➡ The value of silver is expected to rise due to increasing demand and limited supply. Currently, gold is 100 times more valuable than silver, but historically, the ratio is closer to 65 to 1. If this ratio returns, silver could be worth $46 an ounce, up from its current value of around $30-31. Silver is in high demand for use in solar panels, electric vehicles, and medical devices, and large investors are starting to buy physical silver instead of paper contracts.

➡ If you like precious metals, check out Bold Precious Metals. They offer tools, copper options, safe shipping, video checks, and good rates for selling back. Use the link in the video description to visit their site. Thanks to Bold Precious Metals for supporting this video.

85% of retail investors in physical precious metals just cite a deep distrust of paper contracts. They don’t believe that the paper or silver that they’re buying on the exchanges is backed by anything other than a look and a promise by, you know, maybe a JP Morgan or something. So people are starting to realize that, that it’s important to actually own it and to have it physical in their possession. Silver is no longer just an investment. It’s a lifeline in the middle of a global economic storm. As Trump’s tariffs rip through international trade routes and ignite the most unpredictable volatility in decades, a silent crisis is unfolding right beneath the surface of the metals market.

You’ve heard of gold being a safe haven, but right now silver is where the real battle is taking place. Why? Because behind every ounce of physical silver lies a paper system stretched to its breaking point. A 400 to 1 ratio. That means for every one ounce of real silver, there are 400 claims on it. 400. This isn’t speculation. This is a historic distortion between paper and reality. A distortion that could implode under the slightest pressure. And that pressure is here. Trade wars are escalating, inflation is surging, and global supply chains are fracturing in real time.

But in all this chaos, physical silver isn’t just holding steady. It’s becoming the focal point of a financial reckoning. Investors are rushing in, but what they’re discovering is shocking. There simply isn’t enough real metal to go around. So the question becomes, what happens when 400 people all try to claim the same ounce? What happens when trust in paper silver collapses entirely? Stay with me, because we’re about to dig into the mechanics of this crisis. Today, we also have a very special guest, the CEO of Bold Precious Metals, Ryan Cochran. With years of experience and a lifelong passion for precious metals, Ryan is here to offer us a unique insider perspective into what’s happening in the markets.

Yes. First, John, thank you for having me. It’s always a joy to talk to people about our passions in life. I grew up in the 1980s, and I think it got started when my grandfather gave me a 1964 Kennedy half dollar. I still have that today. It sparked an interest of mine. Owning silver, being able to physically hold it, realizing there’s real value in it. Later in life, precious metals just became a personal way to preserve wealth long term. I’ve been collecting or investing ever since. On a personal level, I’ve been married for 20 years.

We have six children ages from 19 to age four, so it keeps me pretty busy going to soccer games and recitals and school and everything else that goes on. My faith in our Lord Jesus Christ is what really shapes my outlook in life. If there’s one thing to define it, our church has a motto. It says to be like Christ in all of life. In my personal and also business life, we try to model this and that shows up in our honesty, integrity. We try to have that lead all of the decisions we do in my personal life, but also in how we build bold precious metals.

Trump’s tariffs didn’t just shake headlines. They lit a fire under inflation, and that fire is now consuming every corner of the economy. Prices are soaring across the board, and the fallout is hitting the metals market with full force. As import costs surge and consumers feel the squeeze, investors are fleeing fiat and flocking to hard assets. Traditionally, gold leads the way, but this time, it’s silver that’s drawing the spotlight. And not just because of inflation fears. There’s something bigger happening. You see, tariffs don’t operate in a vacuum. When Trump reintroduced aggressive duties, some as high as 100%, on imports from China and Mexico, it wasn’t just about protecting American jobs, it was about reshaping the global trade map.

But those maps don’t redraw without consequences. One of the most overlooked effects, the chokehold, it places on silver imports. The US relies heavily on Mexico, the world’s number one silver exporter. Tariff tensions are now threatening that flow, just as inflation makes silver one of the most sought after hedges in the world. That’s the key. You’re not just looking at inflation pushing prices higher. You’re looking at inflation pushing demand higher. At the exact same time, supply is being strangled. This is how perfect storms form. And the market knows it. That’s why we’re seeing a rush into silver like never before.

