarians do not realize that it can take a decade to start a new mine.  There are very, very few pure silver play mines on the planet.

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

RELATED THREAD with OILPRICE.COM short video

https://community.oilprice.com/topic/22619-the-silver-short-squeeze/

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

This interview is with an attorney who used to represent Hedge Funds.  He gives insight on the WallStreetBets scenario.

The video comes from MiningStockEducation.com -

Technology and the "Green Agenda" will put silver on a much higher demand.

Silver Could Be $60/oz Now but Not $1,000/oz says Kerry Lutz

21 minutes

https://youtu.be/tLH_Iuijk5Y

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

I'm holding a bunch of silver miner stocks, and have physicals silver, and I am in PSLV during this silver short squeeze. ( JP Morgan is custodian of SLV, so I won't put money there.)

Here are the recent stats with the SILVER SHORT SQUEEZE.  You can see what physical silver is available for trading.  If we have a repeat of last week, JP Morgan and Big Banks will be sweating.   Inventories are tight.  Very tight. 

Lots of graphs and images from trading platforms in video.  The video also mentions a tremendous article with statistics taken from trading platforms.  The article will follow this post.

(20 minutes)

Real Silver is Dangerously Close to Being Unobtainable

https://youtu.be/RSZ5Tb8L0DQ

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

The previous video mentions this article.  Zero Hedge also highlights the article.

"Houston, We Have A Problem" - 85% Of Silver In London Already Held By ETFs

by Tyler Durden

Tuesday, Feb 09, 2021 - 10:40

https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/houston-we-have-problem-85-silver-london-already-held-etfs

Submitted by Ronan Manly, BullionStar.com

With the ongoing #SilverSqueeze and huge associated dollar inflows into silver-backed Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs), it is now time to look at which of these ETFs store their silver in the LBMA vaults in London, England, and to calculate how much physical silver these combined funds store in those London vaults.

These LBMA London vaults are run by seven vault operators which comprise three bullion banks JP Morgan, HSBC and ICBC Standard Bank – and four security firms – Brinks, Malca-Amit, Loomis and G4S.

While many eyes have been fixated on the mammoth iShares Silver Trust (SLV), that is only part of the picture, and there are 13 additional silver-backed ETFs that store their silver in London that people may not be aware of.

By calculating how much silver the ETFs hold in London , we can determine how much available physical silver remains in the London LBMA vaults that is not already held by these ETFs. This then gives an estimate of how much room these ETFs have before they hit a wall of not being able to source any more silver in the London vaults without having to import it or ship it in. And the answer, as you will see below, is not that much room at all.   

Because out of the 1.08 billion ounces of silver (33,609 tonnes) that the LBMA claims is stored in the London vaults (as per latest LBMA data to end of December 2020), a whooping 83.3% or 28,007 tonnes (900.42 million ozs) is already accounted for by these ETFs. This is based on ETF holdings as of end of day 5 February 2021.

Add in another 22.22 million ozs (691.3 tonnes) of silver held by Bullion Vault (BV) and Gold Money (GM) in the same London vaults, and there are a massive 28,698 tonnes (or 922.65 million ozs) of silver accounted for in the combined ETFs and in the BV/GM holdings. That’s 85.4% of all the silver that the LBMA claims is in the London vaults

https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b792-20bd8d8fa069.storage.googleapis.com/s3fs-public/styles/inline_image_mobile/public/inline-images/Table 1.png?itok=b7JbTRLa

https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b792-20bd8d8fa069.storage.googleapis.com/s3fs-public/inline-images/Table 1.png?itok=b7JbTRLa

This leaves only 4,911 tonnes of silver from the LBMA total of 33,609 tonnes that is not already accounted for. That’s a mere 14.6% of total London vaulted silver stocks. The criticality of the situation was even more acute based on end of day data from 3 February 2021, when based on the same calculation approach, there was only 4,366.7 tonnes of silver in the LBMA vaults (13% of the total) that were not accounted for by silver ETF and other transparent silver holdings. On that day, a full 87% of all the silver in London was held the ETFs and other transparent holdings.

 

Reported Silver Holdings

Importantly, these holdings of Exchange Traded Product (ETP) silver inventories are part of reported silver bullion stocks. As the Silver Institute 2019 annual report (written by Refinitiv) explains:

“Identifiable bullion stocks can be separated into two categories: reported and unreported bullion stocks.

Reported stocks consist of industry, exchange, ETP and part of the government stock category.

Unreported stocks … consist mainly of government and custodian vaulted stocks.”

And notably, says the Silver Institute report, the unreported category is almost exclusively made up of custodian vaulted stocks of silver. According to Refinitiv:

“Terminal market inventory finds its way into Europe, driven by refiners off-loading their metal in times when investment demand is weak. The European and U.S. bullion banks in collaboration with major storage providers remain the main facilitators.”

Here, “terminal markets’ refers to commodity markets that are trading centres as opposed to production centres. When custodian vaulted stocks rise, says Refinitiv, it is “partly a reflection of weak investment demand more than anything else”. The converse is also true. When investment demand is strong, the unreported custodian vaulted stocks fall.

And where have we seen investment demand being strong right now? In the physical market of course, all the way from retail to wholesale to mints to refineries. So now is not a time when there will be “refiners off-loading their metal” into vaults because of weak investment demand. In fact the opposite is to be expected. 

