Gold & Precious Metals

Improving Investor Sentiment Helped Drive the Price Higher in 2019: Interim Silver Market Review

Posted by Larry Kahaner

on Monday, 6 January 2020 12:01

The last few months have seen a major improvement in investor sentiment towards silver, according to Philip Newman, Director at Metals Focus, who recently presented the Metals Focus / Silver Institute Interim Silver Market Review. The silver price benefitted in 2019 from a host of factors, including global economic and political concerns, as some investors sought safe haven investments, such as silver.

Highlights of the Interim Silver Market Review include:
• Healthy gains were projected for physical silver investment in 2019, with sales of silver bars and coins projected to rise by 7% to a three-year high. In the US, investment was on track to record its first annual increase in four years, thanks to improving price expectations and rising price volatility, although levels remained historically low. In India, the partial recovery that started in 2017 continued in 2019, although the sharp rally in the rupee price saw sales ease recently, particularly in rural areas.

• Disruptions and strikes across South America impacted global mine production, which was expected to fall by 0.7% in 2019 to 849.3 million ounces.

• For the second year in a row, silver industrial fabrication was expected to hold at a record high. However, in the wake of the escalating US-China trade war, several areas of silver electrical and electronic end-uses have struggled. That said, any negative impact on silver demand had been mitigated by higher silver usage in other categories, especially in the automotive sector.

• Global silver jewelry and silverware demand was projected to grow by 3% and 4% respectively in 2019. For both, the year’s increases were almost entirely led by India, where gains had been assisted by increasing awareness of sterling silver, and growth in organized retailing, along with the benefits from restrained silver prices in the first half of 2019. • Overall, the silver market was expected to record a small surplus in 2019. However, this metal should have been easily absorbed by investors as rising macroeconomic uncertainties and fresh monetary easing by major central banks rejuvenated the appeal of safe haven assets from mid-2019 onwards which, looking ahead, should continue to benefit precious metal prices.

For more information about the report including a supply & demand chart, click here.

Why Pirates Are Giving Up On Oil

Posted by Julianne Geiger

on Monday, 6 January 2020 10:07

Piracy in some of the world’s most critical oil chokepoints is on the rise–but now, pirates are resorting back to another method of income generation better suited to times of lower oil prices: taking human captives.

Sometimes, black market oil prices just aren’t lucrative enough. In the days of $100 oil, oil theft was a hot commodity. Today, pirates are supplementing their stolen oil income with ransomed sailors, creating a whole new set of problems for the oil industry to tackle.

Where Piracy is Hot, and Where It’s Not

Piracy is being dealt with fairly successfully in certain regions of the world. In others, efforts to shore up maritime security have failed. But the threat of pirates taking human captives is alive and well in all regions.

East Africa – Once a piracy hotspot, piracy off Somalia’s coast has fallen in recent years as the international community–including Iran–stepped up to tackle this pressing problem that disrupted the flow of goods, including oil, through the critical oil route. Somalia, too, has stepped up its ability to prosecute pirates. The East Africa area includes the Bab-el-Mandeb between Yemen and Djibouti, as well as the Gulf of Aden. Piracy incidents here hit a high of 54 in 2017, before falling back to just 9 in 2018, according to One Earth Future’s annual report The State of Maritime Piracy 2018….CLICK for complete article

Timelapse Maps: An Overview of Our Changing Planet

Posted by Nicholas LePan

on Monday, 6 January 2020 10:03

Humankind’s impact on the world is obvious, but our spatial patterns are sometimes difficult to recognize from the ground.

Publicly accessible, high-quality satellite imagery has been a game changer in terms of understanding the scope of forces such as urbanization and land use patterns.

Google Earth’s timelapsed satellite maps capture the drastic changes the planet’s surface has undergone over the past 34 years. Each timelapse comprises 35 cloud-free pictures, which have been made interactive by the CREATE Lab at Carnegie Mellon University.

Three different satellites acquired 15 million images over the past three decades. The majority of the images come from Landsat, a joint USGS/NASA Earth observation program. For the years 2015 to 2018, Google combined imagery from Landsat 8 and Sentinel-2A. Sentinel is part of the European Commission and European Space Agency’s Copernicus Earth observation program….CLICK for complete article

The 20 Biggest Advances in Tech Over the Last 20 Years

Posted by Alexander Hammond

on Monday, 6 January 2020 9:59

Despite what you may read in the newspapers or see on TV, humans continue to reach new heights of prosperity.

Another decade is over. With the 2020s upon us, now is the perfect time to reflect on the immense technological advancements that humanity has made since the dawn of the new millennium.

This article explores, in no particular order, 20 of the most significant technological advancements we have made in the last 20 years…click here for full article.

Best Sector ETFs For January: Energy, Health Care In Focus

Posted by Todd Schriber

on Monday, 6 January 2020 9:53

With the S&P 500 coming off its performance in two decades last year, expectations are in place that returns are likely to be more subdued this year. If historical trends repeat, that subdued tenor could be seen this month as the S&P 500 averaged a January decline of 0.30% over the previous 20 years.

So although January is part of the best six-month period in which to own stocks, the month typically isn’t strong in its own right. The tepid nature of January equity market action is reflected at the sector as just five of the original nine sector SPDR exchange traded funds average gains in the first month of the year.

A Standout

As for solid sector performers in January, the Health Care Select Sector (SPDR) stands out as the best performer of the original nine sector SPDR ETFs….CLICK for complete article