Silver edges up to about £39 an ounce as it lags gold's rebound

Silver finished Thursday's session around $51.78 a troy ounce, according to Kitco's PM report. That is roughly £39 an ounce, or £1.26 a gram, on our approximate conversion before any dealer costs. It was down about 0.8 per cent on the day, even though silver had touched $52.39 in the morning.

Gold behaved differently. Kitco shows spot gold near $4,087, up about 0.6 per cent, after reaching its highest level since October earlier in the day. Dividing one price by the other gives a gold-silver ratio of about 79, the number of silver ounces needed to buy one ounce of gold. That is well above the 60 to 70 seen over the summer, so silver is still lagging in the recovery from October's sell-off.

Kitco links the moves to falling US bond yields, softer labour costs and easing bets on a December US interest rate rise, which have helped metals that pay no interest. Wall Street's fall on Thursday also added to market jitters. Silver tends to swing harder than gold because it is also an industrial metal, so expect bigger daily moves.

For UK buyers, most silver bullion carries 20 per cent VAT, unlike investment gold. Compare the all-in cost: spot plus premium, VAT and delivery. This is market information, not financial advice.