Written by: Sleepy.txt @sleepy0x13

J.P. Morgan, the most loyal 'gatekeeper' of the old dollar order, is actively demolishing the high wall it once vowed to defend.

According to market rumors, by the end of November 2025, J.P. Morgan will relocate its core precious metals trading team to Singapore. If the geographical migration is merely a facade, then its essence is a public defection from the Western monetary system.

Looking back over the past half-century, Wall Street has been responsible for building a massive credit illusion with dollars, while London, as the 'heart' of Wall Street's monetary empire across the Atlantic, has maintained the dignity of pricing with deep underground vaults. The two are interdependent, weaving together the absolute control network of the Western world over precious metals. And J.P. Morgan was supposed to be the last and most solid line of defense.

The grass snake gray line, lurking pulse for thousands of miles. Just as the official silence on the rumors remains unaddressed, JPMorgan completed an astonishing asset shuffle, with approximately 169 million ounces of silver quietly reclassified from 'deliverable' to 'non-deliverable' in the COMEX vault. According to rough estimates from publicly available data from the Silver Institute, this roughly amounts to nearly 10% of the global annual supply, locked up on paper.

In this brutal business game, scale itself is the most hardline attitude. This mountain of over 5,000 tons of silver, in the eyes of many traders, looks more like JPMorgan's prepared chips to seize pricing power for the next cycle.

Meanwhile, thousands of kilometers away, Singapore's largest private vault, The Reserve, has timely initiated its second phase, raising the total capacity of the vault to 15,500 tons in one go. This infrastructure upgrade, planned five years ago, gives Singapore enough confidence to take in the massive wealth flowing out of the West.

JPMorgan locks in the liquidity of physical assets in the West with its left hand, creating panic; with its right hand, it builds a reservoir of safe haven in the East to reap the benefits.

What prompted this giant's defection was the undeniable weakness of the London market. At the Bank of England, the gold delivery cycle has been extended from days to weeks, while the leasing rate for silver once surged to a historic high of 30%. For those familiar with this market, this at least indicates one thing: everyone is scrambling for goods, and the physical assets in the vaults are beginning to seem inadequate.

The most astute players are often the vultures most sensitive to the scent of death.

In this bleak winter, JPMorgan has demonstrated the instincts of a top dealer. Its exit marks the imminent end of the 'paper gold' game that has lasted half a century and turned stone into gold. When the tide recedes, only by holding tightly to the heavy physical chips in hand can one obtain a ticket to the next thirty years.

The end of alchemy

The root of all misfortune was sown fifty years ago.

In 1971, when President Nixon severed the dollar's tether to gold, he actually removed the last anchor of the global financial system. From that moment on, gold was demoted from a rigidly redeemable currency to a financial asset redefined by Wall Street.

In the following half-century, bankers in London and New York invented a clever 'financial alchemy.' Since gold is no longer currency, countless contracts representing gold can be created out of thin air, just like printing money.

This is the vast derivatives empire established by LBMA (London Bullion Market Association) and COMEX (Chicago Mercantile Exchange). In this empire, leverage is king. Every piece of sleeping gold in the vault corresponds to 100 delivery orders circulating in the market. And on the silver table, this game is even crazier.

This 'paper wealth' system has been able to operate for half a century entirely reliant on a fragile gentleman's agreement: the vast majority of investors only aim to profit from the price difference and never intend to attempt to withdraw that heavy metal.

However, the designer of this game overlooked a 'gray rhino' crashing into the room—silver.

Unlike gold, which is eternally hidden underground as wealth, silver plays the role of a 'consumable' in modern industry. It is the vein of photovoltaic panels and the nerve of electric vehicles. According to data from the Silver Institute, the global silver market has been in structural deficit for five consecutive years, with industrial demand accounting for nearly 60% of total demand.

Wall Street can strike unlimited dollars with a keyboard, but cannot conjure an ounce of silver used for conductivity out of thin air.

When the physical inventory is consumed by the real economy, the billions of contracts on paper turn into a house of cards. By the winter of 2025, this layer of window paper has finally been pierced.

The first red flag was the price anomaly. In normal futures logic, forward prices are usually higher than spot prices, called 'contango.' But in London and New York, the market exhibited extreme 'spot premiums.' If you want to buy a silver contract six months from now, it’s a calm time; but if you want to move silver bars home right now, you not only have to pay a high premium but also face a long waiting period of several weeks.

Queues have formed outside the Bank of England's vaults, and the registered silver inventory at COMEX has fallen below the safety line, with the ratio of open contracts to physical inventory once soaring to 244%. The market has finally understood the terrifying reality: physical assets and paper contracts are splitting into two parallel universes. The former belongs to those who own factories and vaults, while the latter belongs to speculators still sleeping in old dreams.

