Gold Resists as Silver Falls Further

Gold and silver both suffered sharp pullbacks this week after an extraordinary run higher, yet the way each metal has responded to selling pressure tells two very different stories. Gold is currently around 11% below its daily high, while silver is down a far steeper 38%.

Even after the pullback, gold remains comfortably above its late-2025 breakout zone and well within its rising trend. Rather than collapsing, price has stabilised around the mid-$6,900 AUD region—an area that previously acted as resistance and is now attempting to flip into support. That kind of behaviour is typical of strong markets. Powerful uptrends rarely move in straight lines, and sharp, vertical advances are often followed by cooling phases that reset positioning without damaging the broader structure.

Silver, by contrast, has experienced a much more aggressive unwind. After surging higher in January, it has retraced a significantly larger portion of its rally and is now trading near the $100 level in Australian dollars. This is not unusual for silver. Historically, it tends to outperform gold during the euphoric stages of bull markets, then underperform just as violently when risk appetite wobbles. Its higher volatility and smaller market size make it more sensitive to leveraged positioning and short-term speculative flows. The recent move looks less like a structural breakdown and more like a rapid de-leveraging event following an overheated surge.

One Major Factor: Gold vs Silver Market Capitalisation

Gold’s total market capitalisation—if all the world’s gold were valued at current prices—is roughly USD 34 trillion. Silver’s market cap is a far smaller USD 4–5 trillion. For context, Bitcoin’s market capitalisation sits around USD 1.3 trillion. This disparity helps explain why similar selling pressure struggles to dent gold yet can move the silver price far more aggressively. It also highlights why silver has recently felt as though it is trading more like a crypto asset.

What stands out is that gold is not behaving like an asset forming a major top. There has been no cascading sell-off and no sustained break of key support. Instead, buyers continue to emerge on dips, suggesting underlying demand remains strong. This aligns with the broader macro backdrop. Central banks are still accumulating gold at historically elevated levels, while sovereign diversification away from the US dollar remains a long-term theme—particularly amid rising global conflict. Government debt levels also remain deeply concerning.

The open question is whether silver simply retreats quietly this time, or whether spending much of the past year in the spotlight has created a more durable shift in confidence. Will silver’s growing recognition as a critical mineral, rather than purely a speculative asset, help establish a higher price floor? From a price-action perspective, silver’s recent run has exceeded all prior cycles by a wide margin. In the short term, however, gold has clearly held onto its gains with far greater reliability.