GOLD and SILVER rallied on Friday to rise for the 3rd week in a row while platinum and palladium leapt again, hitting fresh multi-year highs as borrowing costs for the industrially-useful precious metals jumped to fresh records.

 

"It seems that there really is no platinum in loco London/Zurich," says Bruce Ikemizu, formerly head of giant Chinese bank ICBC's Tokyo precious metals desk and now head of the Japan Bullion Market Association.

 

"Forward discounts have deepened," meaning prices for delayed delivery are cheaper than metal for near-term settlement, signalling that  PGM stockpiles have grown tighter still for immediate availability.

 

Spot market platinum prices today hit fresh 11-year highs in London, peaking above $1480 per Troy ounce before falling $30 into the City's 2pm auction to show a weekly rise of 6.3% in US Dollar terms at that global benchmark.

 

Palladium meantime hits its highest Dollar price since July 2023, peaking above $1330 per Troy ounce before retreating $15 into London's PM auction to gain 12.0% from last Friday's finish.

 

"Paying nearly 30% interest to borrow the metal makes it reasonable to consider just buying it outright," says Ikemizu.

 

 

"Behind the banks are the actual users who borrow from them," the JBM chief goes on, citing mining companies, recyclers, jewellery manufacturers and industrial users.

 

"For the ultimate borrowers, the situation is extremely challenging. I cannot recall a time when lease rates rose this sharply. Unless metal returns to London/Zurich, there is a risk that prices could spiral upward due to buying pressure from those who need metal.

 

"The market may already be broken."

 

Stockpiles of the platinum group metals in New York were unchanged Thursday.

 

Friday then saw the CME exchange's Nymex platinum contract − rarely settled for bullion rather than cash, but driven higher earlier in 2025 by the risk of President Trump applying trade tariffs on US imports − touch $1500 per Troy ounce for October settlement, while September palladium futures touched $1372.

 

"Platinum investment is a natural mechanism for attracting metal into any geography," says a report from the mining industry's World Platinum Investment Council, reviewing last week's presentations at Shanghai Platinum Week in China, "providing a pool of liquidity to supply future demand.

 

"The strength in China's demand for physical platinum investment products and platinum jewellery, driven in part by a response to the high gold price, was a much-discussed topic. For [this] strategically important metal...an essential ingredient for the hydrogen economy and global decarbonisation...this is likely to prove particularly important for China," because the world's No.1 manufacturing economy does not have "meaningful domestic sources of platinum supply beyond recycling."

 

Gold on Friday meantime erased this week's previous drop, fixing around $3355 per Troy ounce at London's 3pm auction, while silver rose to show a 2.1% gain at $38.33.

 

That marked silver's highest Friday benchmarking in London since mid-September 2011, less than 5 months after it re-touched January 1980's all-time $50 top.