If the shortage of silver is due to the consumption of industrial giants, then the loss of gold is due to a national-level 'run'. Central banks of various countries, once the staunchest holders of US dollars, are now at the forefront of the run.

Although the gold price for 2025 is at a historical high, causing some central banks to temporarily slow their gold purchasing pace tactically, strategically, 'buying' remains the only action. The World Gold Council (WGC) latest data shows that in the first 10 months of 2025, central banks worldwide collectively net purchased 254 tons of gold.

Let's take a look at this list of buyers.

Poland, after pausing gold purchases for five months, suddenly returned to the market in October, purchasing 16 tons in a single month, forcibly raising its gold reserve ratio to 26%. Brazil has increased its holdings for two consecutive months, with total reserves climbing to 161 tons. China, since resuming purchases in November 2024, has appeared on the buyer's list for the 13th consecutive month.

Those countries spare no effort to exchange precious foreign currency for heavy gold bars and transport them back home. In the past, everyone trusted US Treasury bonds because they were 'risk-free assets'; now, everyone is frantically buying gold because it has become the only shelter against 'US dollar credit risk.'

Although Western mainstream economists are still arguing, claiming that the paper gold system provides efficient liquidity, the current crisis is merely a temporary logistics issue.

But paper cannot hold fire, and now paper cannot hold gold either.

When the leverage ratio reaches 100:1, and that only '1' starts to be resolutely moved back home by various central banks, the remaining '99' paper contracts face unprecedented liquidity mismatches.

The current London market is trapped in a typical short squeeze dilemma, with industrial giants busy hoarding silver to maintain production, while central banks are tightly locking up gold as a bottom stock for national fortune. When all trading counterparts demand physical delivery, the pricing model based on credit foundations collapses. Whoever masters the physical assets controls the power to define prices.

And JPMorgan, once the most adept at manipulating paper contracts, is clearly more attuned to this future than anyone else.

Rather than being a martyr of an old order, it prefers to be a partner of a new order. This habitual offender, which was fined $920 million for market manipulation over the past eight years, is leaving not out of a sudden moral awakening, but as a precise bet on the global flow of wealth over the next thirty years.

What it is betting on is the collapse of the 'paper contract' market. Even if it does not collapse immediately, that layer of infinitely amplified leverage will eventually be cut down again and again. What remains truly safe is just the tangible metal in the vault.

Betrayal of Wall Street

If the paper gold and silver system is likened to a brightly lit casino, then over the past decade, JPMorgan has not only been the bodyguard maintaining order but also the dealer most adept at cheating.

In September 2020, to settle allegations of manipulating the precious metals market by the U.S. Department of Justice, JPMorgan paid a record $920 million in settlement fees. In the thousands of pages of investigation documents disclosed by the Department of Justice, JPMorgan's traders were described as masters of deception.

They are accustomed to a very cunning hunting method, where traders instantly hang thousands of contracts on the selling side, creating a false impression that prices are about to collapse, inducing retail investors and high-frequency robots to panic sell; then, at the moment of collapse, they withdraw orders and buy back heavily at the bottom.

According to statistics, JPMorgan's former global precious metals chief Michael Nowak and his team have artificially manufactured moments of collapse and surge in gold and silver prices tens of thousands of times over eight years.

At that time, the outside world generally attributed all of this to Wall Street's usual greed. But five years later, when the puzzle of that 169 million ounces of silver inventory is placed on the table, a darker thought begins to circulate in the market.

In some interpretations, JPMorgan's past 'operations' can hardly be seen merely as a means to earn a little more from high-frequency trading spreads. It feels more like a slow and lengthy accumulation of positions; on one hand, they violently press down in the paper market, creating the illusion that prices are pinned down; on the other hand, they quietly gather chips on the physical side.

This former guardian of the dollar's old order has now transformed into the most dangerous grave digger of the old order.

In the past, JPMorgan was the largest short seller of paper silver and the ceiling suppressing gold and silver prices. But now, as the physical chips have been swapped, they have overnight transformed into the largest bulls.

There has always been plenty of market gossip, with rumors saying that recently the silver price has soared from $30 to $60, with JPMorgan being the puppet master. Such claims, of course, have no evidence, but are enough to indicate one thing: in many people's minds, it has transformed from a short-seller of paper silver into the largest bull of physical assets.

If all of this extrapolation holds, then we will witness the most spectacular and brutal coup in business history.

JPMorgan is more aware than anyone that the regulatory iron fist in the US is tightening inch by inch, and that game of paper contracts, which could cost not only money but potentially lives, has reached its end.

This also explains why it is so fond of Singapore.

In the United States, every trade may be flagged as suspicious by AI surveillance systems; but in Singapore, in private fortresses not belonging to any national central bank, gold and silver are completely depoliticized. There is no long-arm jurisdiction, only extreme protection of private property.

