Gold,silver imports may shoot up in festival quarter

Silver prices are in a comfortable range and people are considering it as a buying opportunity,said Harshad Ajmera,proprietor with Kolkata-based wholesaler,JJ Gold House.

Spot silver traded above $30 an ounce,down 39 per cent from its record high of $50 hit in late April,but still up nearly 30 per cent from a year earlier.

Silver prices overseas have declined 37.7 per cent since an April peak of over $49.51,as against gold’s 13 per cent gains,making analysts more optimistic on white metal for a long-term investment.

If one were to take long-term view,even present levels are good for investment in silver. Demand is mostly from the physical side and it is natural because after it reached new highs this year,everybody’s attention is on gold and silver,said Gnanasekar Thiagarajan,director with Commtrendz Research.

Thiagarajan sees support for silver at $28-29 an ounce and the price eventually rising towards $45 by year-end.

Silver prices are likely to follow bullish gold,which is likely to touch $2,000 an ounce,said Ong Yi Ling,an analyst at Phillip Futures in Singapore.

Kothari at the Bombay Bullion Association expects total silver imports in 2011 to surpass 4,000 tonnes. This despite a 30 per cent on month fall in the imports in May this year.

In 2010,the country’s silver imports more than doubled to 3,029 tonnes,data from Thomson Reuters GFMS showed. In 2009,shipments had dived to 1,285 tonnes from 5,048 tonnes a year earlier.

The reason for this fluctuation is the huge stocking and de-stocking undertaken by traders for whom the silver business is a fallback in case of adverse business sentiment in gold.