Retail traders buy record amount of silver amid rally

The question is which way the precious metal might go.

Individual investors netted about $171 million on Monday iShares Silver Trust (SLV)According to market research firm VandaTrack, a popular exchange-traded fund that tracks the metal. This is the largest single-day inflow of new funds into the trust, almost double the previous peak recorded during the “silver squeeze” of 2021.

“Silver has become retail’s new (favorite) toy,” Wanda analyst Ashwin Bhakre wrote on Tuesday.

Monday’s rush came as Silver Trust climbed nearly 6%, taking its 2026 rally to more than 52% and extending last year’s gain of nearly 145%.

Last week, silver reached above $ 100 an ounce for the first time.

Bhakre said silver has overtaken technology stocks to become the center of retail enthusiasm.

Also includes well-known tech stocks NVIDIA, Tesla And palantir According to Wanda, personal names were among the most purchased by mom-and-pop merchants in 2025.

But silver is now a hotter trade than Nvidia, the high-flying artificial intelligence beneficiary that has mesmerized Wall Street since late 2022. Silver’s turnover momentum, which gauges trade acceleration, has jumped to 11.55x its normal level – more than Nvidia’s 7.54x.

As a result, “in relative terms, the ‘chase’ in silver is now more intense than in classic AI trading,” Bhakre said.

Bhakre said increased interest in silver, once known as the poor man’s gold, has had a “halo effect” on mining stocks. hecla mining And coir mining Wanda data shows that new cash inflows have grown at more than double their normal pace. Shares of Hecla and Coeur have risen about 40% or more since the new year.

But Bhakre said investors are fighting a “two-front war” in silver.

On the downside, Wanda found unusually high flow ratios ProShares UltraShort Silver (ZSL)This shows that a lot of individual investors are betting that prices will fall, Bhakre said.

Still, retail investors are no longer trying to put pressure on precious metal prices, Bhakre said. Instead, the group is “structurally repositioning” to reduce exposure to a longer-term, tougher-asset cycle.

Others are doubtful.

LossDog founder Tom Sosnoff described the swing in the price of silver in less than a month as equivalent to swings typically seen over several years, and called the move a “meme stock trade” in the context of both the increased trading volume and higher volatility.

“Gold and silver are, absolutely, the meme commodities of 2026,” Sosnoff said on CNBC’s “Worldwide Exchange.” “Silver’s move has been wild.”

“Trade has been incredible, but it’s been very one-sided,” he said. “I think it’s taken a lot of hostages along the way, because…the trade route is short.”