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For the current silver price update and live silver price charts, please visit PMBull’s Current Silver Price page.

Jan 20, 2012 06:30 PM EST – It was a spectacular rally today with the price of silver finishing COMEX up 3.8% at $31.65 per ounce for a gain of $1.17. It didn’t stop there as afternoon electronic trading in New York added another $0.59 per ounce, pushing the price to $32.20.

Silver performed decisvely better than gold today. Having pushed through the 50-day moving average, technical traders have been given the green light to pile in long, or perhaps cover short positions. This was a solid break above the $30 psychological resistance level too, which served to add fuel to the fire. Both the moving average and $30 price level have now become near-term support for traders.

The rally in Silver has now taken us back to mid-December price levels. What can we say? These explosive moves higher always come when least expected. This is the reason you can’t really trade your core silver position. You just don’t know when it is going to take off, and then keep running. This could be the start of a move to new highs, or it could be the tail end of a major bounce, with another leg down in store for us. At least one guru out there, David Morgan, predicts $60 silver for 2012 but has suggested that the move won’t come until later in the year. With long-term money, buy and hold your physical silver and then sleep tight.

On the Silver ETFs front, Sprott’s Physical Silver Trust (PSLV) did not keep up with SLV today. SLV gained 5.0% and PSLV only 3.7% during market hours. This continues to leave the premium on PSLV at a much more reasonable 9.1% versus the over 30% premium we saw just a few short weeks ago.

ZeroHedge maintains that the original premium in PSLV was most likely due to a shortage in physical silver, which of course pushes the price of physical silver higher. Today they posted an interesting article explaining today’s silver surge that suggests it was the direct result of Sprott applying proceeds from the offering announced two days ago. In our post on the Sprott offering and PSLV premium we suggested that it should be good for silver prices. ZeroHedge does a little speculative quantification as to how much good, which may make PSLV holders feel a little better.

For the current update and real time charts, please visit PMBull’s Current Silver Price page.

Jan 19, 2012 10:45 PM EST – The silver price was flat at the end of COMEX trading today, closing at $30.482, down $0.032 or 0.1%. The afternoon electronic session in New York however pushed spot silver back up to $30.64, adding nearly $0.16 or half a percent. Silver prices first gapped higher in the morning after overnight trading in Asia, but settled back down as floor traders decided enough is enough and began taking profits off the table.

The earlier session price slide can also be attributed to some defensive maneurvering in front of the slew of tech earnings due to be released in the afternoon. Indeed, Google disappointed and dropped roughly 10% in afterhours trading. Nevertheless, the broad equity indexes appeared to shrug off generally lackluster earnings and this may have been the green light for electronic session silver traders to march prices higher once again, leaving prices well above $30 once again. Tomorrow is another day, and skepticism remains valid, all the way up into new highs. If one is bearish equities and expecting a sell-off, one has to expect and accept a drop in the price of silver too. It doesn’t have to happen, and PMBull’s mantra remains the same. Buy physical silver now, for the long-haul and also keep powder dry for any major sell-off that materializes.

PSLV is already trying to add back its premium after yesterday’s 10% dive on Sprott’s announced offering. Perhaps in the end both camps in the PSLV debate will be correct. The premium portends silver shortages and a general distrust for SLV – iShares Silver Trust, but too much premium makes PSLV a dangerous trade that affords the fund the same status as any other paper silver product. Nobody has an algorithm that reveals what the right premium should be. Trade funds and consider the presense of a premium or discount an opportunity to leverage your position, or to arbitrage the difference between SLV and PSLV. Don’t neglect your physical silver and physical gold holdings, which may be the only real way to protect your wealth long-term.

Originally posted on January 18, 2012 at 06:30 PM EST. For the current silver update, visit PMBull’s Current Silver Price page.

Jan 18, 2012 06:30 PM EST – Silver finished floor trading at a price of $30.514, up $0.408 or nearly 1.4% for an impressive break above the $30 level, as well as last week’s closing high. Electronic silver trading in New York only added an additional penny to the price.

Behind the rising silver price today was a lower dollar and an ongoing rally in equities. Markets shrugged off less than exciting early economic numbers in the U.S. and an Egan Jones downgrade for Germany, yet embraced positive numbers out of the National Association of Home Builders. That is what momentum will do for you.

It was a quick consolidation, if this was indeed a break higher. Are silver and equities truly breaking out? We haven’t seen the kind of volume that you would normally expect in a rally like this. Where’s the conviction? The tone in the blogosphere regarding the equity rally is that this rally may be real and could have legs. Bears are beginning to go silent. That is your first warning sign actually. Short interest continues to decline. That is your second warning sign. Traditionally, the problem with being short right now is that retail is decidedly not long, with equity mutual fund outflows showing no signs of letting up. This time around however, Retail may have no funds left to buy shares at higher prices from institutions.

Those participating in silver via Sprott’s Physical Silver Trust may have been left wondering why they didn’t get a piece of today’s action. We published the answer in a blog post today: Why PSLV is Down Nearly 10%: Sprott Premium Teaches Lesson. In the grand scheme of things, we would suggest that a 10% drop in the price of silver doesn’t mean much. That may not comfort those holding PSLV, which as of this update, still has a 9% Premium to NAV. Fund buyers will now be watching premiums more closely.

Silver opened at over $30.50 per Ounce today and attempted to breach the highs established in early morning Globex trading, before starting a long, drawn out slide lower. Nevertheless, we closed over $30.00, finishing the session at $30.092 per ounce for a gain of $0.234 or 0.78%. New York Globex pushed the price to $30.25. Other metals also broke higher today and then merely held their ground as disappointing Jobless Claims data tried to do damage to the markets. Yet the markets would have none of it, continuing to push stock prices (begrudgingly) higher. Technical breakouts in equities appear to be surfacing, yet they feel weak and ripe for reversals.

Oil dumped hard late in the day as ZeroHedge reports that The Iran Embargo is Likely To Be Delayed By Six Months. Oil prices probably have a long way to drop on any easing geo-political concerns. Note that any general market sell-off, like the upcoming sell-off in equities that long-suffering bears have been justifiably waiting for, should provide a nice entry price for trading silver. But us precious metal bugs won’t wait. We still like silver and expect the price to reach an all-time high at some point in the not=too-distant future. We aren’t willing to wait for that drop, because one never knows when something like another MF Global debacle will set physical silver prices on a trajectory wholly different than that experienced by silver futures, ETFs or other paper silver products.