Yesterday, silver briefly pushed toward $92/oz, a level that traders had been watching closely. Momentum was building and the market was approaching a key delivery period in the futures calendar.
And then CME Group halted metals and natural gas trading. Orders were cancelled, the market paused and when it reopened the upward pressure had faded. The exchange has described this as a technical interruption, and it may well have been but one cannot ignore the timing of all this.
Most retail investors do not follow COMEX mechanics closely, because there isn’t a great need to. However, futures markets like COMEX are where the global “paper price” of silver is discovered. That benchmark influences ETFs, mining shares and even the retail price you see quoted online.
In a healthy market, if demand for silver is overwhelming supply, the price rises until balance is restored. That process can be volatile, but it is transparent. When a market stops instead of clearing through price, it introduces a different kind of risk. It suggests that stress is being managed through interruption rather than resolution.
In today’s GoldCoreTV episode, we explain what happened, why the halt occurred at such a sensitive moment in the delivery cycle, and what it tells us about the difference between paper silver exposure and owning physical metal outright.
We are not suggesting an imminent default or collapse. Exchanges have tools to stabilise trading and they use them regularly. The more relevant question for investors is whether paper pricing mechanisms are always aligned with the interests of those who want the underlying asset.
If you own physical silver in your name, stored securely outside the banking system, a trading halt is simply a news event. If you rely entirely on paper exposure, the functioning of that system becomes part of your risk.
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