Not just from retail investors, but from institutions, funds, and global players all scrambling to secure physical metal while they still can. In past cycles, inflation simply nudged metals upward. This time, the combination of trade warfare and monetary decay is sending silver into overdrive. And as the pressure mounts, the fragile paper markets that prop up silver’s price are starting to crack. Because while inflation might be the spark, it’s the looming supply crunch that’s about to set the entire system ablaze. Yeah. It’s been quite an unpredictable roller coaster these last few days with the tariffs.

It’s kind of hard to get a gauge on what’s really going on. But we’ve seen a lot of market turmoil. Trump raises tariffs, and then we get counter tariffs from other countries. And what this is creating is a lot of volatility. Silver, in particular, is somewhat industrial demand driven. So with this uncertainty, it does create a little bit of volatility with silver prices. And then all precious metals are related together somewhat. So if silver goes down, the rest of precious metals will go down too. However, in terms of long-term effects, precious metals are driven.

It’s a great hedge against volatility. A great hedge against inflation. And I believe that precious metals will go up due to all this volatility. I’ve heard it said that about one out of three investors cite geopolitical reasons or fears into why they purchase metals. And so it creates a nice safe haven for financial security in markets that we’re currently seeing with all these tariffs and the tariff war that we’re engaged in right now. The supply chain for silver isn’t just strained. It’s fracturing. And the reason is geopolitical. Trump’s tariffs have struck directly at the heart of silver’s flow into the US with Mexico, the world’s largest producer, squarely in the crosshairs.

But while most analysts focus on surface-level trade numbers, they’re missing what’s really happening. A total breakdown in the logistics behind physical silver delivery. Ports are slowing. Cross-border negotiations are stalling. And miners are throttling output as uncertainty chokes capital investment. But here’s the real shocker. The paper market doesn’t care. Not yet. It’s still trading as if silver is plentiful, abundant, and infinitely available. That’s where the 400 to 1 ratio comes in. For every one ounce of physical silver actually held in reserve, there are 400 paper claims on that same ounce. That means if even a tiny fraction of those holders demanded delivery at once, the entire system would collapse.

This isn’t some fringe theory. It’s the result of decades of fractional reserve-style trading on silver futures, ETF exposures, and over-the-counter derivatives. What does this look like in practice? It looks like vaults running dry. It looks like bullion dealers charging outrageous premiums because wholesale bars are disappearing from supply. It looks like investors waking up to the reality that their paper contracts might be worth far less than they believed. Because when the music stops, there won’t be a chair for everyone. This is no longer a question of price movement. It’s a question of availability.

Physical silver is disappearing from the market just as demand is exploding. And the leverage in the system is past any point of sustainability. If even one major institution moves to secure physical delivery en masse, it could trigger a domino effect that ripples through COMEX, LBMA, and every major silver exchange on the planet. And in that moment, the price won’t just move. It will disconnect completely from paper. A decoupling, a reset, and once it begins, there’s no going back. The silver squeeze, we’ve been talking about this for years. I believe it has a lot of merit.

We see that there’s a lot of shorts on selling silver. 95% or more of all silver futures contracts are settled in cash. This allows there to be, I believe the latest numbers I saw were a 400 to 1 ratio between paper silver ounces compared to physical ounces. And I think that’s the number that really drives this short squeeze discussion is this 400 to 1 ratio. 400 paper ounces of silver are being traded for every one physical ounce. We also know that companies have known to manipulate the markets. JP Morgan was fined nearly a billion dollars in 2020 for spoofing silver prices.