In short, strong investment demand leads to depleted unreported custodian vaulted stocks. And Exchange Traded Products have at all times to compete with the rest of the market for the pool of available silver in the London vaults of the storage providers.

Allocated Silver held by Wealth Sector

And we haven’t even factored in yet the allocated silver holdings that the wealth sector (investment institutions, family offices and High Net Worth individuals) hold in the LBMA London vaults, silver holdings which are also part of the unreported custodian vaulted stocks category.

And that, according to people I’ve talked to in the market, could be anywhere from 30 million and 50 million ozs (933 tonnes to 1,555 tonnes). Which would leave only between 3,300 tonnes and 3,900 tonnes of silver in the London LBMA vaults which is not held by ETFs and the wealth sector. And that is not a lot of silver for 14 ETFs to compete to secure.   

To put this into perspective, over the 3 trading days from Friday 29 January – Tuesday 02 February, the iShares Silver Trust (SLV) just by itself claims to have added 3415 tonnes of silver, of which 1,070 tonnes was on the Friday 29 January, 579 tonnes on Monday 01 February, and another 1765 tonnes on Tuesday 02 February. This 3415 tonnes equates to 14% of annual mine supply and 10% of all the silver that the LBMA claims is in London vaults.

Another 3-4 days of similar magnitude dollar inflows just into SLV would require SLV to source another 3000-4000 plus tonnes of silver, which is mathematically impossible based on the amount of silver said to be in the London vaults. This could cause the SLV to literally seize up and cause all the other silver ETFs with London storage to seize up too. This is assuming no new silver arriving into the London market in quantity at this time. Which is not an unrealistic assumption to make given that there is currently a global demand spike for physical silver. In other words, “terminal market” physical silver inventory would not be “finding its way into Europe” since global investment demand is strong, not weak.

Painting the Tape in Paper Silver

Which is why it now looks like the bullion banks torpedoed the COMEX / LBMA price of silver on Monday 1 February and Tuesday 2 February so as to paint the tape and attempt to break investor sentiment and prevent further inflows into the silver ETFs. But if that was the plan, the bullion banks didn’t succeed, since total ETF holdings only ebbed marginally over the rest of the week following the bullion bank price onslaught.

Its also important to remember that the LBMA data on silver vault stocks in London covers all forms of silver bars and silver coins held in the LBMA vaults, not just the large Good Delivery silver bars http://www.lbma.org.uk/gdl-silver-bar-specifications.

As the LBMA explains about its silver vault data:

“All physical forms of metal are included: large wholesale bars, coin, kilo bars and small bars.”

However, ETFs are limited by their prospectuses to only purchasing Good Delivery silver bars (which normally weigh 1000 oz each). Therefore, since the LBMA data covers all forms of silver bars and silver coins in the London vaults, the LBMA data of 33,609 tonnes total stock in London may be overstating how much of that is Good Delivery silver bars. Which means that the ETFs have even less leeway in sourcing silver inventory than would at first appear.

Note also that the Bank of England does not hold silver, because central banks do not hold silver at the Bank of England. In fact, central banks rarely if ever hold silver as a reserve asset. So unlike gold, bullion banks cannot borrow silver from central banks to augment supply and firefight demand.

Don’t forget also that professional investors and institutions hold huge quantities of unallocated ‘paper’ silver positions in the London LBMA market, in the form of claims against LBMA bullion banks for silver which is not readily available. This unallocated silver is really ‘silver credit’ or fractionally-backed / unbacked silver positions which have been created by the bullion banks to absorb demand that would otherwise have gone into physical.

As former LBMA CEO Stewart Murray euphemistically said in 2011: “various investors hold very substantial amounts unallocated gold and silver in the London vaults”. But what Murray failed to explain is that unallocated silver does not exist in a vault because it is not physical. It is a merely a paper claim on a bullion bank for a quantity of silver that the bank is obliged to find somewhere if the claimant happened to move to execute the claim.

The Squeeze is On

In short, the scarcity of available silver in the London LBMA vaults is far more advanced than most people think. And with 14 ETFs, and not just SLV, competing for available silver, the bullion banks and storage providers are now in a “Houston, we have a problem” mode. A problem which you will see from a quick review of these 14 silver-backed ETFs and Exchange Traded Products (ETPs) which claim they are fully physically backed with silver stored in LBMA vaults in London. First we will review all the other ETFs, and finally end with the big one SLV. The review below uses a similar framework to the 2017 BullionStar article “How many Silver Bars are in the LBMA Vaults in London?”, and uses some helpful updates last week from Daniel March. 

PHAG and PHPM – WisdomTree

PHAG / PHSP is the WisdomTree Physical Silver fund. It has two ticker codes as it trades on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) in US dollars (PHAG LN) and pounds sterling (PHSP LN). It’s the same product with two lines, so in this analysis is easier to refer to as PHAG.

PHAG was formerly known as ETFS Physical Silver until WisdomTree acquired the European business of ETF Securities in 2018. The silver custodian of PHAG is HSBC bank plc, London.

PHPM / PHPP is the WisdomTree Physical Precious Metals fund. PHPM /PHPP was formerly known as ETFS Physical PM Basket until the WisdomTree acquisition of ETF Securities European business. The silver custodian of PHAG is also HSBC bank plc, London. The WisdomTree Physical Precious Metals product also trades on the LSE in two currencies US dollars (PHPM LN) and pounds sterling (PHPP LN), but is easier to refer to here as PHPM.

