As you can clearly see – there’s not much silver kicking around.

So here’s a thought: When there is clearly far less silver bullion in circulation than gold… then why is silver 53 times cheaper than gold?

I admit this is comparing apples and oranges to a degree. They are different markets and have different fundamentals.

But the core reason for the different price is that gold is primarily an investors metal, be it punter, hedge fund or central bank – they are buying for its investment qualities.

Whereas silver has long been an industrial metal, with a few investors making up a portion of purchases.

But this is changing.

As recently as 2007, investment demand was just 5% of the market.

By 2012 investment demand was 30% of the market.

And this is where China comes in.

Chinese precious metals demand has exploded recently.

All the press focus on the gold side of the story, as China’s hunger for gold means it’s now the main player in the market. That’s what happens when an economy grows in size five-fold in a decade, and gold ownership becomes legal (and encouraged) along the way!

But the silver story is just as bullish.

The key point here is that China has only recently switched from being a silver exporter, to a silver IMPORTER.

In 2012, the tide quietly turned in earnest. The silver stopped flowing from Chinese ports to Hong Kong, and started flowing from Hong Kong ports to China.

You can see how clear this trend of Chinese silver imports is in this chart I provided recently.

Investors often wish that someone would ring a bell to signal the turning point in a market. Well this is just about as close as you’ll get. Whenever China’s hunger for any particular commodity has forced them to import the commodity, it has been a watershed moment.

Although Chinese gold imports have soared to record levels recently, China actually became a significant net importer of gold (5 tonnes/month) as far back as 2007.

And since then the gold price has climbed from $600/oz, to $1650/oz. China is still there now, buying all the dips with their ears pinned back.

Today silver is looking at a similar transformative event in its market as China is now a net importer here too. What’s great for investors today is that this has only just happened, which means you have time to act.

So it’s no coincidence that silver’s technical chart is looking interesting again.

Over the last six months it has bounced off the 200-week moving average, to find support around the 50-week average more recently.

This is very bullish, and the last time we saw this pattern was back in 2010. And it was the prelude to the mother of all silver rallies, which saw the silver price more than double in just nine months.