With Wednesday’s tumble, the iShares Silver Trust is down nearly 11% in just the past month, forcing the fund to a residence more than 15% below its 200-day moving average, a level SLV has not closed above since March.
SLV, the largest silver ETF, also about 8% below its 20- and 50-day moving averages, but is just 8.4% above its 52-week low. That low could soon be tested if the charts are accurate. [More Declines Could be in Store for Silver ETFs]
Silver’s move below $20.50 an ounce is ominous in the eyes of some technical analysts. “The break of the key support at $20.50 favors a move towards the next key support at $18.23,” said Luc Luyet, a senior analyst at MIG in Switzerland, according to Bloomberg.
Silver is the second-worst performer, after corn, in the Standard & Poor’s GSCI gauge of 24 commodities. With Wednesday’s loss, SLV is down about 37% this year.
Silver outpaced gold last month and there are some commodities markets observers that are bullish on silver’s long-term outlook, which they see as buoyed by robust industrial demand. [Silver ETFs Could Rally]
Investors have stood by SLV and comparable funds even as they have not been shy about pulling cash from gold-backed ETFs. Two gold ETFs are found among the 10 worst ETFs in terms of 201 outflows but SLV has seen inflows.
The ProShares UltraShort Silver (NYSEArca: ZSL) could be the way for risk-tolerant investors to deal with and profit from silver’s declines. ZSL is up 8.3% in just the past week and is up almost 23% in the past month. Double-leveraged ZSL also resides 18% above its 200-day line.
ProShares UltraShort Silver
ETF Trends editorial team contributed to this post. Tom Lydon’s clients own shares of SLV.