As of end of day 5 February, WisdomTree claims the combined silver holdings of PHAG and PMPM total 99,460,478.5 ozs (3,093.64 tonnes) in the form of 102,667 silver bars. The bar list can be seen in XLS format here, ( a link to a zip file opens the latest xls).  

The  PHAg and PHPM silver is claimed to be split between HSBC’s London vault and Malca-Amit’s London vault, with 43,379,829.9 (1,349.29 tonnes) in the HSBC vault in the form of 44,620 silver bars, and 56,080,648.6 ozs (1,744.35 tonnes) in the Malca-Amit vault in the form of 58,047 silver bars.

Oddly, the WisdomTree website product pages say that PHAG holds 95,579,115 troy oz of silver, and PHPM holds 1,296,137 troy oz of silver, which is a combined total of 96,875,252 ozs, which is 2,585,226.5 ozs less than the combined total reported.

SSLV – Invesco

SSLV is the Invesco Physical Silver ETC. SSLV was formerly operated by ETF provider Source until Invesco acquired Source in 2017.

The custodian of SSLV is JPMorgan Chase Bank. The silver owned by SSLV is claimed to be in JP Morgan’s vault in London.

As of end of day 5 February 2021, SSLV claimed to hold 7,820,611.8 troy ozs of silver (243.25 tonnes) in the ‘JPM London V (VLT)’ vault in London, in the form of 8061 silver bars. The 5 February bar list is at the link here.

https://zh-prod-1cc738ca-7d3b-4a72-b792-20bd8d8fa069.storage.googleapis.com/s3fs-public/inline-images/LBMASilverHoldings02a.png?itok=yE3-REh6

PMAG and PMPM – ETF Securities Australia

PMAG is the ETFS Physical Silver product. It is operated by ETF Securities Australia, and also known as ETPMAG. The custodian of the PMAG silver is JPMorgan Chase Bank NA, London.

PMPM is the ETFS Physical Precious Metal Basket. Its also operated by ETF Securities Australia, and also known as ETPMPM (Basket). The custodian of the PMPM silver is also JPMorgan Chase Bank NA, London.

PMAG and PMPM report this silver holdings in a combined report under ETFS Metal Securities Australia Limited. As of 4 February 2021, the latest dated report that has been uploaded to the ETFS Australia website, the combined silver holdings in London of PMAG and PMPM was 8,634,676.1 ozs (268.57 tonnes) in the form of 8,909 silver bars, all claimed to be held in the JP Morgan vault in London. The link to the bar list in XLS format is here.

SIVR and GLTR – Aberdeen Standard

SIVR is the Aberdeen Standard Physical Silver Shares ETF. GLTR is the Aberdeen Standard Physical Precious Metals Basket Shares ETF.

SIVR and GLTR were formerly operated by ETF Securities until Aberdeen Standard Investments acquired the US business of ETF Securities in 2018. The custodian of SIVR and the silver of GLTR is JP Morgan Chase Morgan Chase NA, London.

As of end of day 5 February 2021, SIVR claimed to hold 36,657,877.7 ozs of silver (1,140.21 tonnes) in the form of 37,537 silver bars. Currently, none of the silver of SIVR is held in JP Morgan’s London vault. It’s all claimed to be held in the London vaults of Brinks, Malca-Amit and Loomis. Specifically the SIVR bar list shows all the silver as being held in ‘Brinks Premier Park’, ‘Loomis Int (Viamat)’, and ‘Malca-Amit’.

This storage arrangement is however, very strange, since on 14 August 2020, the last physical audit of SIVR showed that all its silver was held in the JP Morgan vault in London, specifically at that time “32,712 London Good Delivery Silver Bars with a weight of 31,827,933.800 troy ounces”. That’s 989.98 tonnes of silver. See audit report here.

Then why is all of the SIVR silver now in the vaults of sub-custodians and none of the SIVR silver is in the vault of the custodian JP Morgan? Why did 989.98 tonnes of SLRV silver move out of the SIVR vault since 14 August 2020 and is now claimed to be in the vaults of 3 sub-custodians, Brinks, Malca-Amit and Loomis?

As of end of day 5 February 2021, GLTR claimed to hold 9,306,054.1 ozs of silver (289.46 tonnes) in the form of 9,548 silver bars. Currently, this silver is claimed to be stored in the JP Morgan London vault (about 92%) and a Malca-Amit vault (about 8%). Yet there is no recent physical audit report for the GLTR silver on the Aberdeen Standard website.

In total between them, SIVR and GLTR claim to hold 1,429.67 tonnes of silver in the LBMA London vaults.

SSLN – iShares

SSLN is the iShares Physical Silver ETC. The custodian of SSLN is JPMorgan Chase Bank NA, London Branch. Not to be confused with the much larger iShares Silver Trust (SLV). See below for SLV.

As of end of day 5 February 2021, SSLN claimed to hold 24,679,579.5 ozs of silver (767.64 tonnes) in 2 vaults in London, roughly split between the JP Morgan vault London (2/3) and the Malca Amit’s London vault (1/3). The exact figures being ‘JPM V’ vault with 16,947,579 ozs (17,387 silver bars), and Malca-Amit vault with 7,732,000.5 ozs (7,975 silver bars).

