People Are Holding Tight to Their Gold and Silver “Scrap”

It’s really no surprise that gold and silver scrap are not coming back into the market with the two metals continually beat into submission. Gold and silver have been on the low side of the high-end for the past several years. Unless people are seriously desperate for cash they will usually hold pretty tight to their gold at the levels they have been for the past several years. Once we get into the 2020 decade and we begin seeing higher gold and silver the so-called “scrap” market will be alive and kicking. My guess is the “scrap” market will be as lively as it was between 2010 and 2012 when we saw gold and silver both moving to higher ground. As soon as this reversed people put away their silverware, old/borken gold jewelry and any other items they had earmarked for sale.

United States gold scrap prices declined on the Scrap Register Price Index as on Friday, tracking the weakness in gold futures prices at New York Mercantile Exchange despite benchmark dollar index weakened, offering some support to prices for the precious metal.

The major gold scrap commodities prices including 9ct hallmarked gold scrap, 14ct hallmarked gold scrap, 18ct hallmarked gold scrap, 22ct hallmarked gold scrap, 9ct hallmarked gold scrap, 14ct hallmarked gold scrap, 18ct hallmarked gold scrap and 22ct hallmarked gold scrap on the Scrap Register Price Index showed a down trend on Friday.

The 9ct hallmarked gold scrap, 14ct hallmarked gold scrap, 18ct hallmarked gold scrap and 22ct hallmarked gold scrap prices dropped to 481.732 an ounce, 751.502 an ounce, 963.465 an ounce and 1176.711 an ounce respectively.

The 9ct non-hallmarked gold scrap, 14ct non-hallmarked gold scrap, 18ct non-hallmarked gold scrap and 22ct non-hallmarked gold scrap prices declined to 455.659 an ounce, 710.828 an ounce, 911.318 an ounce and 1113.023 an ounce respectively.

The most active June gold contract on the COMEX division of the New York Mercantile Exchange fell by $1.60 to $1,320.70 an ounce on Friday.

The contract settled Thursday at $1,322.30 an ounce, marking the highest finish for a most-active contract since April 27. Futures saw a roughly 0.5% rise for the week, which marked the first weekly climb in about a month. Source

What’s interesting is the different values assigned to hallmarked gold versus non-hallmarked. Simply because the hallmark is missing from the jewelry, or whatever piece of gold has been returned to market, it is assigned a completely different, much lower, value. If you have a ring sized and the jeweler cuts the hallmark out, please ensure the jewelry is hallmarked before completing the transaction or abandon several percentage points of value for your gold!!