Backwardation and Physical Premiums

Stijn Schmitz welcomes Bill Holter to the show. Bill is a Precious Metals Expert and Broker. In this in-depth discussion about the precious metals market, Holter provides a comprehensive overview of the current dynamics driving silver and gold prices, highlighting a significant structural shift in the global metals market. Holter emphasizes a substantial supply and demand deficit in silver, estimated at 300-400 million ounces, driven by increasing industrial applications such as AI technology and electric vehicle batteries.

He notes that physical metal exchanges like Shanghai are experiencing significant premiums over paper markets, indicating a fundamental change in metals trading. This phenomenon, known as backwardation, suggests investors are increasingly prioritizing physical metal ownership over paper contracts. Bill predicts a potential transformation in global currency systems, suggesting that the US dollar is declining while BRICS nations are developing a potentially gold-backed settlement currency. Holter believes this shift could dramatically impact global financial markets, with gold and silver emerging as the only truly trustworthy currencies.

Institutional buying is currently driving the precious metals market, with family offices, hedge funds, and even sovereign nations like Russia purchasing significant quantities. Holter sees this as a critical moment for metals, potentially leading to a delivery failure in silver markets that could trigger massive price increases. For individual investors, Holter recommends starting with silver, particularly “junk silver” coins minted before 1965, which offer the most practical and recognizable form of silver ownership. He stresses that it’s not too late to enter the market, warning that current financial systems are fundamentally unstable and that precious metals represent a critical hedge against potential economic collapse.

Timestamps:
00:00:00 – Introduction
00:01:00 – 2025 Precious Metals Review
00:01:41 – Structural Supply Deficit
00:02:29 – Industrial Demand & Vaults
00:03:21 – Backwardation and Premiums
00:06:04 – Historical Interventions
00:07:17 – Gold vs Silver Differences
00:09:30 – BRICS Remonetization Outlook
00:11:42 – Failure to Deliver Risks
00:13:58 – Institutional Buying Trends
00:14:56 – Retail Flows and Junk Silver
00:20:10 – Silver Going Mainstream
00:21:48 – Investment Advice for Beginners
00:23:17 – Fiat Collapse and Great Taking
00:26:03 – Concluding Thoughts

Guest Links:
Facebook: https://facebook.com/groups/jsmineset/
Website: https://billholter.com
E-Mail: mailto:bholter@proton.me

Bill was a stockbroker for 23 years and a branch manager for 12. He retired and moved his family out of the U.S. to Costa Rica in late 2006. He returned to Texas in 2011. He was a contributor to GATA since 2007 and began writing for Miles Franklin from 2012 to 2015. He then joined with Jim Sinclair and the Holter/Sinclair collaboration from 2015-2022.

Bill is a precious metals expert and broker, he clears through Miles Franklin.