The SSLN bar list, which updates the same PDF file each day, can be seen at the link here.

XTrackers – Deutsche Asset Management – now called DWS

Deutsche Bank Asset Management (now called DWS) operates 5 DWS XTrackers which hold physical silver. These are known as the XTracker Physical Silver ETCs. A list of XTracker precious meals ETCs can be seen in the list here.

The custodian of the silver for all of these XTracker ETCs is JP Morgan Chase Bank NA, and the silver is claimed to be in the JP Morgan vault in London.

In total, as of end of day 5 February 2021, these 5 XTrackers hold 1,839.45 tonnes of silver in London. This figure is correct and is based on data directly from the DWS website and from a Deutsche daily Excel sheet of funds and holdings. There are no silver bar lists or audit reports on the DWS website, nor anywhere else. 

The silver holdings of each of these XTrackers as of 5 February was as follows:

Xtrackers Physical Silver ETC : 2,334,322.7 ozs (72.61 tonnes)

Xtrackers Physical Silver ETC (EUR): This is the big one: 43,963,590.6 ozs (1,367.45 tonnes). This fund is also known by the ticker XAD6

Xtrackers Physical Silver EUR Hedged ETC: 9,091,742.5 ozs (282.79 tonnes)

Xtrackers IE Physical Silver ETC Securities: 3,363,569.56 ozs (104.62 tonnes)

Xtrackers IE Physical Silver EUR Hedged ETC Securities: 385,151.26 ozs (11.98 tonnes)

Ironically, the silver XTrackers can be complicated to keep ‘track’ of, as they are domiciled in a number of jurisdictions (UK and Ireland), trade on various exchanges (LSE and Xetra), trade in various currencies (USD and EUR), and have various metal entitlements per security depending on the particular ETC.  

The Xtrackers IE Physical Silver ETC Securities may look like 2 separate XTrackers, but it’s not, because both have the same ISIN, and they just trade as XSLR on LSE, and XSLR on Xetra. So to reiterate, there are 5 silver XTrackers, not 6 as some people might initially think.

Excluding SLV, the other silver-backed ETFs which store their silver in London claim to hold a combined 7,642.23 tonnes of silver in London LBMA vaults, which is 27.2% of all ETF silver in London, 22.7% of all the silver said to be in the London LBMA vaults, and 37.5% of the silver claimed to be in SLV. So any discussion of the #SilverSqueeze must take into account these other 13 ETCs from a total of 6 providers. 

Apart from SLV, the biggest silver ETFs which hold their silver in London are PHAG from Wisdomtree with 2974 tonnes, XAD6 XTracker from Deutsche with 1367.45 tonnes, and SIVR from Aberdeen with 1,140.21 tonnes. So next time someone mentions SLV, tell them about PHAG, SIVR, XAD6, and the other ETFs / ETCs.

Other Transparent Silver Holdings

As mentioned above, there are some other silver holdings in the LBMA London vaults which are transparent since they are publicly reported on. These are the silver holdings of customers of Bullion Vault (an LBMA member) and Gold Money. As of 5 February, the reported silver holdings of Bullion Vault in the London vaults of Loomis (mostly in Feltham and a small amount in Shepperton) was 478,474.795 kgs, which is 15,383,322 ozs or 478.5 tonnes. The link to Bullion Vault silver holdings in London is here. 

SImilarly, on 5 February, the reported silver holdings of Gold Money in the London LBMA vaults (Loomis) was 212,765.5 kgs, which is 6,840,570 ozs or 212.8 tonnes. The link to Gold Money silver holdings in London is here.

Together the silver holdings of Bullion Vault and Gold Money in London LBMA vaults total 691.3 tonnes. 

SLV – iShares Silver Trust

Now, if you have digested all of that, let’s look at SLV.

As of end of day 5 February 2021, SLV claims to hold a massive 654,726,423 ozs of silver (20,364.74 tonnes).

Recently, the SLV bar list has been 1 day behind the stated SLV totals. And so the SLV bar list as of end of day Friday 5 February shows SLV’s claimed holdings as of end of day Thursday 4 February, which were a claimed 659,278,427.9 ozs of silver (20,505.85 tonnes) in the form of 675,425 silver bars.

SLV’s bar list is mammoth and runs to 10561 pages, with a filesize of 27 MBs. Luckily, the first page contains all the vault data. Based on the 5 February bar list (which refers to 4 February silver holdings), SLV claims to hold silver over an incredible 7 vaults, 6 of which are in London.

Three of these vaults are operated by Brinks, two vaults are operated by JP Morgan (the SLV custodian), one vault operated by Malca-Amit, and one vault operated by Loomis.

The three Brinks vaults are Brinks London C, Brinks Premier Park (London), and Brinks Unit 7 in Radius Park (London).

Brinks (Premier Park) is located in an industrial estate called Premier Park, off Abbey Road in Park Royal, north-east London, and is actually down the road from the G4S vault which is at 291 Abbey Road, Park Royal. Brinks unit 7 is, as the name suggests in Unit 7 of the industrial park near Hatton Cross tube station, beside Heathrow Airport. Brinks London C could also possibly be in Radius Park, as Brinks occupies a number units in Radius Park, such as units 1 and 3. But Brinks London C could be elsewhere. Note, SLV used to store some of its silver in Brinks London A, back about 7 – 10 years ago.

