RE: Oops, where is all the silver gone? Is the Day Nigh for Silver Bulls?
By Jon A. Nones
17 Oct 2005 at 05:58 PM EDT
St. LOUIS (ResourceInvestor.com) -- In a recent policy statement, the Silver Users Association (SUA) urged the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to stop Barclays from creating a silver backed Exchange Traded Fund.
“The Silver Users Association opposes the creation of a silver ETF because of the concerns that doing so will require the holding of physical silver be held in allocated accounts, thus removing large amounts of silver from the market. By doing so, the ETF will cause a shortage of silver in the marketplace. If this happens, it will ultimately be the economy that suffers due to the negative impact taking large amounts of silver out of the market will have on industry,” the statement said.
Barclays Global Investors, the asset management arm of Barclays Plc, filed a registration in June seeking regulatory approval for a new silver ETF. If approved, the trust would be backed by silver held in England initially, and possibly at other locations down the road.
SUA Executive Director Paul Miller told Resource Investor that the removal of large quantities of physical silver would have a negative impact on industry-specific employment as well as the overall economy.
“So much silver would be taken out of the market place, which in turn, means higher costs to companies that use silver,” he said.
Miller added that the ETF would “obviously cause higher prices, and if some folks aren’t doing well, could mean loss of jobs.”
According to an article in FreeMarketNews.com, some speculators believe that there isn’t enough silver stored above ground to fulfill investment demand for a silver ETF. If the ETF is blocked for this reason, it could be seen as a bullish confirmation for investors.
“This is one of the issues that we’re going to discuss at our meeting next week,” Miller said, alluding to the SUA’s second annual meeting scheduled in October.
However, the SUA statement itself alludes to a shortage.
“A silver ETF would only exaggerate silver’s illiquidity given the sheer volume of physical silver needed to be shipped and stored,” the SUA wrote.
According to FreeMarketNews, the admission by the SUA is astonishing given that all the major players in the silver industry have maintained for a number of years that silver is plentiful and that the analyses of silver bulls in regard to a dwindling supply were wrong.
The SUA notes that the silver ETF would be similar to the popular gold ETFs, which are responsible for purchasing about 250 tonnes of gold worth $3.4 billion.
The SUA comes perilously close to admitting that the silver market has indeed been controlled by those forces that want low, steady prices.
And, by turning to the SEC, the SUA is implying that the manipulation should be continued by any means possible.
“This issue concerns a lot of our members,” Miller said.
The SUA represents the interests of companies that make, sell and distribute products and services related to silver. The Association’s members process 80% of all silver used in the United States.
Today, December silver climbed 1.3 cents to close at $7.875.