Retail Investors Are Piling Into Gold and Silver While Institutions Quietly Exit – Here’s the Data
Wall Street is selling gold and silver to retail investors. That’s the story the latest Bank for International Settlements data tells, and The Kobeissi Letter just laid it out in a stark chart.
The tweet from Kobeissi breaks down exactly what’s happening in the precious metals market, and the numbers are striking.
Since Q2 2025, retail investors have bought more than $70 billion in gold ETFs. That’s not a slow trickle. These purchases have more than tripled over the last six months.
The chart shows cumulative inflows climbing steadily from Q2 2025 through Q1 2026. The retail line moves sharply higher, reflecting aggressive accumulation through the second half of 2025 and into early 2026.
Silver is a similar story. Over the last year, retail investors have poured over $10 billion into silver ETFs. That’s serious money flowing into the white metal.
Institutions Head for the Exits
Now look at the other side. While retail was buying $70 billion in gold, institutional investors sold over $1 billion. The outflows accelerated in late January after gold prices crashed 20% in just three days.
For silver, the pattern repeats. Institutions sold $200 million over the same period that retail was adding $10 billion.
The Kobeissi Letter sums it up simply: “Retail investors are all-in on precious metals.”
The chart visualizes this divergence perfectly. The institutional lines trend negative through Q4 2025 and Q1 2026, while retail lines climb. At the bottom, the BIS attribution confirms the source: this is official data from the central bank for central banks.
Retail buys. Institutions sell. That’s the setup in gold and silver price right now.
What This Divergence Means
This kind of split doesn’t happen often. Usually, retail and institutional money move in the same direction. When they diverge this heavily, it’s worth paying attention.
The BIS data shows institutional selling started around mid-November 2025 and picked up speed after the January correction . That timing matters. Institutions saw the peak and took profits. Retail kept buying the dip.
The Kobeissi Letter has been tracking this closely. They’ve also pointed out that retail options activity in precious metals is now running 6.6 times higher than the 2023 average, up at least 300% from previous years . That’s not normal. That’s a frenzy.
The BIS noted in its quarterly review that “retail-driven exuberance” set the stage for the massive moves in precious metals, and that leveraged ETF rebalancing and margin calls amplified the swings when the correction hit . In plain English: retail piled in, prices got stretched, and when they turned, the forced selling made it worse.
Read also: Here’s Where Gold Price Could Go After the FOMC Decision
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