The JP Morgan London vault is referred to by SLV as JPM London V (which is the same vault as other ETFs use). This may be the JP Morgan vault under John Carpenter St/ Carmelite St in the City of London . Note, SLV used to store some of its silver in a vault called JPM London A back in the day.

The JPM New York vault is under 1 Chase Manhattan Plaza in Manhattan. The Malca Amit vault is referred to as Malca Amit UK (MA) London. This Malca vault is located in Arena Parkway, Hounslow in London, near Heathrow Airport.

The Loomis vault is referred to as Loomis International (UK) Ltd (VIAMAT) London, in Feltham, London, near Heathrow Airport.

Looking at the SLV bar list for 4 February, and the silver holdings distribution by vault, a few things jump out.

• Only 27% of the claimed SLV silver is located in the JP Morgan vaults (the custodian vaults). A full 73% of SLV silver is held in the vaults of custodians.
• Brinks vaults now claim to hold 48% of SLV silver, the Malca Amit vault holds 22%, and Loomis holds 3%.
• Between 29 January and 5 February, 2854 tonnes of silver was claimed (by JP Morgan) to have been added to SLV.  Exactly 50% of this silver was claimed to appear in the Brinks Premier Park vault, 18% in the Brinks Radius Park unit 7 vault, and 22% in the Loomis vault, with only 6% from the JP Morgan vault, and only 3% from the Malca-Amit vault
• Between the same dates there was no change in the SLV silver claimed to be held in Brinks vault C, nor in JP Morgan vault New York (see below)
• As recently as 30 January, there were only 5 vaults listed on the SLV bar list. On that day, Brinks Radius Park was not listed nor was the Loomis vault.
•  The Loomis vault only appeared on the SLV bar list on 3 February. The Brinks Radius Park unit 7 vault only appeared on the SLV bar list on 2 February.
• JP Morgan, the SLV custodian, has had to heavily tap Brinks (specifically Brinks Premier Park vault and Brinks Radius Park vault) and Loomis’ vault for the bulk of the claimed silver inflows  
• The Brinks Premier Park vault now claims to hold 31% of all SLV silver, followed by 14% for the Brinks London C vault, and 3% for the Brinks Radius Park Unit 7 vault.
• Of the 27% of SLV’s claimed silver located in JP Morgan vaults, this is distributed as 11% in JP Morgan London vault and 16% in JP Morgan New York vault.

A Note about SLV and COMEX

Since the big dollar inflows into SLV beginning on 29 January, the silver inventory claimed to be in the JP Morgan New York vault, i.e. 103,176,253 ozs (3,209.21 tonnes) in the form of 102,837 silver bars, has not changed at all.

Furthermore, all silver bars claimed to be held by SLV are in the form of Good Delivery silver bars (usually about 1000 oz in weight). All the SLV silver claimed to be in the JP Morgan New York vault will be in the form of 1000 oz bars.

The flagship silver futures contract on COMEX is the SI 5000 oz contract which is deliverable as 5 * 1000 oz silver bars in COMEX approved vaults in New York.

Currently, as of end of day 5 February, the COMEX daily silver inventory report shows the JP Morgan New York vault as containing 152,946,614.74 ozs (4757.28 tonnes) of Eligible silver. Exactly 103,176,253 ozs (3,209.21 tonnes) of this silver belongs to SLV. Therefore, on the COMEX silver vault report under JP Morgan’s Eligible category, there is only 49,770,361.74 ozs (1548 tonnes) which does not belong to SLV. Something that many people probably never thought of before. 

So any calculation of available silver on COMEX has to take this SLV silver into account.

Conclusion

If the above 14 ETFs see continued investment inflows, they will all have to compete for the available silver in London which is not already held within these ETFs. And that available silver is at an historic low, some 3000 tonnes or so. A few more days of inflows like the ones seen over 29 January to 2 February would be a major emergency for these ETF providers, particularly the iShares SLV. Because there is just not that much physical silver left in the vaults of JP Morgan, Brinks, Malca-Amit, Loomis and HSBC, which is not already reported as being in these ETFs. 

And lets not forget all the unallocated silver positions which are outstanding which are claims against the bullion banks for silver which they have not got. Anyone with deep enough pockets could now cause a serious run on the remaining available silver stored in London that is not currently attributed to the above ETFs. 

This article was originally published on the BullionStar.com website under the same title “Houston, we have a Problem”: 85% of Silver in London already held by ETFs.

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

A recent IHS Markit Report has noted that a large number of EV batteries are approaching their end-of-life stage, thus presenting a huge opportunity for recycling. IHS has projected that over 500,000 tons (57 GWh) of batteries reached their end-of-life point in 2020 with 1.2 million tons (121 GWh) and 3.5 million tons (350 GWh) expected to do so in 2025 and 2030, respectively, thus creating a sizeable repository of recyclable material. 

Corporate Investment In Battery Tech Has Exploded

By Alex Kimani - Feb 10, 2021, 4:00 PM CST

https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Corporate-Investment-In-Battery-Tech-Has-Exploded.html

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

I want to mention that it seems physical Silver inventories are very low and that the COMEX does not reflect the true price.

For example:  In 2020, the mining supply brought about 1 billion ounces of silver to the market.

In one recent day of trading, 1.8 billion ounces of silver were purchased in the markets, online and from physical silver brokers.