JPMorgan's breakout is certainly not a solo effort.

At the same time that rumors are brewing, a consensus has quietly formed at the top of Wall Street. While there has been no physical collective migration, strategically, the giants have completed a remarkable synchrony shift, with Goldman Sachs aggressively setting the gold price target for 2026 at $4,900, and Bank of America even directly calling for a sky-high price of $5,000.

In the era dominated by paper gold, such target prices sound like fantasy; but if we shift our perspective back to physical gold, looking at the pace of central bank gold purchases and the changes in inventory in the vaults, this number begins to have space for serious discussion.

Smart money on Wall Street is quietly repositioning, reducing gold shorts while increasing physical positions. The US Treasury bonds in hand may not be fully sold off, but gold, silver, and other physical assets are being gradually stuffed into investment portfolios. JPMorgan is acting the fastest and most decisively, as it not only wants to survive but also to win. It does not want to sink with the paper gold empire; it wants to take its algorithms, capital, and technology to a place that not only has gold but also has a future.

The problem is that the place already has its own owner.

When JPMorgan's private jet lands at Singapore's Changi Airport and looks north, it finds a much larger competitor that has long since built high walls there.

The waves surge and flow

While traders in London are still anxious about the depletion of liquidity in paper gold, a vast physical gold empire has already completed its primitive accumulation by the Huangpu River in Shanghai, thousands of kilometers away.

Its name is the Shanghai Gold Exchange (SGE).

In the Western-dominated financial landscape, SGE is a complete outlier. It rejects the virtual games built on credit contracts and has adhered to an almost paranoid iron rule since its inception: physical delivery.

These four words, like a steel nail, precisely hit the seven inches of the Western paper gold game.

At COMEX in New York, gold is often just a string of fluctuating numbers, with the vast majority of contracts being closed before expiration. But in Shanghai, the rules are 'full margin trading' and 'centralized clearing.'

Every transaction here must have real gold bars lying in the vault. This not only eliminates the possibility of infinite leverage but also raises the threshold for 'shorting gold,' as you must first borrow real gold before you can sell it.

In 2024, SGE delivered an astonishing report card, with annual gold trading volume reaching 62,300 tons, a 49.9% increase from 2023; transaction value skyrocketed to 34.65 trillion yuan, an increase of nearly 87%.

When the physical delivery rate at New York COMEX is even less than 0.1%, the Shanghai Gold Exchange has become the world's largest physical gold reservoir, continuously absorbing the global stock of gold.

If the influx of gold is the strategic reserve of a country, then the influx of silver is China's 'physiological craving' for industrial needs.

Speculators on Wall Street can bet on prices using paper contracts, but as the largest photovoltaic and new energy manufacturing base in the world, Chinese factory owners do not want contracts; they must obtain real silver to start production. This rigid industrial demand has made China the world's largest precious metal black hole, continuously swallowing the stock from the West.

The road of 'western gold moving east' is busy yet secretive.

Taking the journey of a gold bar as an example. In Ticino, Switzerland, some of the world's largest gold refiners (such as Valcambi, PAMP) are operating day and night. They are executing a special 'blood exchange' task, melting and purifying 400-ounce standard gold bars transported from the London vault, then recasting them into 1-kilogram 'Shanghai Gold' standard bars with a purity of 99.99%.

This is not only a physical reshaping but also a monetary attribute change.

Once these gold bars are melted down to the 1-kilogram specification and stamped with the 'Shanghai Gold' mark, they are almost impossible to flow back to the London market. Because to transport them back, they must be melted down and certified again, which is extremely costly.

This means that once gold flows east, it is like river water entering the sea, with no turning back. The waves surge and flow, and the endless river water never rests.

On the tarmacs of major airports worldwide, armored convoys bearing the logos of Brink's, Loomis, or Malca-Amit are the carriers of this grand migration. They continuously fill the Shanghai vault with these recast gold bars, becoming the physical cornerstone of the new order.

Mastering physical assets is to master the discourse power. This is precisely the strategic significance that Yu Wenjian, the head of SGE, repeatedly emphasizes in establishing the 'Shanghai Gold' benchmark price.

For a long time, the global gold pricing power has been firmly locked in the London afternoon 3 o'clock fixing price, as it embodies the will of the dollar. But Shanghai is attempting to cut off this logic.

This is a strategic hedge of the highest dimension. As countries like China, Russia, and those in the Middle East begin to form an invisible alliance for 'de-dollarization,' they need a new universal language. This language is neither the renminbi nor the ruble, but gold.

Shanghai is the translation center of this new language. It is telling the world that if the dollar is no longer trustworthy, then please believe in the real gold and silver stored in your own warehouse; if paper contracts may default, then please trust the Shanghai rules of 'pay cash and deliver goods.'

For JPMorgan, this is both a huge threat and an opportunity that cannot be ignored.

