Today In Silver

NOTE: Originally published for Metal Augmentor subscribers on February 10, 2010 at 6:09 PM EST.

PROMOTIONAL NOTE: We are now getting really close to officially launching the Metal Augmentor service. Yeah, I know we’ve said that about a bazzillion times but one of these days it will eventually turn out to be true. As a heads up, we’ve had quite a few additions to the mailing/waiting list lately, so much so that assuming all of our current subscribers and the people on the waiting list all end up registering, we will have completely filled our initial Founding Member roster. Once that happens, we would close the membership again for a while as we decide exactly how many Founding Members we can have while still being able to answer individual questions. So, my obviously biased suggestion would be that you sign up for the mailing/waiting list immediately by going to Metal Augmentor. End promotion.

With the recent weakness in silver, it was somewhat gratifying to see that the iShares Silver Trust ETF, SLV, has just filed a report with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to disclose a recent amendment to their custodian agreement that provides for an increase in the silver bullion storage capacity to 400 million ounces. The iShares SLV is already by far the largest single public owner of silver bullion in the world with just a bit over 300 million ounces in custody at present, and the increase to 400 million ounces indicates that the ETF sponsors, BlackRock, feel confident that the trust’s silver bullion holdings will continue to grow at a rapid pace. By the way, very few in the bullion community have commented much less seem to have noticed that the iShares sponsor is no longer Barclays Global Investors, a division of a troubled bank, but rather a (somewhat) independent publicly-traded asset management firm*. In our opinion, this change in sponsorship structure of the iShares silver ETF represents a reduction in operations risk.  Importantly based on some whispers I have heard, BlackRock may become more aggressive compared to Barclays in protecting its image and credibility by going after irresponsible slander and libel against its iShares unit, especially when the lies are being publicly disseminated by competitors. We’ll have to see if these whispers are true or merely wishful thinking by market participants with an ax to grind, but in the meantime I would suggest that those who like to throw around unsubstantiated, self-serving accusations about their competitors should cool their jets. You know who you are.

*I know the merger of BlackRock and Barclays Global Investors is old news, but the deal did just close this past December.

silverax Windbag Wisdom