re that Theta TV video - classic cetail sector 'wish fulfillment' with them blowing inaccurate takeouts to absurd extremes
Jeff Currie was talking about Silver as a much larger market than an equity market like Gamestop
each individual stock etc on a bourse is an equity market - ie a market in an equity
its just that the same description is also used - again somewhat misleadingly - to describe indexes by media - so thats the connotation most retail people have when they think of 'equity markets'. But it actually means both - and more.
So - all Jeff Currie was trying to say was that most individual equities have much tighter distribution/supply patterns than the Silver market - so Silver is much harder to force a short squeeze
the Silver market while tiny compared to most global commodity markets - tiny against gold etc - absolutely dwarfs most common single stock equity markets
The other complication is that commodities aren't a defined and fixed supply/demand distribution pool - unlike shares ex a CR/issue.
constant inflow/ex flow of production, recycling and useage - and a shadow inventory of historically accumulated holdings both in dore and non dore form
So more levers to source added product - which makes accurately guaging the chance of a price sqeeze via physical shortage harder
Once you add that many of the actors in the physical market have incentive to suppress silver pricing - and so undertake cross counterparty silver inventory lending, double counting etc, and that many have their fingers in multiple ownership/control positions across the industry - the squeeze math becomes foggy at best
thats why the big rise in wholesale silver bar premiums - ie generally bought only by institutions and UHNWs - is imo the best guague to support the view of real physical shortage through the supply chain all the way up to the financialisation nerve center is there to backstop any on-market squeeze
Silver has always been historically susceptible to short squeezes because demand is almost totally price insensitive- if anything rising prices tend to increase demand not reduce it
industrial buyers are price takers. theyll generally pay any price - albeit at real price extremes there is r&d effort to reduce demand by either swapping out for other metals or more commonly reducing the amount through alloys or more efficient design. go from a 3nm to a 2nm contact etc
but that stuff is basically miniscule vs monetary demand
the more money demand causes the price to rise the more money demand there tends to be.
its just that money demand has only been infrequent and not sustained since 1970. but the fiat spendathon backdrop now is much more likely to create sustained monetary demand - so stronger for longer silver pricing
but the bidding into silver now isnt simply or probably even primarily because of some reddit callout.
it was happening organically because of the fiat backdrop and in particular because of the hot system inflation data coming through.
the probability of surging US M2/debt to gdp, capped bond yields and rising inflation makes gold/silver a preferred asset class
if that backdrop wasnt there - you wouldnt be seeing the big insto/hnw money thats increasingly opting to take futures contract deliveries - youd just see the big bid into SLV etc
and yes - the only silver etf worth a bid is sprott's.
many posters have said this repeatedly since the /rsilversqueeze meme became a thing
anyone buying another silver etf is more than likely simply adding firepower to bullion banks.. though ofc where it means double counting becomes triple counting - it may come back to bite the BBs in 2nd order effects if the dam does in fact burst
