The main reasons for this week's plunge in gold and silver prices! I. Subjective Factors: US President Trump appointed hawkish figure Kevin Warsh as Chairman of the Federal Reserve, advocating "aggressive balance sheet reduction + limited interest rate cuts," causing market expectations for Fed rate cuts to plummet from 40% to 15.5%. The US dollar index rebounded 0.9%, its largest single-day gain in six months, suppressing the attractiveness of gold and silver, non-interest-bearing assets denominated in US dollars. Easing Geopolitical Risks: Trump's signals of "progress in US-Iran negotiations" and "a temporary ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine" weakened the safe-haven demand that had previously supported the rise in gold and silver prices, accelerating the withdrawal of funds from the precious metals market. II. Objective Factors: Bursting Leverage Bubble and Technical Surge: From the beginning of 2026 to the plunge, gold rose by 28% and silver surged by 54%, with their relative strength indices reaching 88 and 93.8 (40-year peaks) respectively, indicating severe overbought conditions that triggered automatic sell-offs by algorithmic trading systems. Leveraged funds triggered a chain reaction of margin calls. The Chicago Mercantile Exchange raised the margin requirement for silver futures three times this month to $25,000 per contract, a cumulative increase of 28.6%. Highly leveraged speculators were forced to liquidate their positions due to their inability to meet margin calls, triggering a death spiral of "decline → forced liquidation → accelerated decline." Within half an hour, a chain of sell-offs reached $38 billion. Silver, with a market size only one-tenth that of gold and significantly lower liquidity, experienced a far greater drop than gold.