In an exclusive conversation with MarketFramework, Jeffrey Christian, founder of CPM Group, walked through what's really been driving silver's turbulent year, why he believes both the Federal Reserve and political dysfunction matter more than headlines out of the Middle East, and why he remains skeptical of the "silver deficit" narrative that has come to dominate market chatter.
The Rally, the Peak, and the Pullback
Silver's 2026 has been a story of extremes. Investment demand climbed steadily — from roughly 26 million ounces in 2023, to about 42 million in 2024, to 94 million last year — setting the stage for a historic run that carried silver to a record above $121 an ounce in January.
Christian attributes the surge to a wave of short-term investors piling in on the belief that global conditions were deteriorating fast enough to justify aggressive positioning. The unwind was just as fast: once prices peaked, many of those same buyers rushed to take profits, dragging silver into a roughly $55-to-$70 range that has held for weeks despite persistent volatility.
Christian firmly rejects the idea that this pullback signals a bursting bubble or any deterioration in silver's underlying investment case — he calls it straightforward profit-taking. He expects a floor near $50, with technical support around $40-to-$45 that he doesn't expect to be tested, and anticipates renewed buying once the calendar turns past August.
Politics: A Core Driver, Not Background Noise
Christian was explicit that investment demand — the single biggest swing factor in gold and silver prices — is driven primarily by economic and political concerns, uncertainties, and risks. It's not just a talking point for him; he pointed to CPM Group's track record of making political calls years in advance. Ahead of both the 2016 and 2024 U.S. presidential elections, he said, the firm told clients it didn't matter who won — the outcome for the country and the world would be bad either way, likely fueling social unrest and political fracturing. He admitted the firm underestimated just how bad things would get, but the directional call — that political dysfunction would support gold and silver — proved right both times.
That same lens shapes his outlook for the rest of 2026. He expects a contentious and "nasty" U.S. election cycle, combined with an unresolved U.S.-Iran standoff, the ongoing Ukraine war, and Israeli operations against Lebanon (with talk of Syria as well), to drive investors back into gold and silver in large volumes once markets move past August. In his framing, political risk and economic risk work together to push investment demand — one rarely moves markets without the other.
Why the Fed Still Has the Final Word
Even so, Christian was careful to draw a distinction: while political and economic uncertainty broadly fuels demand for gold and silver as safe havens, interest rates are the more immediate, mechanical lever on price. He illustrated this with gold's behavior around the U.S. strikes on Iran — prices held firm above $5,000 an ounce for the first two weeks of the conflict, meaning the war itself didn't break the rally.
What did break it was a Federal Reserve announcement in mid-March, signaling that rate cuts expected six months earlier were off the table, and that further hikes were possible into 2027 given a stronger economy and worsening inflation. Gold fell from roughly $5,000 to $4,000 within days. Asked directly whether interest rates matter more than geopolitics for these metals, Christian said yes — rates are perhaps the single most important factor not just for gold and silver, but for the economy broadly, from auto sales to housing.
In effect, his framework separates two layers: politics and economic anxiety build the underlying case for owning gold and silver over time, while interest-rate decisions determine the timing and magnitude of price swings within that broader trend.
Pushing Back on the 'Silver Deficit' Narrative
Christian also took direct aim at rival data providers — notably the Silver Institute's World Silver Survey, now compiled by Metals Focus — for what he calls systematically inflated investment-demand figures. Their methodology, he explained, asks dealers how much silver they sold without netting out silver bought back from investors, dramatically overstating true demand. As an example, he cited last year's estimates: rival data put investment demand at roughly 275 million ounces, versus CPM's own estimate of just 62 million — a gap explained almost entirely by the roughly 200 million ounces CPM believes investors sold back into the market over the same period.
CPM Group's balance calculation excludes investment demand entirely, defining supply-demand balance as total supply minus fabrication demand alone. By that measure, silver isn't in deficit — it's in surplus.
Where Industrial Demand Is Heading
On the industrial side, Christian sees solar panel demand for silver likely peaking, as elevated prices push manufacturers to cut silver loading per panel or substitute copper entirely — with usage potentially declining as much as 10% this year. Data center construction is generating fresh demand for silver used in batteries, contacts, and connectors, though Christian expressed real skepticism about how durable that trend is, citing broader doubts about the AI infrastructure buildout and saying he wouldn't be surprised to see it "peak and collapse."
Gold Over Silver, For Now
Asked which metal he'd rather hold over the next twelve months, Christian chose gold without hesitation. Global investment demand for gold currently outpaces silver, he said, and silver holders have shown a persistent tendency to sell into rallies out of fear gains won't last — a pattern he doesn't see nearly as often among gold investors.
His broader message for the back half of 2026: expect silver to consolidate near current levels through the summer, then resume climbing as the U.S. election cycle, ongoing Middle East tensions, and unresolved political dysfunction — both in the U.S. and globally — push investors back toward safe-haven buying. Both metals, he says, are likely to stay elevated by historical standards for as long as that political and economic uncertainty persists.