Edited February 12, 2021 by Tom Nolan

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

Reuters - Feb 10th

Platinum hovers near 6-year peak as markets bet on auto recovery

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/gold-edges-lower-dollar-rebound-040025226.html

By Eileen Soreng

(Reuters) - Platinum extended its gains into a fifth straight session on Thursday, holding near more than a six-year high, with analysts expecting further upside driven by higher demand from the automobile sector as an economic recovery picks up pace.

Platinum was up 1.4% to $1,258.33 per ounce by 11 a.m EST (1600 GMT), having earlier jumped as much as 2.2% to its highest level since January 2015 at $1,268.88.

Palladium was flat at $2,355.93 per ounce.

Platinum's rally was driven by a relatively tight market "and certainly the investment demand, which is reflected in strong exchange traded fund (ETF) inflows among others," said Commerzbank analyst Daniel Briesemann.

Both platinum and palladium are used by automakers in catalytic converters to clean car exhaust fumes.

"Short-term supplies are probably just not going to be able to hold up, while demand is going to be extremely high," said Edward Moya, senior market analyst at OANDA.

Platinum may see a third consecutive annual deficit in 2021, specialist materials firm Johnson Matthey said in a report released on Wednesday.

"The market has been looking beyond the pandemic - to a recovery in the auto sector, which will eventually happen," said StoneX analyst Rhona O'Connell.

It will draw support from potential demand for fuel cells, with the Johnson Matthey report also talking about increased loadings, particularly for diesel vehicles, O'Connell said.

Citi Research analysts expect prices to rise to $1,300 an ounce by the end of the year.

Elsewhere, spot gold edged 0.2% lower to $1,838.44 per ounce. U.S. gold futures fell 0.1% to $1,840.30.

Spot silver rose 0.6% to $27.15.

"Gold is still being kept in check by the positive market sentiment in general ... Gold does not seem to be in particular demand right now," Commerzbank's Briesemann said.

Wall Street's main indexes opened near record highs.

(Reporting by Eileen Soreng, Asha Sistla; Additional reporting by Nakul Iyer in Bengaluru; Editing by Paul Simao)

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

SILVER -

At the Silver Institute, they have a pdf of the World Silver Survey 2020

On page 70 they list the Top 30 Silver Producing Mines, many of which are in Mexico.  The average person does not recognize that there are very, very few PURE play silver mines.  Most mined silver is a result of mining for other metals.  Mexico has some pure play silver mines, such as First Majestic.  

Also note on the pdf how tight the inventory for silver really is.  It is extremely tight.  With the projected demand of ESG, there just will not be much industrial silver available.     

https://www.silverinstitute.org/all-world-silver-surveys/

Is Mexico’s Road To Recovery Paved In Precious Metals?

By Oxford Business Group - Feb 13, 2021, 10:00 AM CST Updated: Feb 13, 2021, 10:00 AM CST

https://oilprice.com/Metals/Gold/Is-Mexicos-Road-To-Recovery-Paved-In-Precious-Metals.html

Mining was heavily disrupted last year as a result of Covid-19, with most mines and projects suspended for a number of months, before resuming activity under strict health guidelines.

As a result, overall investment took a significant hit in 2020. According to estimates from the Mining Chamber of Mexico (Cámara Minera de México, Camimex), sector-wide investment fell by around 50% relative to pre-virus estimates, dropping from $5bn to $2.5bn.

However, the industry is set for a rebound this year, with a number of companies announcing increased investment in projects across the country.

A prime example of this trend is U.S.-headquartered company, Southern Copper. Having seen its expected investment in Mexican and Peruvian mines fall from $1.1bn to $650m in 2020, the firm has a capital expenditure budget of $1.4bn for this year, rising to $2.9bn in 2024.

Investment for gold and silver

There has been particularly significant movement in silver and gold projects.

In mid-January, for example, Canadian company Torex Gold announced capital expenditure of between $195m and $235m for its Mexican operations in 2021, above last year’s estimated outlays of $175m.

This includes $90-100m for its Media Luna underground deposit, located in the state of Guerrero, along with major investment in its El Limón Guajes mining complex.

Related Video: Why And How To Trade Lithium

US mining company Newmont similarly announced that it had a capital expenditure budget of $155m for its Peñasquito mine, which produces gold, silver, lead, and zinc – an increase on the $69m invested in the first three quarters of 2020.

Meanwhile, Almos Gold is expected to increase expenditure in its Mulatos mine, located in the northern state of Sonora, from $40m to between $125m and $135m, while new spending has also been announced for Pan American Silver’s La Colorada mine and First Majestic Silver’s Ermitaño project.

As well as investment, there has been production expansion within the industry.

US-based, Latin America-focused company Golden Minerals announced in February that it had poured the first gold from its Rodeo open-cut mine in Mexico’s Durango state. The news came after the company launched operations at the site in mid-January.

Also in February, Minera Gorrión, the Mexican subsidiary of Canadian mining company Almaden Minerals, said it was looking to revive its $1.4bn Ixtaca mining project, which had its environmental impact assessment denied by authorities in December.

The company said it was in discussions with the national regulator with a view to submitting an updated environmental report, noting that the project would create some 1120 jobs during the construction and operation stages.

