Silver miners · ETF deep dive
Global X Silver Miners ETF SIL
Leverage on the silver price through the miners that dig it — a high-beta basket dominated by one streaming name (Wheaton ~22%). It amplifies silver moves both ways and carries operating and jurisdiction risk that bullion does not.
Price & momentum chart & stats through 2026-07-10
Data summary: last close $76.35 on 2026-07-10, 35% below the 52-week high of $118.03, 61% above the 52-week low of $47.34; trading below its 200-day average of $86.28. Trailing returns: YTD -8%, 1-year +55%, 3-year +205%, 5-year +77%.
What it holds
Top 10 holdings
| Holding | Ticker | Weight |
|---|---|---|
| Wheaton Precious Metals | WPM | 21.9% |
| Pan American Silver | PAAS | 12.3% |
| Coeur Mining | CDE | 11.0% |
| Hecla Mining | HL | 5.0% |
| Industrias Penoles | PE&OLES | 4.9% |
| First Majestic Silver | AG | 4.8% |
| Fresnillo | FRES | 4.4% |
| SSR Mining | SSRM | 4.2% |
| Cia de Minas Buenaventura | BVN | 4.1% |
| OR Royalties | OR | 4.0% |
Top-10 ≈ 77% of the fund (40 holdings total). Positions as of 2026-07-13, from the issuer fact sheet (source). Holdings drift daily; weights are a snapshot, not live.
Sector mix live, FMP
- Basic Materials99.8%
- Consumer Defensive0.1%
What this fund is
SIL tracks the Solactive Global Silver Miners Total Return Index — a free-float-cap-weighted basket of 20–40 global silver mining, exploration and refining companies, with a single-name cap around 22.5%.
This is miner equity, not metal. Miners are a high-beta, leveraged play on the silver price: when silver rises, a miner's margins (and share price) can rise far more; when silver falls, the same leverage works brutally in reverse.
Concentration is heavy at the top — Wheaton Precious Metals (a streaming/royalty name, not a pure miner) sits near 22%, and the top three are ~45% of the fund. Geography spans Canada, Mexico (Penoles), Peru (Buenaventura) and the UK (Fresnillo).
The Synthos read
How the tracked themes this fund rides are reading right now — conviction-weighted net stance from independent expert voices in the Synthos knowledge base (management/officials laned out). Snapshot as of 2026-07-12.
| Tracked theme | Net stance (−100 to +100) | Recent drift | Reliability |
|---|---|---|---|
| Silver & precious metals The metal theme is the driver, but SIL adds miner leverage on top — it will over- and under-shoot silver sentiment. | up +79 Very Bullish | slightly more bearish 14 claims | Provisional |
| Gold Precious-metals beta: SIL tends to move with the broader gold/silver complex and its real-rate driver. | up +68 Very Bullish | slightly more bearish 22 claims | Provisional |
Reliability tiers: Full ≥ 25 claims in the current window, Provisional 10–24, Insufficient < 10 (read as directional only). Net stance is a rate-of-change signal about the theme, not a price target for this fund and not advice. Themes can be right while the fund’s structure works against you.
Cost & structure
Expense ratio 0.65% (issuer, cross-checks against FMP).
1940-Act open-end ETF (Global X), inception 2010. Index reconstitutes and rebalances semi-annually (May and November).
Free-float cap-weighted with a ~22.5% single-name cap — which is why Wheaton can be nearly a quarter of the fund.
Honest fit
The job it does
- Leveraged upside to silver: in a precious-metals bull, miners can far outrun the metal.
- One ticket for a global silver-miner basket most investors could not assemble directly.
- Operating leverage that bullion (SLV) cannot provide.
What it does not do
- Is not the same as owning silver — it is equity with operating, cost-inflation and jurisdiction risk.
- Will not track silver 1:1 — it is high-beta and amplifies moves in both directions.
- Is not diversified at the top — ~22% in a single streaming name (Wheaton) means one company heavily shapes returns.
What would change this read (falsifiers)
- A falling silver price hits miners with amplified downside — the leverage cuts both ways.
- Cost inflation (energy, labor) or a jurisdiction shock (Mexico/Peru policy) can sink miners even if silver holds.
- If you want clean exposure to the metal without operating risk, SLV (bullion) is the more direct tool.