So going back to the 400 to 1 ratio, we see that silver has an increase in industrial demand, and there’s a need for physical silver instead of paper silver. And so as this demand increases, right now, the industrial demand is about equivalent to the actual mining production every year. So as this demand increases, then the physical demand for silver is going to increase, and it may outpace the actual mining of silver. And when that happens, people more than the 95% I believe will start converting to actual physical. And with a 400 to 1 ratio, that could create a quite a spectacle in the short squeeze term.

When that happens, it’s anybody’s guess. We’ve been talking about it for years, but I do think it’s primed. It’s getting primed for that to happen sometime. To me, gold is being bought by countries, reserves, big investors. It’s difficult to buy silver or to store. It takes a lot more to store silver than it does gold. However, with that said, the current ratio as of yesterday, it’s really close. It’s about 100 to 1. This means gold is 100 times more valuable in terms of price and silver. Historically, we see that that ratio is about 65 to 1.

In the 1920s, I believe it was 20 to 1. A gold, St. Godin, $20 piece, and a 1-ounce Morgan dollar. So it was a 20 to 1. Historically, it’s 65 to 1. Right now, it’s 100 to 1. This implies that if the gold-silver ratio gets back to just a 65 to 1, at gold’s current prices, this would mean silver should be valued at $46 an ounce, up from about 30-31 that it is currently right today. So there’s a lot of upside potential just getting back to the historical gold-silver ratio average. In terms of demand, there’s a lot of demand for silver in the solar panels, the new green energy-type initiatives.

Electric vehicles use silver. A lot of our electronics use medical devices. Lots of usage for silver, even more so than gold. So I believe silver is a good buy right now. I think, from what I’ve seen, analysts are forecasting even mid-40s or even low 50s for silver by year-end. That may be a little optimistic currently, but it’s definitely reasonable. So I think silver has a lot of potential. Gold has a lot of potential, but silver is really the one with the industrial demand and the potential to really do quite amazingly. While retail investors scramble to get their hands on silver coins and bars, the real moves are happening in silence, deep within the vaults of central banks and institutional portfolios.

Because of the people running these systems, they see what’s coming. They’re not watching CNBC. They’re watching supply flow reports, derivative exposure charts, and lease rate spikes. And what they’re doing is quietly but aggressively accumulating physical silver, not futures, not ETFs. The real thing, this isn’t new. It’s a strategy that’s been used for decades by those with the foresight and the capital to prepare before the storm hits. And right now, all the signals are flashing red. Central banks have already shifted dramatically toward gold in recent years, dumping treasuries and dollar-based assets.

But silver, that’s the wild card, has been artificially cheap, overlooked, and suppressed, which is exactly why the biggest players are moving in now before the mainstream even realizes what’s happening. Meanwhile, Wall Street is quietly repositioning. Major funds are starting to unwind paper exposure and hedge their portfolios with a real bullion. Even mining executives who understand this market better than anyone are buying physical silver on the open market because they know the delivery system is under extreme stress. It’s not just about profits anymore. It’s about protection. And that’s the psychology shift most people miss.

This isn’t speculation. It’s preparation. The institutions understand that when trust evaporates from the paper markets, the fallout will be immediate and violent. Because the 400 to 1 leverage ratio isn’t a statistic. It’s a countdown. And the smart money isn’t going to wait until it hits zero. They’re already locking in supply, front-running a crisis that could detonate at any moment. The question is, will retail wake up in time, or will they be left holding paper promises in a market that’s gone? What we see, it’s not quite like it was during COVID. COVID times in 2020, it was a big sudden demand for physical silver and gold.

It just basically wiped out all the reserves. We are seeing that as an increase. I would say what we see more is some new bigger investors getting into the retail space. A lot larger purchases. I believe people are maybe even shifting from ETFs, ownerships like SLV and other such mediums of exchange for silver to actually owning physical silver. We’re seeing people converting their IRAs into physical silver and metals, gold, all sorts of stuff. There’s a bigger shift, maybe not in terms of quantity of investors, but the people that are buying it, they’re buying a lot larger amounts.