Key to economic recovery

The increased investment and activity in the mining sector could help support Mexico’s recovery from the economic fallout of the pandemic.

With the economy having contracted by 9% last year, according to the IMF, Mexico was among the countries most affected by Covid-19. The fund expects GDP to rebound this year with growth of 3.5%; however, much is dependent on how key industries such as mining perform.

Prior to the pandemic, Mexico was the world’s largest producer of silver and the ninth-largest producer of gold. The sector accounted for around 4% of GDP, as well as being the sixth-largest generator of foreign currency and providing 2m jobs indirectly.

The increase in investment in both gold and silver mines could thus bode well for Mexico, with both commodities experiencing a spike in value in recent times.

Silver prices reached an eight-year high in February and silver was trading at around $28 per oz as of February 8. Meanwhile, gold – after reaching an all-time high in August last year – was valued at around $59 per kg.

“Precious metal prices, particularly of gold, have surged as a result of the pandemic. This has led to a rise in projected investments in gold extraction,” Amilcar Rosas Orozco, heavy industry sales manager at Danfoss Mexico, told OBG. “However, new mining tenders have slowed due to the disruption of the pandemic. As a result, mining companies now need to produce more with existing investments, which itself requires equipment to be more efficient and have longer life cycles.”

In addition, there are also some signs that demand for some of Mexico’s key minerals will remain strong into the future.

“Historically, most silver demand has been generated by investment and jewelry demand,” Mitchell Krebs, CEO of Coeur Mining, told OBG. “However, increasing use of silver in solar panels, new cars and the ongoing electrification of the world has led to sizeable future growth prospects.”

By Oxford Business Group

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

https://www.mining.com/mining-com-minute-biggest-stories-of-the-week-36/

MINING.COM MINUTE: Biggest stories of the week

Bruno Venditti | February 12, 2021 | 10:00 pm News Asia China Europe Latin America USA Diamond Silver Tin 

MINING.COM MINUTE is a roundup of the biggest stories from the global mining and metals industry. 

This week’s top stories:

• Copper price rally slows ahead of Chinese holiday – Read more
• Want to see a real short squeeze? Come to the tin market – Read more
• Mongolia asks Rio Tinto to mutually cancel Oyu Tolgoi deal – Read more

(90 second video)

https://youtu.be/si32uwO5Ues

 

[Tom Nolan + 2,443]

 

#SilverSqueeze Hits London As SLV Warns Of Limited Available Silver

by Tyler Durden

Sunday, Feb 14, 2021 - 18:44

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/silversqueeze-hits-london-slv-warns-limited-available-silver

Submitted  by Ronan Manly, BullionStar.com

Less than a week ago in ‘Houston, we have a Problem”: 85% of Silver in London already held by ETFs’, we explained how with the emergence of the #SilverSqueeze, the silver-backed ETFs which claim to hold their silver in London, now account for 85% of all the silver claimed to be stored in the London LBMA vaults (over 28,000 tonnes of the LBMA total of 33,609 tonnes). This, for anyone who can out 2 and 2 together, does not leave very much available silver in London for silver ETFs or for anyone else, especially the largest silver ETF in the market the giant iShares Silver Trust (SLV), which let’s not forget has the infamous JP Morgan as custodian.

That SLV has seen massive dollar inflows in late January and early February with corresponding jumps in claimed silver holdings is now widely known, but is worth repeating here, for what’s about to come next.

3,416.11 Tonnes of Silver?

The intense market interest in the iShares Silver Trust (SLV) started on 28January when a huge volume of 152 million shares traded on NYSE Arca. Again on Friday 29January, SLV traded a massive volume of 113 million shares. This led to an increase in SLV ‘Shares Outstanding’ on Friday 29 January of 37 million shares, and a same day claim by JP Morgan, the SLV custodian, that it had increased the silver held in the SLV by 37.67 million ozs (1,171 tonnes), all claimed to be sourced in the LBMA vaults in London.

On Monday 01 February, an even larger 280 million SLV shares traded on NYSE, and by end of day SLV shares outstanding jumped by 20 million. On that day SLV claimed to add another 15.376 million ounces of silver (478.25 tonnes) within the LBMA vaults in London, about three-quarters of the value of the new SLV shares created on that day.

On Tuesday 2 February, with SLV trading still elevated on NYSE, the iShares Silver Trust created a massive 61,350,000 new SLV shares, bringing the SLV shares outstanding to 729.1 million. On the same day, JP Morgan and Blackrock claimed to have added a huge 56.783 million ozs of silver (1,766 tonnes) to the SLV (again all in London), an incredible amount by any measure, but still short of reflecting the total of 118.45 million total of new shares that had been created between Friday and Tuesday (which led them to adjust down shares outstanding by 8.6 million on Wednesday 3 February).

Over this time, you can see a nearly one for one relationship between the change in number of SLV shares outstanding and the amount of silver ounces claimed to be added to SLV.

Between Friday 29 January and Wednesday 3 February inclusive, SLV shares outstanding increased by a net 109.85 million. Over the 3-day period from Friday 29 January to Tuesday 2 February, SLV claimed to have added an incredible 109.83 million ozs of silver (3,416.11 tonnes), with holdings of silver bars rising from 567.52 million ozs of silver to 677.35 million ounces (from 17,651.77 tonnes to 21,067.88 tonnes).

