[Price Review] Driven by CME’s seven consecutive emergency margin hikes on silver futures to 18%, a liquidity squeeze and exchange-mandated cooling measures together steered the overheated silver price back to earth. This week the silver market moved sideways after wild swings. On the SHFE side, the exchange released on Wednesday the “Automatic Conversion Standard for Hedging Position Quotas”; although the TD price on the SGE did not narrow versus the SHFE silver 2602 contract, the backwardation structure of the SHFE calendar spread kept converging and the risk of a speculative short squeeze declined. This week the SGE deferred-fee direction again stayed “short pays long”, and traders holding longs still found it hard to pick up physical metal through SGE delivery. As for the gold/silver ratio, silver’s plunge far outpaced gold’s, sending the ratio from the prior 47× low to near the 70 handle, a two-and-a-half-month high, showing silver’s volatility during deleveraging was markedly above gold’s. By 12 February, as silver rebounded, the ratio pulled back to roughly 60×; with short-term speculative money out, the ratio is expected to consolidate in a range.
[Key Data]
Bullish: US Dec retail sales m/m 0%, below both prior and expectations
Bearish:
US Jan unemployment 4.3%, below prior and expectations
US Jan seasonally adjusted non-farm payrolls 130,000, above prior and expectations
US week to 6 Feb EIA crude inventory: 8.53 million barrels, above prior and expectations
Data and macro headlines to watch next week include:
This Friday the US will release the Jan non-farm payrolls and unemployment, but note the BLS has warned the report could be delayed due to the partial government shutdown. Several Fed officials will speak, including Atlanta Fed President Bostic on the economic outlook.
[Price Forecast] Domestic markets entered a holiday lull this week. Overseas liquidity over the holiday left short-term speculative money cautious about re-entering silver, awaiting either the full deflation of price froth or the removal of margin-hike risk controls. Post-holiday silver is expected to search for a new equilibrium after the wild swings. A possibly soft US data set this week and lingering worries over Fed independence have weakened the US dollar index, briefly lifting precious metals. Although supply-demand fundamentals still lend medium- and long-term support, sentiment-driven spikes and the ever-present threat of rapid pullbacks keep silver in a high-risk, high-volatility environment. Overall, post-holiday silver is likely to hover at highs; stay alert to liquidity risk amid elevated volatility.
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