Category Archives: Silver Rounds

Gold hits a record high above $2,900 an ounce early Monday on U.S. President Donald Trump’s promised steel and aluminum … Continue reading →

U.S. President Donald Trump meets with Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba (not pictured) at the White House in Washington, U.S., Feb. 7, 2025. 
Kent Nishimura | Reuters

President Donald Trump ordered a halt to the production of new pennies, which he said will help reduce “wasteful” government spending.
“For far too long the United States has minted pennies which literally cost us more than 2 cents,” Trump said in a Truth Social post. “This is so wasteful! I have instructed my Secretary of the US Treasury to stop producing new pennies. Let’s rip the waste out of our great nations budget, even if it’s a penny at a time,” Trump wrote.

It’s not clear whether the president has the authority to stop the manufacture of the currency. According to the U.S. Constitution, coinage power, as recognized by the Supreme Court, is “exclusive” to Congress. Federal law says the Treasury Secretary can mint and issue coins as necessary for the needs of the United States.
But at least one analyst on Wall Street expects that the penny’s days are numbered. TD Cowen’s Jaret Seiberg said the halt will likely to pass judicial review, leading to a shortage in the coin.
“We believe this order would survive judicial review, which is why this is likely to occur,” Seiberg wrote on Monday. “We worry about this leading to a shortage of pennies, which could force merchants to pay banks more for coins. It also adds legal risk for merchants and banks. That could create the crisis needed to force Congress to act.”
Seiberg said he expects this could support the move toward electronic payments, bolstering companies such as Visa, MasterCard and other real-time payment networks.
What is clear is that pennies cost to make than they are worth. In 2024, the U.S. Mint spent 3.69 cents to manufacture each penny, according to an annual report. That meant the cost of each penny has run above its face value for a 19th straight fiscal year.
The latest U.S. Mint report suggests the nickel better watch its back too. Each five-cent piece costs the Mint 13.78 cents to make. Continue reading →

Market analyst Michael Oliver predicts a precious metals boom, led by silver and gold miners, as the stock market falters. … Continue reading →

Gold has surged 4.8% in a week, nearing $2,870 amid trade wars, record central bank buying, and soaring demand. Will … Continue reading →

In the monthly bulletin reserved for GoldBroker clients, I analyze the historic rise in COMEX stocks recorded in January. For the … Continue reading →

China’s futures traders drove a remarkable $400 surge in gold prices this past spring, and now they are positioned to … Continue reading →

The U.S. has used tariffs since its founding in the 18th century.
They were primarily a way to raise revenue in the nation’s early days. Later, tariffs were largely used to restrict imports or as a bargaining chip to reduce trade barriers.
President Donald Trump’s use of the import duties has broken with historical norms, economists and historians said.

Shipping containers are seen at the Port of Montreal in Montreal, Canada, on Feb. 3, 2025. 
Andrej Ivanov | Afp | Getty Images

President Donald Trump imposed broad tariffs on China on Tuesday, while tariff threats hang over other major trading partners like Canada, the European Union and Mexico.
That may lead some to wonder: How have tariffs been wielded through U.S. history, and is Trump unique in his use of them?

The ‘three Rs’ of tariffs

The U.S. has used tariffs since its founding in the 18th century.
In fact, the Tariff Act of 1789 was among the first bills ever passed by Congress.
Since then, the U.S. has used tariffs to achieve three broad goals, said Douglas Irwin, an economics professor at Dartmouth College and past president of the Economic History Association.
Irwin calls them the “three Rs” — revenue, restriction (import barriers to protect domestic industry) and reciprocity (a bargaining chip to cut deals with other countries).

Using tariffs for revenue

Tariffs are taxes on U.S. imports, paid by the entity that’s importing the foreign good. Those taxes raise revenue to help fund the federal government.

For roughly the first third of the nation’s history — from its founding until the Civil War — the revenue motivation was “paramount” as a driver to impose import duties, Irwin said. The federal government relied on tariffs for about 90% or more of its revenue during that period, he said.

But things changed after the Civil War, Irwin said. The U.S. started to impose other taxes, like excise taxes, that made the nation less reliant on tariffs.
Tariffs generated about half of federal revenue from about 1860 to 1913, when the income tax was created, Irwin said.
The scale of the government expanded significantly in the 1930s — with the creation of New Deal programs like Social Security — and later for defense spending during WWII and the Cold War, said Kris James Mitchener, an economics professor at Santa Clara University who studies economic history and political economy.
Today, “tariffs simply cannot raise enough revenue to fund government expenditure,” Mitchener said. “There’s no possible way you could support the size of the U.S. military on tariff revenue.”

