Business & Economics
Silver Clears $100 as Gold Leaps Past $5,000 in Record 2026 Metals Spike
For the first time ever, silver printed triple-digits and gold crossed the $5,000 threshold within three trading days, driven by a sliding dollar, looming Fed cuts, and fresh U.S.–NATO friction over Greenland.
Focusing Facts
- Spot silver traded up to $100.94 per ounce at 18:48 GMT on 23-Jan-2026, more than 200% higher than a year earlier.
- Spot gold hit an intraday record of $5,110.50 on 26-Jan-2026 after rising 18 % year-to-date on top of a 64 % gain in 2025.
- The U.S. Dollar Index simultaneously fell to a four-month low, losing roughly 1 % in the week ending 23-Jan-2026.
Context
Precious-metal spikes this violent echo the 1979-80 panic, when silver shot from $6 to $50 and gold from $200 to $850 amid inflation, Soviet-Afghan war angst, and the Hunt brothers’ squeeze. Then, prices collapsed when Volcker hiked rates and margins rose. Today’s rally instead marries chronic negative real yields, decade-long central-bank de-dollarisation, and structural silver supply tightness from booming solar demand—forces that persisted even before President Trump’s tariff feints and the Greenland row lit the fuse. Over a 100-year horizon, $5,000 gold signals a potential inflection in the post-1971 fiat era: either policymakers restore confidence (through credible fiscal, monetary or technological fixes) and metals retreat as in 1982, or bullion’s repricing becomes a marker—like Britain’s 1931 gold exit—of a slow pivot toward a multipolar reserve system where the dollar’s monopoly fades and real assets regain monetary ballast.
Perspectives
Western financial media
CNBC, Investing.com UK — Record-high gold and silver prices are portrayed mainly as a safe-haven rush driven by rate-cut hopes and fleeting geopolitical worries, with analysts cautioning that sharp pullbacks are possible. Catering to an audience of traders, the reports spotlight daily catalysts and tradeable volatility, potentially downplaying deeper structural problems to keep market attention and page views high.
Indian consumer business media
India.com, Hindustan Times, Economic Times — Coverage stresses that the metal rally reaffirms gold and silver’s status as indispensable household stores of value, supplying rupee-denominated price lists and celebrating new milestones. By emphasising gold’s ‘proven track record’ and offering little discussion of downside risks, the stories implicitly encourage continued buying that benefits local jewellers, advertisers and the outlets’ consumer-finance niches.
Middle-Eastern state-linked outlets
SANA, Oman Observer — The surge is framed as investors’ flight from U.S.-driven geopolitical chaos—citing Trump’s Greenland spat and tariff threats—as proof of eroding confidence in Washington and the dollar. By foregrounding U.S. policy missteps while assuming prices will keep soaring, the pieces reinforce domestic narratives that blame Western powers for instability and may exaggerate the likelihood of unrelenting gains.