With London and COMEX storage going down, there’s a time where the physical demand won’t be met, and at that point, that could initiate the start of a silver squeeze like people have been talking about. It could be the start of a big rally. I think the numbers I’ve seen, 85% of retail investors in physical precious metals just cite a deep distrust of paper contracts. They don’t believe that the paper silver that they’re buying on the exchanges is backed by anything other than a look and a promise by maybe a JP Morgan or something.

People are starting to realize that, it’s important to actually own it and to have it physical in their possession. There’s lots of reputable depositories around the country and around the world that people have been sending their metals to for safe storage. Speaking of the tariffs, if you’re overseas and you want to purchase metals, you could store your metals in a US depository and avoid paying the tariffs. That’s what a lot of people are doing also. There’s a couple, but the one we see a lot is that physical metals are just really hard to sell.

It’s that every good investment needs a good liquidation or an exit strategy. People have a hard time wanting to invest into metals because they don’t know how to liquidate it. The demand for silver alone, I looked it up recently here, and I think it was 1.2 billion ounces per year for the demand. Silver, though it’s relatively a small market compared to other things, it’s got a lot of demand and it’s fairly easy to liquidate. You can liquidate it anywhere around the world. It’s recognized all over the world. You don’t have to be wealthy to start investing.

You can start with just a one ounce or even a fractional round. Lots of opportunities. It’s easy. There’s lots of buyers. It’s easy to liquidate. It’s simple, accessible. It empowers you. I think that’s the biggest misconception, if I were to say the biggest, would be that people just don’t know how to get rid of it when the time comes. That’s just a real misnomer, unfortunately. Physical metals, I looked this up about six months ago. There is a proven record going back thousands of years, even Abraham in the Old Testament, who valued its wealth in terms of gold and silver.

It’s a longer historical record of using precious metals as a monetary system than we have anywhere today. In a crisis, physical metals are probably more reliable than just about anything else. That’s why people do opt to own precious metals. In times of crisis, you can easily trade and barter with it. That would probably be the biggest myth or concern that people have getting into it. How do I sell it when the time comes? Is anybody going to be paying me $50 an ounce for silver? I can’t imagine anybody paying that kind of price for it.

That’s probably the biggest hurdle and misnomer that people deal with when getting into buying precious metals. Every major economic crisis in history has had a tipping point. One moment where perception cracks, trust disappears, and reality floods in like a tidal wave. For the silver market, that moment is now. We’re witnessing the perfect collision of monetary instability, geopolitical trade war, and a financial system built on illusions. Trump’s tariffs ignited a chain reaction that’s stretched the silver supply chain to its limits, while inflation has accelerated investor demand to levels we haven’t seen in decades.

And yet, the paper markets keep pretending everything is fine. Trading 400 contracts for every one ounce that actually exists, but the facade is breaking. You can already see the signs, premiums exploding, delivery, delays stacking up, and institutional demand quietly stripping the market dry. When this disconnect finally snaps, it won’t be a slow burn. It will be a rapid revaluation of silver, as the price of physical metal surges far beyond its manipulated paper counterpart. And when the world realizes that most of the silver they thought they owned doesn’t actually exist, panic won’t be a theory.

It’ll be a reality. This isn’t just a trade. It’s a warning. In 2025, physical silver isn’t a luxury. It’s critical. Because when the paper game collapses, only real assets will matter. So if you’ve been watching from the sidelines, understand this. The countdown has already begun. Don’t wait for the headlines. Position yourself now while you still can. Make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss what’s coming next. And you’re making any investment decisions. When it comes to investing in gold, silver, and precious metals, you want more than just a transaction. You want a partner.

That’s why we’re proud to say this video is sponsored by Bold Precious Metals. Bold Precious Metals offers unbeatable direct-to-you pricing, premium selections from Global Mints, weekly Guess The Spot contests with free silver prizes, a free bullion portfolio tracking tool, copper bullion options, fully insured shipping, video verification, and competitive buyback rates. So if you’re interested in precious metals, head to their website using the link in the description. Thanks again to Bold Precious Metals for sponsoring this video. [tr:trw].

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