The price of silver has undergone a sudden price change in the last week, starting on May 5th. In a few days the price of the metal went from 72 dollars an ounce to 87, slowing down only today 13 May. A trend that had not occurred for at least two months in silver prices, which reached a peak in January and then collapsed, although they remained much higher than a year ago.
Clear difference with gold prices, which instead seem to have relatively stabilized, especially when compared to the great variability at the beginning of the year. The most precious metal has been between 4,500 and 4,700 dollars an ounce for more than a month now.
The sudden change in silver prices
In the last week, silver prices have increased suddenly. From May 5th to May 13th they gained 20%, reaching 87 dollars an ounce from 72. Silver had remained relatively stable for more than a month, traveling between 70 and 75 dollars an ounce without major variations.
A novelty compared to the recent past. The silver market has in fact experienced a period of enormous instability, doubling in value in the space of two months from the end of November 2025 to the end of January 2026, when the metal reached the record price of 116 dollars an ounce. Then, on January 30, a sudden drop of 30%, followed by a period of instability with sudden increases and decreases in value, until the last collapse in early March, which had led to weeks of stability in the spring.
The reason for this trend should be linked in particular to a greater industrial demand for silver, combined with new export limitations imposed by India, which wants to limit sales of precious metals to strengthen its currency
The stability of gold prices
It would not, therefore, be a new speculative wave like the one that hit silver and gold at the beginning of the year. This is demonstrated precisely by the price of gold which, after months of rises and falls which have cast doubt on the role of this metal as a safe haven asset, has stabilised.
Since the beginning of April, in fact, gold has continued to remain within a range of 100 dollars per ounce of variation, never exceeding 4,750 and never falling below 4,650. An anomaly compared to previous months, when the market regularly recorded variations of several hundred dollars an ounce in a single day.
Because gold and silver are linked to the war in Iran
Even if the latest movements in gold and silver are linked to industrial logic, these metals have an important role as a safe haven at an international level. Investors tend to buy gold and silver when they fear an inflationary flare-up could occur. When this occurs, or approaches, prices first collapse and then stabilize.
This is exactly what happened with the war in Iran. Throughout the lead-up to the conflict, gold and silver performed out of the ordinary, because investors were accumulating while waiting for a major geopolitical event to upset the markets.
At the beginning of March, when the US actually attacked Iran, the prices of gold and silver collapsed, because many investors sold their reserves to free up liquidity and take advantage of the opportunities that the markets presented. Now that the war is at a standstill, there is no need for accumulation or selling, so prices stagnate.
