Gold futures turned higher Monday, getting a boost from positive U.S. manufacturing data and dovish comments about monetary stimulus from a U.S. central banker.

Our global competitors in China are buying gold at an eye-opening pace. It may be bad news for Uncle Sam, but it is great news for gold bugs.

While the metal is trading 31 percent below the record $49.79 set in April 2011, this year’s average of $30.67 is the second-highest ever.

“Silver tends to track gold, except it overperforms in a bull market and underperforms in a bear market because it’s a much thinner market and has a big industrial component.”

The supply crunch is in full force, and silver buyers are getting as much as they can while silver’s still available for purchase. Expect $50 silver in the near future…

The first stop is old highs at $1,925. After that he’s “all about the $2,000 price target.”

Schiff says the latest round of “unlimited” money printing by the Fed has only “postponed the collapse.”

With gold having passed $1700 (twice the 1980 high of $850) already, it stands to reason that $100 (twice the 1980 high of $50) silver could be virtually guaranteed.

The Fed said it would buy mortgage-backed securities at a pace of $40 billion per month.

A third installment of QE will likely have an even greater impact and both metals will “retest, if not surpass, 2011 highs,”