Gold Silver March 2020 Review

[LawrenceChard]

This is a market review I wrote yesterday 25th March 2020, partly for the benefit of our staff, but also intended to go out as a blog post on our website.

I don't think we have had time to add it, as things have been hectic. Some of our staff have been working until almost midnight, others from 6.00 a.m., mainly to pick and pack exisitng orders, so we could make a clean start to each day.

Gold Silver March 2020 Review

 

Gold 

Gold peaked at £1302.68 on 9th March, before a big sell-off dropped it to just under £1200 (£1182.51) on 16th March. 

Since then it recovered to the £1270 - £1280 range late last week through to Monday. Today it has rocketed up to about £1368 as I write this. 

Smart investors already bought gold in early January at around the £1150 level. 

Even smarter ones were buying at year ago for under £1000 per ounce, possibly as low as £971. 

Is it still smart to be buying gold at current levels? We don’t know! 

At all the dips and troughs during the past year, we would certainly have been keener to keep our gold stock up, and we would have been advising customers similarly.  

I might explain that although we are always happy to sell gold to investors, we are almost always even keener to replace it as soon as possible. 

 

Silver 

A year ago, silver was trading around the £11.50 price mark, at a Gold:Silver ratio of around 85:1; it peaked at £16.01 on 4th September 2019, at a Gold:Silver ratio of 80.03; before dipping to below £13 in December with Gold:Silver around 85. 

For most of January and February it was in the £13 to £14 price range, with Gold:Silver around 85 rising to 90. On Leap Day (29th February 2020), it touched £13.00 and Gold:Silver took off to 95+. 

In the big precious metals sell-off, the Gold:Silver ratio hit an all-time high of 126.35 on 18th March, with spot silver briefly dropping below £10. 

Smart silver investors should have been filling their boots (car boots?) with the stuff during that week. Silver prices remained below £11 until 23rd March. 

As I write this, silver is currently £11.86 per ounce, and the Gold:Silver ratio has only eased slightly to 113.582; so still remains very cheap compared with gold. 

Platinum looks dirt cheap at below £600, but we don’t have any secondary market platinum bullion in stock. 

[dicker]

Thanks Mr Chard.  I have been a customer of yours previously and really appreciate your comms and insights.

 

Best

Dicker

[Cornishfarmer]

@LawrenceChard thanks for adding this, have you ever seen a time like the last month?    Think you said you started in 64 so gone through several crashes and huge political events.    Is this standard? Ie after 9/11 or the banking bail out?

[LawrenceChard]

36 minutes ago, Cornishfarmer said:

@LawrenceChard thanks for adding this, have you ever seen a time like the last month?    Think you said you started in 64 so gone through several crashes and huge political events.    Is this standard? Ie after 9/11 or the banking bail out?

Yes, we have been there before.

... Except that each crisis is different in some way or other.

In 2008/9 it was "only" a financial crisis (only money), this time it is a health crisis, so lives are at stake.

Before 2008/9, I regularly flew to mainland Europe to visit major banks and fellow dealers, and brought back gold as hand luggage. The biggest and heaviest lot I brought back was 44Kgs. I had this in 2 rucksacks and 5 bumbags, to distribute the weight. I ended up with bruises around my waist and hips. I was good fun! At the time, we refrained from publishing this information, for obvious security reasons. I don't do that now, so I can tell.

On at least one occasion, we also loaded about half a tonne of silver bars into our car, and drove it back. If you try that at home, don't put it in the boot, stash it in the rear passenger footwell, more stable and safer loading of the car, and more secure.

We can't go and collect stuff in the current crisis, which is one of the main differences.

Gotta keep this brief, because I am need elsewhere right now, more later if you want it.

[sovereignsteve]

44 kg of gold omg as they say🥂

[AuricGoldfinger]

Nice! 👍