Business Notes Commodities

In the late 1970s, the billionaire Hunts of Texas used all their wiles and much of their wealth in what appeared to be a daring and nearly successful attempt to corner the silver market. The family accumulated some 200 million oz. of the precious metal in a series of purchases that helped drive silver prices from $11 per oz. in 1979 to $50 per oz. in January 1980, when the market finally crashed.

Last week the family revealed that it has completed the sale of 90% of its remaining silver hoard, amounting to some 53 million oz., for $320 million. The sell-off represented a multimillion-dollar loss for the Hunts, whose combined wealth had slipped from more than $5 billion in 1980 to about $2.2 billion before the sale.

Word of the Hunts' action came as a welcome surprise to Wall Street. Said Paul Sarnoff, an analyst at Paine Webber Mitchell Hutchins: "I didn't think they would ever sell all that silver." Investors were happy to see that the Hunts have largely left the silver scene. The price of the commodity jumped more than 5% after the sell-off became known and closed the week at $6.32 an ounce.