Online Reporter
Platinum extended this year’s surge to almost 40 percent, as the market strains under signs of tightness.
The price of platinum — used in jewelry and autocatalysts, as well as in the chemical and glass industries — rose as much as 4,6 percent to $1 275,45 an ounce on Wednesday. After trading largely sideways at around $1 000 for the best part of a decade, that’s taken the white metal to the highest in more than four years.
The gains come as the physical platinum market heads for another year of deficit, boosted by strong Chinese demand for a cheaper alternative to gold jewelry. A dramatic outflow of platinum to the US in the first few months of 2025 — over fears that imports would be subject to President Donald Trump’s tariffs — further tightened the availability of the metal in the largest spot trading hubs of Zurich and London.
The implied cost of borrowing the precious metal for one month peaked in data going back six years at an annualised rate of 15 percent, while forward prices for platinum are trading a steep discount to spot, both indications of tightness.
Platinum output in South Africa — by far the world’s biggest producer — has declined this year amid heavy rains and other disruptions. That’s helped to underpin the price gains, boosting the shares of miners such as Anglo American Plc spinoff Valterra Platinum Ltd. and its rivals Impala Platinum Holdings and Sibanye Stillwater.
Those producers have come under pressure from the worldwide rollout of electric vehicles, which don’t use either platinum, or its sister metals, palladium and rhodium. — Moneyweb
