At Specialty Metals, Smelters, and Refiners, we understand the importance of discerning the true nature of your precious metal scrap. Whether you're a jewelry enthusiast, a medical device manufacturer, or a collector, knowing whether your material contains platinum, iridium, or a combination of both is essential for ensuring its value and utility.

With high palladium trading prices, now is a good time to liquidate your palladium scrap holdings. 

Demand is high. Because palladium is a secondary product that is recovered from platinum and nickel mining, miners have limited ability to increase palladium output in response to rising prices. 

The platinum group metals - platinum, palladium, rhodium, iridium, and ruthenium look pretty much the same. They are all bright, shiny white metals that do not tarnish. And if you’re dealing with platinum group metal scrap – the stuff that is left over after different industrial processes – it all looks pretty much the same. 

Platinum engagement rings are not rare. Maybe you called off an engagement and your former fiancé gallantly said, “I gave the ring to you . . . it’s yours, so keep it.” Or maybe you find some platinum engagement ring blanks (rings that have not yet had stones mounted in them) in a jewelry manufacturing company that went out of business. 

We recently asked Dan Fried, Founder and CEO of Specialty Metals Smelters and Refiners, to name a few places where platinum can be found. Some of his advice was surprising and if you follow it, we predict you will find platinum that you can recycle for money. 

Platinum alloys are valuable and are commonly used in various industrial applications, including electronics, jewelry, and more. And if you can find platinum and platinum alloy scrap, chances are good that you will be able to recycle it for a good payback. After all, platinum is now trading for $908.00/troy ounce. That means that even a small quantity of platinum scrap you find can often result in a big profit for you. 

The platinum family metals, also known as the platinum group metals (PGMs), are a group of six elements that share similar chemical properties. These metals are highly valuable and have various industrial applications, making them attractive for investment purposes. 

The six platinum family metals are:

What are platinum group metals, where are they found and what are they used for?

Platinum group metals (PGMs) are a group of six metallic elements that belong to the platinum group on the periodic table. 

A number of factors make certain kinds of precious metal scrap more desirable investments than others. 

These factors include the density and distribution of precious metal within the scrap. If one ounce of gold is distributed through two pounds of scrap, for example, that is a desirably, high density form of scrap. If that same single ounce of gold is distributed through two tons of dirt or sand, that makes for a less desirable investment. (It is easier to ship and process two pounds of material than it is to ship and process two tons.)

A recent article in Metals Focus points out that demand for platinum, palladium and rhodium (all platinum group metals) grew 5% in 2021 and is expected to hit a record 11% increase in 2022 alone.

What is causing the surge?

Metals Focus points to these two trends:

When someone mentions devices that clean exhaust gas, chances are you think, “I know what they are . . . they’re catalytic converters that are installed on cars.”

But there are other kinds of exhaust gas purifiers that can be recycled profitably – varieties that you might not know about. They too can contain platinum, rhodium, and even palladium. We’ll give you a quick course on what these other kinds of exhaust gas purifiers are and how you can make money reclaiming them by having us recycle them for you.

Multilayer Ceramic Capacitors (MLCCs or MLCC chips), which are small electronic components made of alternating ceramic and metallic layers, can be found in many applications today.

Here at Specialty Metals, we have a long track record of recycling gold scrap, silver scrap, and platinum scrap for our clients. We have helped countless customers make a lot of money in those metals, and we know we will continue to do so in the future.

We have written a lot in the past about gold scrap, silver scrap, and platinum scrap.

Today, we would like to take a look at palladium scrap. Why? Because palladium is currently trading at $2,208.00, which compares favorably to gold, which is now trading at $1906.80. Like the trading price of gold, the trading price of palladium has been rising.

It has been a few months since we wrote about palladium on this blog. And it is time to write about it again. Why? Because palladium trading prices are rising steadily. That’s another way of saying that if you acquired some palladium scrap or bullion a few years ago and simply held onto it, you would be making a nice profit on it today.

People confuse palladium and platinum. Both metals are white, lustrous, tarnish-resistant . . . and rare. But if you compare the prices of palladium and platinum jewelry, you will notice immediately that a piece of palladium jewelry sells for about one-third more than a similar piece of platinum jewelry, even though both items weigh about the same.

It’s been a while since we wrote about palladium on our blog. Since we last wrote about this precious metal two years ago, its trading price has risen from about $700 to $800 on the London fix. That’s reason enough to revisit the topic of palladium. And because it is still very feasible to realize a good return from acquiring and recycling this often-overlooked precious metal, we are providing an overview of the basics in today’s blog post. 

Will your gold, silver, platinum and other precious metals increase in value in the coming months and years? Will the demand for recyclable precious metals increase in 2017? There is no way to predict with absolute certainty. But here are some trends to watch.

Our editorial team had a very busy 2016, writing a total of 46 blog posts on a variety of topics. Some posts contained only nuts-and-bolts advice on finding and processing precious metals. Others covered trends. Yet we did our utmost to deliver practical, usable advice in every post we wrote. In today’s post, we’ll organize those 2016 posts by topic, so you can quickly find the information you’re looking for.

“Precious metals and rare earth element are the same thing, right?”
 Let’s clear up this misconception right away. No, precious metals and rare earths are not the same. In today’s post, we’ll find out what the difference is