Gold and Silver Hold Strong as Bitcoin Drops Below $95K

Daily News Nuggets | Today’s top stories for gold and silver investors
November 14th, 2025 

For Millions of Americans the Recession is Already Here 

While Wall Street celebrates near-record highs, a different economic reality is emerging at ground level. Financial analyst Peter Atwater describes the current economy as a “Jenga tower” — top-heavy and increasingly fragile. The bottom tier is already experiencing recession-like conditions, with affordability pressures mounting and layoffs hitting a 20-year high for October.  

Meanwhile, the upper layer of the economy continues to boom, buoyed by AI enthusiasm and stock-market wealth. Mohamed El-Erian warns this widening K-shaped split is riskier than it looks: the buffers that cushioned consumers in 2020 — stimulus checks, rapid wage growth, abundant savings — are gone. Inflation is still stuck around 3%, and household exhaustion is setting in. 

Gold Takes a Breather After Record Run 

Gold pulled back slightly on Friday, trading around $4,170 per ounce after touching an intraday high above $4,200. The yellow metal remains up about 4% for the week despite the modest retreat. The softness comes as Federal Reserve officials signal caution on further rate cuts, with traders now seeing just a 49% probability of another December cut. Still, a weaker dollar and lingering economic uncertainty are keeping demand strong.  

Gold hit a record high of $4,382 in mid-October before correcting roughly 11%, but analysts view the pullback as healthy profit-taking rather than a fundamental shift. With central banks continuing to accumulate and geopolitical risks elevated, the underlying bid remains firm even as short-term traders lock in gains. 

The takeaway: Western investors tend to interpret every dip through the old playbook — “rates up, gold down.” But the new playbook is being written elsewhere… 

China’s Shadow Gold Buying Campaign 

Beijing is quietly accumulating far more gold than official figures suggest, according to analysts tracking opaque market flows. While the People’s Bank of China reported adding just 6 tons in recent months, Société Générale estimates China’s actual purchases could reach 250 tons per year—more than a third of total global central bank demand. Some analysts believe the gap between official and actual purchases topped 1,300 tons annually in 2022-2023.  

Beijing’s motive is clear: diversify away from U.S. dollar assets without triggering market reactions that would push the dollar lower and gold higher ahead of their positioning. As Goldman Sachs put it, tracking these flows is nearly impossible — “there’s just no way to know where these things are going.” 

Why this matters: Central bank accumulation has become the backbone of this bull market. And China’s covert buying means the floor under gold is far higher — and far more structurally supported — than Western investors assume. 

Silver Deficit Enters Fifth Consecutive Year 

The silver market is on track for its fifth straight year of supply deficits, with 2025 expected to show a shortfall of 95 million ounces. That brings the cumulative deficit since 2021 to nearly 820 million ounces—a staggering figure that helps explain this year’s market tightness. Silver hit a record high of $54.48 in October and has posted a 67% year-to-date gain, eclipsing gold’s 52% rise.  

Despite weaker industrial and jewelry demand, investment flows continue to dominate. Silver-backed ETP holdings are up 18% this year as investors respond to stagflation risk, geopolitical tensions, and unsustainable debt trajectories. 

What we’re watching: Persistent structural deficits don’t resolve quietly. When supply remains flat and investment keeps rising, price consolidations tend to be temporary pauses — not trend reversals. 

Bitcoin’s Bull Run Hits the Brakes 

Bitcoin dropped below $95,000 on Friday for the first time in six months, threatening to erase its entire 2024 gains as investors pulled nearly $870 million from crypto ETFs. The digital asset, which hit a record high of $126,251 in early October, has now surrendered most of those gains amid a broader wave of risk aversion sweeping markets.  

The selloff follows $19 billion in liquidations that rocked crypto in mid-October and comes as fading Fed rate-cut expectations pressure speculative assets. Bitcoin ended 2024 at $93,714—barely above current levels. 

The contrast is striking: while Bitcoin retreats from its highs, gold and silver continue holding near elevated levels. Markets are starting to differentiate between momentum-driven speculation and genuine hedges. Bitcoin thrives on risk appetite. Gold and silver thrive when risk appetite evaporates. And right now, risk appetite looks increasingly fragile. 

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