I did more research into silver. I thought it was primarily the AI buildout that is driving silver prices but it is solar panels. ~20% of silver is used in solar panels, ~4% is used in EVs, ~3% used in AI datacenters.
Newer solar panels use 2-3x more silver and have ~24% efficientcy, older solar panels have a 19% efficientcy. Newer panels started to become popular since 2023. Newer panels are ~50% more expensive, but the cost of installing panels is many times the cost of a solar panel so the increase in price is immaterial and the ROI on installing new panels vs old is still about 10 years.
My biggest fear was that if AI does crash, which it will, it will take silver with it. In that scenario, Silver will crash but it will be a small crash and will recover quickly vs AI stocks.
My minor fear is the gold to silver ratio which is now 50:1, but silver is primarily an industrial metal and gold is primarily an investment metal nowadays. Historically both were investment metals so the ratio was more important in the past IMHO. Around 2016 the ratio was ~43:1.
If you believe in solar panels and EVs, then silver is a buy even at current prices. Treat AI demand for silver as icing on the cake.
I will likely liquidate some US equities and buy more silver.
In the long term, there are even newer higher efficiency solar panels that do not use silver but those panels have durability issues. If durability issues are solved and they start to take market share then I would dump silver. Currently these new panels make up ~1% of new panels sold.