Historic gold, silver price rally: project economics lens for mine planners
Reviewed by Tom Sullivan
First reported on MINING.com
30 Second Briefing
Gold, silver and platinum hit fresh records on Friday, with spot gold touching $4,540/oz, February Comex futures peaking at $4,584/oz and March silver futures jumping over 9% to $78.30/oz, as palladium surged 13% to above $2,000/oz. Gold is heading for a >70% annual gain, driven by robust central bank buying and ETF inflows, including SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) increasing its holdings by more than 20% and physically backed funds taking in $82 billion (749 tonnes) by 22 December. Silver has rallied 160% in 2025 amid an October short squeeze, ongoing supply dislocations between London and New York vaults, and a pending US Commerce Department probe that could impose tariffs or trade restrictions.
Technical Brief
- Platinum moved 10% on the day to $2,475/oz, indicating extreme short-term volatility in PGM pricing.
- Palladium’s $234/oz single-session gain pushed prices comfortably above the $2,000/oz threshold.
- Physically backed gold ETFs absorbed $82 billion (749 t) by 22 December, tightening freely available bullion.
- SPDR Gold Shares (GLD) expanded its physical inventory by over 20% during 2025, amplifying warehouse demand.
- London silver vaults have seen post-squeeze inflows, yet much tradable inventory remains concentrated in New York.
Our Take
With gold up more than 70% and silver about 160% in 2025, the relative outperformance of silver in our gold- and silver-tagged coverage suggests primary silver projects and polymetallic gold–silver deposits could see renewed economic viability at grades that were marginal even a year ago.
The 749 tonnes of gold represented by 2025 ETF inflows is large enough to influence mine planning for assets like Essakane in Burkina Faso, where operators may be incentivised to accelerate higher-grade sequencing or defer closure to capture elevated price decks in 2026 budgets.
Compared with other 2025 metals price spikes in our database—such as record copper prices tied to major mine outages—the current gold and silver rally is being driven more by financial flows (GLD and other ETFs) than supply shocks, which may leave producers more exposed to sentiment reversals than to physical market tightness.
Prepared by collating external sources, AI-assisted tools, and Geomechanics.io’s proprietary mining database, then reviewed for technical accuracy & edited by our geotechnical team.
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