Restriction and reciprocity

From the Civil War to the Great Depression, the U.S. primarily used tariffs as a restrictive measure on imports, to insulate the domestic market from foreign competition, Irwin said.
For example, the Tariff Act of 1930, popularly known as the Smoot-Hawley Tariff, levied protective tariffs on roughly 800 to 900 different types of goods, accounting for about 25% of all goods imported to the U.S., Mitchener said.
Then, the post-Depression era — especially the post-World War II period — ushered in an era of “reciprocity,” Irwin said.
The U.S. helped create the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in 1948, the precursor to the World Trade Organization, which set global rules for trade and ushered in an era of low tariffs.
More from Personal Finance:What the ‘mother of all trade wars’ can teach us about U.S. tariffsCould Trump’s tariffs replace the income tax?Stockpiling ahead of higher tariffs is a big mistake
That said, the U.S. also used tariffs as a reciprocal bargaining chip before WWII.
For example, before the U.S. annexed Hawaii, it signed a free-trade agreement with the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1875. The treaty allowed for duty-free imports of Hawaiian sugar and other agricultural products into the U.S. In exchange, the U.S. got exclusive access to the harbor that would later be known as Pearl Harbor.

How the president’s tariff power grew

U.S. import taxes before the WWII era were pretty high, ranging from 20% to 50%, sometimes even reaching 60%, Irwin said. They have been “very low” since 1950 or so, he said.
The average duty on goods subject to a tariff was about 2% to 4% in the 2010s before Trump’s first term, Mitchener said.
“That’s what President Trump is trying to overturn, this sort of low period of tariffs we’ve had since World War II,” Irwin said.

Before 1934, it was Congress — not presidents — that had power over tariff rates and negotiations, said Andrew Wender Cohen, a history professor at Syracuse University.
But Democrats — then known as the political party of free trade — had an enormous majority around the New Deal era and passed the Reciprocal Trade Agreements Act of 1934, granting the president the right to negotiate tariffs in certain cases, Cohen said.
“That’s when the president gains a much more substantial authority,” Cohen said.
That power accelerated after 1948 during the “transformation of the whole global economic order,” he said.

Why Trump tariff policy is ‘very unusual,’ economists say

President Donald Trump in the Oval Office of the White House on Feb. 03, 2025. 
Anna Moneymaker | Getty Images News | Getty Images

That said, Trump’s use of tariff policy is “very unusual” among modern U.S. presidents, Cohen said.
For one, Trump “likes all three Rs” — revenue, restriction and reciprocity, Irwin said.
For example, on the campaign trail, he suggested that tariffs could replace the U.S. income tax to fund the government. He said during his campaign that they would create U.S. factory jobs and has threatened to use them to strongarm Denmark to give up Greenland.
However, there are tradeoffs, Irwin said. For example, restricting imports somewhat negates tariffs’ ability to raise revenue, because it diminishes the tax base for tariffs, he said. (Those additional duties may cause companies to import less or push people to buy less, for instance.)
“You can’t really achieve all three objectives at same time,” he said.
Additionally, no previous president has tried to link a U.S. drug crisis to trade policy, as Trump did with fentanyl.
“That’s a novel take,” Mitchener said.

Many presidents have used tariffs. For example, George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon applied tariffs to protect the U.S. steel industry, as Trump did in his first term, Irwin said.
“What’s unusual about Trump is, he’s not just picking out particular industries that he thinks are of strategic importance, but he’s blocking imports across the board almost with some of these countries,” Irwin said.  
Trump imposed a 10% additional tariff on all Chinese goods, for example, and threatened a 25% tariff on imports from Canada and Mexico.
“No president in recent memory has really used tariffs across the board or in a broad-brush way to achieve various objectives,” Irwin said. “They’ve sort of adhered to the rule that we belong to the WTO. That means we keep our tariffs low as long as other countries keep their tariffs low.”
Cohen agreed.

Global trade treaties, like the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) Trump signed in his first term, establish a mechanism for nations to file grievances for alleged unfair trade practices, Cohen said. Nations can generally raise tariffs as a retaliatory measure if trade rules are breached, per the treaty terms, he said.
Trump’s recent unilateral tariff announcements are unique in this regard, he said.
“I can’t think of any precedent for that,” Cohen said.
“While the executive branch was given much more power since 1934, it’s always been subject to the specific terms of the agreements,” he said. Continue reading →

The silver market is forecast to record a fifth straight market deficit in 2025, with demand once again outstripping supply.

Analysts at the Silver Institute call the projected market deficit “sizeable.” 

The Silver Institute projects record silver offtake this year, with overall demand coming in at around 1.20 billion ounces.

Supply is expected to grow by 3 percent, but it won’t be nearly enough to feed growing demand. This will lead to a 149 million-ounce market deficit. While the gap between supply and demand will shrink by about 19 percent from last year’s level, it will remain “sizeable historically.” 

