Just noticed platinum ETFs have been quietly crushing it compared to the gold and silver crowd. The abrdn Physical Platinum Shares ETF jumped 40% in the first half of 2025, while the usual suspects like GLD and SLV barely scraped 30%. Most of that action happened in the last month alone—platinum surged 30% while gold and silver climbed 7% and 13% respectively. Pretty wild divergence.

The reason? Platinum's got serious supply issues. South Africa produces about 80% of global supply but they're dealing with aging infrastructure and operational headaches, so output keeps dropping. The World Platinum Investment Council is forecasting a 966 koz deficit this year, which is the third year running of shortages. Meanwhile, demand from automotive catalytic converters, hydrogen fuel cells, and jewelry is holding strong. China's platinum jewelry demand is surging, and stricter emissions regs in Europe are actually pushing more platinum into vehicles. Even with the EV slowdown, ICE and hybrid cars still need catalytic converters.

What's interesting is the valuation angle. Platinum has been trading at a massive discount to gold for years—the ratio hit 3.5 earlier in 2025 when historically it hovers around 1-2. That's a huge signal the metal was underpriced. Since the recent rally, that ratio's come down to 2.7, but platinum still looks cheaper than gold and silver on most metrics. The platinum ETF space is getting more attention because, frankly, gold and silver look overbought by comparison. With above-ground stocks forecast to drop 31%, you're looking at just three months of demand coverage—that's tight. Hydrogen infrastructure buildout is also ramping up globally, which should keep industrial demand solid. It's one of those rare moments where a precious metals ETF actually has real supply-demand tailwinds behind it.