To the west, it cannot return because there is only exhausted liquidity and tightened regulations; to the east, it must face the colossal Shanghai. It cannot conquer Shanghai directly, for the rules there do not belong to Wall Street, and the walls there are too thick.

The last buffer zone

If Shanghai is the 'heart' of the Eastern physical asset empire, then Singapore is the 'front line' of this East-West showdown. It is not just a geographical transit point but also the last line of defense carefully selected by Western capital in the face of Eastern rise.

Singapore, this city-state, is investing itself crazily to become the 'Switzerland' of the 21st century.

Located next to Changi Airport's runway, Le Freeport is the best window to observe Singapore's ambitions. This free port, with independent judicial status, is a perfect 'black box' both in physical and legal senses. Here, the flow of gold is stripped of all cumbersome administrative regulations, from the aircraft landing to the gold bars entering the warehouse, the entire process is completed in a completely closed, tax-free, and highly private loop.

At the same time, another super vault called The Reserve has been on high alert since 2024. This fortress, covering an area of 180,000 square feet, has a total designed capacity of up to 15,500 tons. Its selling point is not only the one-meter-thick reinforced concrete walls but also a privilege granted by the Singapore government—complete exemption from consumption tax (GST) on investment-grade precious metals (IPM).

For market makers like JPMorgan, this is an irresistible temptation.

But if it were just because of taxes and vaults, JPMorgan could choose Dubai or Zurich. Its final move to Singapore hides deeper geopolitical calculations.

In Wall Street, directly moving the core business from New York to Shanghai is akin to 'betraying,' which in the current unpredictable international political climate is tantamount to suicide. They urgently need a fulcrum, a safe haven that can reach the enormous physical market in the East while providing political safety.

Singapore is the unequivocal choice.

It guards the Strait of Malacca, connecting London’s dollar liquidity and reaching physical demand in Shanghai and India.

Singapore is not only a safe haven but also the largest transit point connecting two divided worlds. JPMorgan is attempting to establish a never-setting trading loop here: fixing prices in London, hedging in New York, and hoarding in Singapore.

However, JPMorgan's calculations are not without loopholes. In the struggle for pricing power in Asia, it cannot avoid a formidable opponent—Hong Kong.

Many mistakenly believe that Hong Kong has fallen behind in this round of competition, but the reality is exactly the opposite. Hong Kong has a core advantage that Singapore cannot replicate: it is the only channel for the renminbi to go overseas.

Through the 'Gold Hong Kong-Shanghai Connect,' the Hong Kong Gold & Silver Exchange (CGSE) is directly connected to the Shanghai Gold Exchange. This means that gold traded in Hong Kong can directly enter the delivery system of mainland China. For capital truly wanting to embrace the Chinese market, Hong Kong is not 'offshore,' but an 'onshore' extension.

JPMorgan chose Singapore, betting on a hybrid model of 'dollars + physical,' attempting to establish a new offshore center on the ruins of the old order. Meanwhile, HSBC, Standard Chartered, and other old British banks continue to heavily invest in Hong Kong, betting on a future of 'renminbi + physical.'

JPMorgan thought it had found a neutral safe haven, but in the geopolitical meat grinder, there has never been a true 'middle ground.' The prosperity of Singapore is essentially the result of Eastern economic spillover. This seemingly independent luxury yacht has long been locked in the gravitational field of the Eastern continent.

As the gravitational pull of Shanghai becomes ever stronger, as the landscape of gold priced in yuan continues to expand, and as China's industrial machine continually consumes the physical silver in the market, Singapore may no longer be a neutral safe haven, and JPMorgan will also have to make another fateful choice.

Cycle reboot

Regarding rumors about JPMorgan, there may ultimately be an official explanation, but that is no longer important. In the business world, astute capital always senses tectonic shifts first.

The epicenter of this tremor is not in Singapore, but deep within the global monetary system.

For the past fifty years, we have been accustomed to a 'paper contract' world dominated by dollar credit. That was an era built on debt, promises, and the illusion of infinite liquidity. We once thought that as long as the printing press kept running, prosperity could be perpetual.

But now, the wind has completely changed.

When central banks spare no effort to transport gold back home and when global manufacturing giants start to worry about seizing the last bit of industrial silver, we see a return of an ancient order.

The world is slowly but surely returning from the ethereal credit currency system to a visible and tangible physical asset system. In this new system, gold is the measure of credit, while silver is the measure of production capacity. One represents the bottom line of safety, while the other represents the limit of industry.

In this long migration, London and New York are no longer the only endpoints, and the East is no longer just a simple manufacturing factory. New rules of the game are being established, and new centers of power are forming.

The era when the value of gold and silver was defined by Western bankers is slowly coming to an end. Gold and silver remain silent, yet they answer all questions about the times.