According to the SLV daily bar lists, this extra 3,416.11 tonnes of silver added to SLV between 29 January and 2 February was in the form of 113,501 Good Delivery silver bars (the bars weighing approx. 1000 oz each). Again, according to the SLV bar list, these bars were added in five London vaults which SLV uses, namely Brinks vault in Premier Park London (45.5%), Loomis London vault (27.7%), Brinks Unit 7 vault Radius Park London (15.5%), Malca Amit London vault (6.0%) and JP Morgan’s own London vault (a measly 5.3%).

In fact, according to the bar lists, SLV only started tapping into silver in the Brinks Premier park vault on Monday 1 February, and only started tapping to silver held in the Loomis London vault on Tuesday 2 February. Which to some people may look like a case of desperation or maybe even panic.

 

SLV silver holdings over the 6 months from August 2020 to February 2021. Source: www.GoldChartsRUs.com

Unable to Acquire Sufficient Silver

Adding 3,416.11 tonnes of silver to SLV between 29 January and 2 February is not something that JP Morgan can easily claim to do again.

Which is why it’s particularly interesting that on Wednesday 3 February, right after claiming to add 3416 tonnes of silver to SLV by frantically tapping the LBMA vaults in London, the iShares Silver Trust prospectus was changed, and the following wording added:

“The demand for silver may temporarily exceed available supply that is acceptable for delivery to the Trust, which may adversely affect an investment in the Shares.

To the extent that demand for silver exceeds the available supply at that time, Authorized Participants may not be able to readily acquire sufficient amounts of silver necessary for the creation of a Basket.

Baskets may be created only by Authorized Participants, and are only issued in exchange for an amount of silver determined by the Trustee that meets the specifications described below under “Description of the Shares and the Trust Agreement— Deposit of Silver; Issuance of Baskets” on each day that NYSE Arca is open for regular trading. Market speculation in silver could result in increased requests for the issuance of Baskets.

It is possible that Authorized Participants may be unable to acquire sufficient silver that is acceptable for delivery to the Trust for the issuance of new Baskets due to a limited then-available supply coupled with a surge in demand for the Shares.

In such circumstances, the Trust may suspend or restrict the issuance of Baskets. Such occurrence may lead to further volatility in Share price and deviations, which may be significant, in the market price of the Shares relative to the NAV.”

That the prospectus change was first drafted on Wednesday 3 February is clear by looking at prospectus pdf filename which is ‘p-ishares-silver-trust-prospectus-3-feb.pdf’ and the pdf title ‘Microsoft Word - slv20210203_s3asr_v1.docx’, which was authored by someone called ‘nick’. While the draft started in Word, the final version was saved as a pdf on 5 February.

SLV Prospectus amendment draft created on Wednesday 3 February

The final pdf date is the same day, 5 February, that the amended prospectus was quietly uploaded to the SEC Edgar website here with an effective date of 8 February. The previous version of the SLV prospectus was from 14 January

SLV informs SEC of its amended prospectus, 5 February

Below you can see the changes in the new 8 February version of the SLV prospectus compared to the 14 January version.

SLV Prospectus" Left Hand Side - 14 January version, Right Hand Side New February version

BullionStar picked up on the fact that there was a new prospectus with the suspicious 3 February date, and then a twitter user (h/t Roelzns) compared the two prospectus versions to pinpoint the amended text

In addition to the paragraph above about silver demand exceeding available silver supply, the SLV prospectus also added into two further paragraghs under the first, one of which ominously predicting volatile share price movements that could be uncorrelated to the silver price: 

“Risks Related to the Shares

A sudden increase in demand for Shares that temporarily exceeds supply may result in price volatility of the Shares.

A significant change in the sentiment of investors towards silver may occur. Investors may purchase Shares to speculate on the price of silver or to hedge existing silver exposure. Speculation on the price of silver may involve long and short exposures. To the extent that the aggregate short exposure exceeds the number of Shares available for purchase, investors with short exposure may have to pay a premium to repurchase Shares for delivery to Share lenders.

In turn, those repurchases may dramatically increase the price of the Shares until additional Shares are issued through the creation process. This could lead to volatile price movements in Shares that are not directly correlated to the price of silver."

Humorously, the third new paragraph inserted into the SLV prospectus explains that the silver price, which don't forget is a paper price set by the dominance of bullion bank trading on COMEX and LBMA London, is subject to extreme fluctuations which are unrelated to physical silver demand and supply, but alas there is no mention of the years long silver price manipulations that JP Morgan and other LBMA cronies have been recently prosecuted for:   

The trading price of the Shares has recently been, and could potentially continue to be, volatile.

The trading price of the Shares has been highly volatile and could continue to be subject to wide fluctuations in response to various factors. The silver market in general has experienced extreme price and volume fluctuations that have often been unrelated or disproportionate to factors such as silver's uses in jewelry, technology, and industrial applications, or cost and production levels in major silver-producing countries such as China, Mexico, and Peru. In particular, supply chain disruptions resulting from the COVID-19 outbreak and investor speculation have significantly contributed to recent price and volume fluctuations.”

If the short squeeze on GameStop caused fireworks among a few hedge funds on Wall Street, we hate to think what a short squeeze on the global silver supply will look like as hedge funds wake up to the possibility that SLV "cannot acquire sufficient silver acceptable for delivery to the Trust".

Edited February 15, 2021 by Tom Nolan