Silver funds: 99% in a year, 37% below the January peak

The number

The median silver fund returned 99.01% in the year to 17 August 2026. All 12 silver funds with a full year of NAVs made between 94.82% and 101.91%.

Yet the same funds are 36.5% below the highs they reached on 29 January. A silver fund bought a year ago has roughly doubled; one bought at the top has lost more than a third.

These are silver funds of funds: mutual funds that buy units of silver ETFs, which hold physical silver. We count 16 of them on the Direct plan, Growth option. Silver ETFs themselves are not included, nor are the five funds of funds that hold gold and silver together. Returns of a year or more are annualised; all are computed from daily NAVs to 17 August 2026.

The funds

The spread is wide for one-asset funds over one year, 7.09 points, but over three years the seven oldest funds sit within 0.54 points a year of each other.

Three more funds launched in 2026, and their records show what timing does. Bandhan Silver ETF FoF published its first NAV on 28 January, the day before the peak, and is down 31.33% since. Angel One's, from 6 March, is down 9.72%. Mirae Asset's, from 25 March, is up 0.52%.

From the peak to now

Every silver fund that existed in January made its highest NAV on 29 January 2026. The fall came in two stages:

• To 23 March, the funds' lowest point, they lost between 42.93% and 46.16% from the peak.
• Since then they have recovered part of it. On 17 August the median fund was 36.54% below its high.

In the last month alone, from 17 July, they gained between 8.91% and 9.36%; over three months they are still down about 10%.

Funds and the price part company

Our reference for silver is the international price (the COMEX futures close) converted to rupees each day, from our gold and silver price page. It closed at ₹2,02,912 per kg on 17 August.

Over three years the two are close. Inside 2026 they have not been. A silver fund holds ETFs that follow India's domestic silver price, which includes import duty and can sit above or below the international price. Taking ICICI Prudential's fund as an example and setting both to 100 at the end of 2025, the fund was about 13% behind the international price at the end of February, level with it at the end of May, and 10% ahead at the end of June.

The sharpest single shift came on 12 and 13 May. Over those two sessions the 16 silver funds rose between 10.87% and 12.03%, while the international price rose 5.31%. Since then the funds have fallen less than the international price, which is why their losses from the peak are smaller.

What this does not tell you

A doubling is not a forecast. The year includes silver's best months in our records and its two worst.

Short-term comparisons with the world price mislead. Within this year, the gap between ICICI Prudential's fund and the international price has swung by more than 20 points.

Nothing here is advice to buy or sell any fund, or silver itself.

Where to go from here

Every silver fund of funds is on the domestic fund-of-funds page. For silver's path in rupees, see silver 41% below its January peak and gold and silver in July 2026. For gold's equivalents, see gold fund returns to April 2026.

The guide to funds of funds explains the structure.