This supply shortfall will have to be filled by existing stocks of above-ground metal, potentially driving prices higher.

Silver Demand in 2025 

According to the Silver Institute, growing industrial and investment demand will be somewhat offset by sagging offtake in the jewelry and silverware sectors.

Industrial demand is expected to grow by another 3 percent coming off a record year in 2024. Continuing growth in the green energy sector – specifically solar energy applications – will continue to drive overall demand higher. 

Policies implemented by the Trump administration will likely put pressure on renewable energy initiatives in the U.S., however, analysts at the Silver Institute still expect global photovoltaics installations to reach another all-time high in 2025.

The rapid growth of artificial intelligence (AI) will also fuel demand for silver.

Silver is a key component in circuit boards, semiconductors, and connectors and is vital in reducing electrical resistance and enhancing processing speeds in AI applications. AI also requires massive data centers that rely on advanced cooling systems and efficient electrical transmission. Silver is used in heat-dissipation materials and high-speed connectivity components in these big data centers.

Silver is also an important input in the automotive industry. Even assuming slower growth in battery electrical vehicle production, silver demand is expected to remain robust in this sector due to greater vehicle sophistication, electrification of powertrains (albeit at a reduced pace), and ongoing investment in expanding related infrastructure. 

On the investment side of the coin, silver demand is expected to grow by around 3 percent due to increasing retail buying in the West. According to the Silver Institute, “As Western investors adjust to new price levels, fresh investment is expected to improve, and profit-taking will also ease.”

Analysts say there are several factors underpinning investment demand.

“Uncertainty over U.S. trade and foreign policy, record-high U.S. equities, and worries about U.S. public debt levels should all reinforce interest in portfolio diversification, which in turn will benefit silver and gold investment. Moreover, even if the pace of U.S. policy rate cuts slows in 2025, the consensus is still that they are coming. Coupled with sticky inflation, this points to potential declines in real rates ahead.”

Silver Institute analysts say that any kind of crisis could drive investment demand even higher.

Given the Federal Reserve is walking a monetary policy tightrope, and the economy has been distorted by decades of easy money policies, the likelihood of some kind of economic upheaval is elevated.

This is exacerbated by the fact that the central bank is caught in a Catch-22.

On the one hand, the Fed needs to keep rates elevated to address price inflation. 

On the other hand, the debt-riddled bubble economy can’t function in a higher interest rate environment.

Clearly, the Fed can’t do both, meaning rising price inflation or an economic meltdown are in the cards. In the worst-case scenario, we could see a combination of both – stagflation.

The demand for jewelry and silverware is expected to soften in 2025, with jewelry fabrication declining by about 6 percent.

According to the Silver Institute, India will account for the bulk of the decline due to higher local prices. Chinese demand is also expected to drop due to “cautious spending by consumers on non-essential items.”

Silver Supply in 2025

On the supply side, silver mine production is expected to grow by 2 percent to a seven-year high of 844 million ounces, with increased output anticipated from both existing and new operations in several markets. But even with the surge in mine output, the silver mining sector faces structural challenges. 

Silver mine output peaked in 2016 at 900 million ounces. Up until last year, silver production had dropped by an average of 1.4 percent each year. In 2023, mines produced 814 million ounces of silver.

According to Metals Focus, a combination of reserve depletion, mine closures, and a 20 percent drop in ore grades drove sagging mine output. 

With prices rising, silver recycling is projected to increase by 5 percent, with volumes breaching 200 million ounces for the first time since 2012. According to the Silver Institute, “Industrial scrap will be the key growth driver, particularly changeouts in ethylene oxide catalysts. Jewelry and silverware recycling will also rise, reflecting India’s price-led gains.” 

Silver Isn’t Priced for These Dynamics 

While silver gained over 20 percent in 2024, many investors consider it a laggard because it remains far below its all-time high, even as gold continues to set new records. Given the supply and demand dynamics, there is the potential for silver to shine in 2025.

The gold-silver ratio is hovering at around 90-1, indicating that silver is on sale when priced in gold. Historically, when the ratio gets distorted to this degree, it tends to snap back to the mean with a vengeance as the silver price spikes to catch up.

And as already mentioned, there is the potential for economic chaos in the coming months.

Furthermore, as analyst Jesse Colombo explained, bearish investor sentiment on silver due to its perceived underperformance last year is bullish from a contrarian perspective. 

When you add it all up, there are plenty of reasons to be bullish on silver and it appears at least some in the mainstream are picking up on these dynamics. Continue reading →

Silver is on the brink of a historic breakout, trading at $32.69 with projections hitting $50 by mid-year. With rising … Continue reading →

Gold rose to an all-time high early Wednesday on concerns over the U.S. and China trade war. The two countries … Continue reading →