"after reading your opinion about silver, i sold my etfs silver (trackers). now, reading the attached article, i wonder who is right.

"perhaps you might inform me about it."

David Fuller's view Well, I am glad to see that you could now buy your silver position back more cheaply, should you wish to do so.

I will only reproduce the headline for the item which you attached: "Why Silver Should be $95.87/oz Today", because it was written by what I consider to be a publishing service rather than a research service.

There is an important distinction. A publishing service will tell you what it thinks you want to hear. A research service will tell you what it thinks about the market in question. A complication for you, the customer, is that both will be right on occasion and both will also be wrong on occasion. Chalk it up to the human condition and the uncertainty of markets. Nevertheless, you may wish to consider whether you are paying for a promotional service or an analytical service.

About a year ago, Eoin and I had lunch with an extremely successful publisher. He mentioned that Fullermoney must be doing well. I replied that despite anticipating the stock market recovery, the process of attracting new subscribers in the post-crash environment was slow.

He replied: "Are you sure that you are telling them what they want to hear?"

I swallowed and said: "That is not what we do. We tell people what we think, and why."

What do we think about silver today, and also over the longer term?

It still looks as if that climactic day on 25th April, when silver (monthly, weekly & daily) almost reached $50 before falling back sharply, signified an accelerated peak of at least near-term significance. Although that high was tested three days later, silver could not break above the psychological $50 level and it has now fallen back beneath the initial reaction low just beneath $45.

The volatility since April 25th is unprecedented and signifies a struggle between short-term bulls and newly emerged bears. This is a top characteristic of unspecified duration and silver would need to maintain a break above $50 to reinstate the overall secular uptrend. While I would give the upside the benefit of the doubt in that event, it currently seems more likely that silver will range sideways to lower in an additional period of mean reversion towards its rising 200-day moving average.

Over the considerably longer term, I think silver will eventually move to $100 or more, as paper money continues to lose purchasing power. This historic chart of silver adjusted by CPI inflation indicates that it is still someway beneath its 1980 bubble peak.

Gold (weekly & daily) surged ahead when silver retested its high last week. This included some acceleration and gold is a little more overextended relative to its MA. Silver is likely to remain a short-term influence but gold's seasonal period of strength would normally end around this time, with a mean reversion consolidation occurring before seasonal strength resumes around September. A close under $1490 would tend to confirm the consolidation hypothesis.

Platinum (weekly & daily), having been a comparative wallflower recently, touched a new recovery high yesterday. While it has catch-up potential, it may require steady action by gold and silver if this is not to be delayed until 4Q 2011.

Palladium (weekly & daily) has been in a process of mean reversion towards its MA since this year's high on 22nd February. There are seasonal reasons why this consolidation could continue for a while longer. Nevertheless, a break beneath last month's higher reaction low near $726 would be required to indicate somewhat lower ranging during this phase. Conversely, a sustained move above $800 would suggest that palladium could be among the upside leaders if seasonal strength for precious metals is reasserted in 4Q 2011.