What's Driving the Silver Price
Silver is $52.07 an ounce, −15.9% in three months. Four charts of what moves it, each with what it shows now:
- Rates: The Fed's target range is 3.75–4.00% (effective rate 3.88%). Futures price three-month SOFR at 4.17% for Dec 2026 and 4.49% for Dec 2027, against 3.97% today: markets expect rates about 0.52 percentage points higher by Dec 2027, roughly 2 quarter-point hikes. The 2-year yield is 4.61% (+36 bp in three months).
- Dollar: The dollar index is 101.70 (+1.7% in three months, while silver fell 15.9%). Over the last 90 trading days the daily correlation is −0.33 (moderate: silver has tended to rise when the dollar falls).
- Positioning: Speculators (managed money and other large traders) were net long 98.5 million oz on 27 Oct, down 11.9 million oz in four weeks. That is in the lowest third of the past three years and the smallest since February 2024. Positioning shows how much buying or selling power is left; very large positions have often come before reversals.
- Gold/silver ratio: An ounce of gold buys 78.5 ounces of silver, against a 10-year average of 80.9. Over three months the ratio rose 12.2%: silver lagged gold. A falling ratio usually comes with silver rallies, when industrial demand and investors pile in.
Interest rates: the Fed and what markets expect
The Fed's target range is 3.75–4.00% (effective rate 3.88%). Futures price three-month SOFR at 4.17% for Dec 2026 and 4.49% for Dec 2027, against 3.97% today: markets expect rates about 0.52 percentage points higher by Dec 2027, roughly 2 quarter-point hikes. The 2-year yield is 4.61% (+36 bp in three months).
Silver vs the US dollar
The dollar index is 101.70 (+1.7% in three months, while silver fell 15.9%). Over the last 90 trading days the daily correlation is −0.33 (moderate: silver has tended to rise when the dollar falls).
Speculators' net position in silver futures
Speculators (managed money and other large traders) were net long 98.5 million oz on 27 Oct, down 11.9 million oz in four weeks. That is in the lowest third of the past three years and the smallest since February 2024. Positioning shows how much buying or selling power is left; very large positions have often come before reversals.
Silver vs the gold/silver ratio
An ounce of gold buys 78.5 ounces of silver, against a 10-year average of 80.9. Over three months the ratio rose 12.2%: silver lagged gold. A falling ratio usually comes with silver rallies, when industrial demand and investors pile in.
How to read these charts
Two lines, two axes. The silver price is on the right axis; the driver is on the left. Where a driver usually moves the opposite way to silver (the dollar, the gold/silver ratio), it is drawn upside down, so the lines move together when the usual pattern holds.
When the lines part, something else is in charge. Gold's break from real yields after 2022, when central banks bought record amounts, is the best-known example.
The sentences above each chart use correlations of daily changes over the last 90 trading days: −1 means they always moved in opposite directions, +1 always together, near 0 no link. A link that held for months can fade quickly.
Day to day
For today's move and the headlines behind it, see why silver is up or down today. For the chart patterns, support and resistance, see silver technical analysis; for the dates that move rates, the economic calendar.
Get the daily market email: gold, silver and bitcoin after the US close, with the day's move and why.
These charts describe how prices and their drivers moved together. They are not a forecast or investment advice.
Get the market email every evening
Silver is $52.07 an ounce now. Gold, silver and bitcoin after the US close: the price, the day's move and why, in one short email. No account, no spam.
What Drives Silver: FAQ
What drives the silver price?
The same forces as gold (interest rates, the dollar and gold itself), plus industry: about half of silver demand comes from solar panels, electronics and other uses, so the economic cycle matters too. Its swings are larger than gold's, and speculators' positions in COMEX futures can amplify them.
Why is the dollar drawn upside down?
Because silver usually moves the opposite way to the dollar. Drawn upside down, the dollar line rises when the dollar weakens, so when the two lines move together the usual pattern is holding; when they part, something else is driving silver. Untick "Upside down" to see it the normal way.
What do SOFR futures show?
Three-month SOFR futures trade on the CME; their price is 100 minus the average SOFR interest rate expected over the three months after the contract month. A December contract at 95.85 means markets expect about 4.15% at the end of that year. Comparing it with today's rate shows whether markets expect the Fed to raise or cut. The 2-year Treasury yield gives a similar, longer reading.
Who are the "speculators" in the COT report?
The CFTC's managed money category (hedge funds and commodity trading advisers) plus other reportable large traders: the usual measure of speculative positioning. Producers, merchants and swap dealers are left out, as they mostly hedge. Net long = long contracts minus short contracts; one COMEX silver contract is 5,000 troy ounces.
Is this a forecast?
No. The charts show how silver and each driver moved together in the past and what the latest figures are. Relationships change (gold broke away from real yields after 2022), so none of this predicts the next move. Not investment advice.
How often is it updated?
Prices and the dollar daily, yields after each US business day, the fed funds and SOFR futures readings daily, the CFTC report every Friday (positions as of Tuesday). The sentences above each chart are recomputed from the same data.
Cite this page
For essays, articles and research. Prices on this page update daily, so the citations include today's date as the date you accessed it.
@misc{corgano2026whatsdrivingthesilver, author = {{Corgano}}, title = {What's driving the silver price}, howpublished = {\url{https://silverprice.corgano.com/silver-price-drivers}}, year = {2026}, note = {Corgano Silver Price, accessed 2026-11-06}}Data
Fed funds target, effective fed funds rate, SOFR and 2-year Treasury yield: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, via FRED (Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis). SOFR futures: CME Group three-month SOFR futures settlement prices via Yahoo Finance, recorded daily (implied rate = 100 − price). US Dollar Index (DXY, ICE): Yahoo Finance daily closes. Positioning: CFTC Commitments of Traders, disaggregated futures-only report. Silver: COMEX front-month futures daily closes; the price above is live. Weekly values before the last 400 days.