Silver is staging a notable comeback. After tumbling from the $120 highs in early January, spot silver (XAG/USD) has jumped about 2.2% on February 19, 2026, trading around $79.33 per ounce. The move is turning heads because it arrives in a market still digesting a sharp correction and because silver’s price action has lately looked stronger than gold’s, even as gold remains the headline metal near the $5,000 mark.
The bigger question for 2026 is not whether silver can bounce today’s tape says it can, but whether it can sustain leadership in a precious-metals complex increasingly driven by politics, new buyer groups, and supply constraints rather than the “clean” macro correlations that dominated past cycles.
By midday, silver is trading $79.14 to $79.37 in global spot markets, recovering from levels near $77 the day prior. The rebound is also evident in key physical hubs, with India’s MCX futures surging above Rs 2,47,000 per kg and retail pricing in Delhi reportedly near Rs 2,54,900.
Even after a steep pullback, roughly a 36% correction from January’s highs, silver remains up about 140% year over year. That combination of violent drawdowns and a strong longer-term trend is increasingly typical of 2026’s precious-metals tape.
J.P. Morgan Global Research’s core call is that silver is not merely repeating a speculative blow-off like 2011. Instead, it sees the market building a structurally higher base. The bank projects a 2026 average forecast of $81 per ounce, with a potential high and strongest period occurring in the fourth quarter, with an average near $85 per ounce. Furthermore, their 2027 outlook anticipates prices remaining around $85 per ounce on average, representing a constructive carry-through.
The bank frames this as a “higher floor, unclear ceiling” setup. In other words, fundamentals may justify a higher mean price, but the distribution of outcomes is wide because silver remains susceptible to sudden risk-off waves and positioning shocks.
The Silver Institute’s 2026 outlook points to a market in its sixth straight year of deficit, with a projected 67 million-ounce shortfall. A simplified read-through of the balance shows a mixed but generally supportive picture. Industrial fabrication is projected at approximately 650 million ounces, providing a bullish implication as AI, data centers, and EVs help offset solar thrifting. Physical investment is expected to rise 20% to a three-year high, acting as a strongly bullish signal as Western retail investors return. Conversely, demand for jewelry and silverware is forecasted to drop by 9%, indicating a bearish trend driven by price sensitivity, especially in India and China. Meanwhile, mining supply is anticipated to grow by 1.5%, which remains a neutral factor since this growth is not enough to erase the deficit.
The key structural issue is supply rigidity. Roughly 70% of silver is produced as a byproduct of base-metal mining, such as copper and zinc. That matters because even at $80 per ounce, miners typically can’t respond with a rapid, silver-led production surge. Silver supply is tethered to the economics and capex cycles of other metals, meaning deficits can persist longer than many traders assume.
Gold remains the anchor asset of the precious-metals complex, yet HSBC’s 2026 framing is blunt: expect volatility. The bank highlights that traditional relationships especially gold’s historical sensitivity to real yields have weakened since 2022.HSBC points to a recent example in which 10-year U.S. Treasury yields fell from roughly 4.30% to 4.00% over a short window, a move that historically would have provided clearer tailwinds for gold. Yet the reaction function has become less reliable.
HSBC emphasizes three forces that now matter as much as, or more than, yield math. These include elevated geopolitical risk, stronger retail participation, and exceptionally high central bank buying since 2022, which is estimated at two to three times the prior decade’s average.
Crucially, central banks buy gold as a reserve asset and as a tool to reduce overreliance on the U.S. dollar, even while the dollar remains the dominant reserve currency. That “structural dip buyer” base helps explain gold’s resilience, but it also underscores a disadvantage for silver. J.P. Morgan stresses that silver lacks gold’s official-sector bid, making it harder to define a “fair” price and more vulnerable to sharp downdrafts when stress hits. In those moments, the gold-to-silver ratio can snap higher quickly, even if the longer-term thesis remains intact.
That said, the ratio itself has been signaling shifting power dynamics. After spiking above 100:1 in prior stress phases, it is now closer to the lowest levels seen in roughly 15 years, offering evidence that silver, at least for now, is fighting its way out of gold’s shadow.
Part of 2026’s story is that policy headlines and questions about institutional credibility are whipping around precious metals. J.P. Morgan attributes major recent moves to a couple of key catalysts. U.S. trade policy uncertainty surrounding a Section 232 review played a major role. The Department of Commerce reviewed critical raw materials under the national security framework. When President Trump refrained from new tariffs on critical raw material imports, including silver, in mid-January, leaning instead toward bilateral supply-security agreements, silver first pulled back, then stabilized and recovered.
Furthermore, expectations of Fed leadership served as an explosive catalyst. On January 30, following news tied to the intention to nominate Kevin Warsh as Fed Chair, silver reportedly plunged 27% in a day, alongside a roughly 10% drop in gold. Whatever one thinks of the individual, the episode highlighted that markets are now hypersensitive to perceived shifts in monetary-policy posture, Fed independence, and balance-sheet direction.
In other words, silver is trading not only on its supply-demand reality but also on a fast-changing policy risk premium. The strongest argument against an uncomplicated run higher is also embedded in silver’s strength: high prices incentivize thrifting and substitution.
J.P. Morgan flags that solar manufacturers may respond to sustained high silver prices by further reducing silver per cell, and by shifting toward silver-light or silver-free technologies over time. For example, cadmium telluride thin films are often cited in these discussions.
These transitions typically take years, not weeks, so they may not derail 2026 immediately. But a market pricing structural scarcity must also price the possibility that industry engineers around scarcity once pain becomes persistent.
Silver’s rebound to roughly $79 is more than a dead-cat bounce if specific conditions hold. Deficits must remain entrenched, and industrial demand, especially AI and data-center electrification and solar scale, must continue to overwhelm efficiency gains. Under that framework, J.P. Morgan’s $81 average and $85 fourth-quarter view is plausible, particularly if investment demand stays hot and the gold-to-silver ratio remains compressed.
But silver’s path is unlikely to be smooth. It lacks gold’s central-bank backstop, sits at the intersection of commodities and monetary assets, and is trading in a year when, per HSBC, volatility is the base case and old correlations are less dependable.