Nasdaq Just for Funds: Sprott’s Steve Schoffstall on SLVR

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Video Transcript

Carter Haskel: Welcome back to another episode of Just For Funds here at the Nasdaq MarketSite. My name is Carter Haskel, Senior Product Analyst on the ETF Listings team. I'm joined here by Steve Schoffstall, Managing Partner and Head of ETFs at Sprott. Steve, silver is off to a strong start in 2026 after a record-setting 2025. What has been driving silver's rise this year?

Steve Schoffstall: That's a great question. There are several things in play. If you look back at how silver's price moved last year, it wasn't until the second half that we really started to see prices move higher and investors take notice. We're seeing that momentum carry through the start of 2026. We're starting to see institutions come to the table regarding increased investments. Retail and advisors have been investing quite heavily in silver ETFs and silver in general.

Then there's another aspect of the silver market that is a little unique among other metals: it's both a precious metal and a critical material. There are many industrial uses for silver. Depending on where you're in the world, there are some supply disruptions or shortages in certain markets. We're seeing that also play into the overall price of silver.

Carter Haskel: It's unique because it's both a precious metal and an industrial metal. How does this impact the silver market as a whole?

Steve Schoffstall: With the precious metal side, you get some of the same attributes that you would expect from gold, for example, where you get that portfolio diversification tends to do well in periods of inflation, de-dollarization. In industrial uses, about 59% are in that sector. There are more than 10,000 ways in which silver is used. This is becoming increasingly important for the investment thesis for silver.

Solar panels, for example, require silver to harness the sun's electricity. With that, once the solar panels are retired, there's not really a way to go and recycle that silver. That silver at this point is out of the system. They have to bring new silver around. We see these industrial uses and, in certain cases, a lack of recycling capabilities that are really fueling silver's outlook moving forward.

Carter Haskel: The Sprott Silver Miners & Physical Silver ETF (SLVR) has gathered more than $700 million in assets since its inception a year ago. In your view, why has SLVR been so well received by your investors?

Steve Schoffstall: The main thing is it's focused on a pure-play strategy, and this is something that we do across our product lineup. What we mean by “pure-play” is that we're targeting companies with at least 50% of their revenue or assets dedicated to mining silver. Identifying opportunities in the silver market is more challenging than in some other markets. I think investors appreciate that.

It also allocates about 17.5% to physical silver. That's something that's also unique to this product. I think once you take the pure-play allocation on the equity side and add in the physical exposure, it's unique in the market, and investors really gravitated toward the structure.

Carter Haskel: What makes a pure-play exposure so important in a strategy like SLVR?

Steve Schoffstall: It's exceedingly important in a market like silver. When you look at the largest producers of silver, they typically aren't in the business of mining silver. About 73% of silver is mined as a by-product. When companies mine copper, they also get some silver involved. In those types of companies, the price of silver isn't going to drive their investment decisions.

By focusing on those companies that are principally involved in mining silver, we see that those investment decisions do react to the price of silver, and so what you're left with is a strategy that has less unintended exposure, and we've seen investors really gravitate to that.

Carter Haskel: Overall, how do you see investors using an ETF like SLVR in a portfolio?

Steve Schoffstall: This is an area I think that is relatively new to investors. Silver funds have been around for decades, but are wildly underused in many cases. We're seeing investors realize you do get the monetary aspects, but they're also adding it to a growth sleeve given its industrial characteristics.
It also fits in thematics, but it does offer some diversification you might not get from other growth strategies or other thematics available to investors. 

Carter Haskel: Thanks for coming by today.

Steve Schoffstall: It's great to be here. Thanks.