After a precious metals shop in Hong Kong's central business district announced that hundreds of silver bars had sold out for the day on Wednesday, murmurs of disappointment rippled through a waiting queue.

Despite increasing its supply to cater to strong demand, the store saw hundreds of bars snapped up in just over an hour.

Retiree Ken Wong, 65, began queueing at the precious metals shop Lee Cheong at around 5 am and managed to buy five bars.

He told AFP that buying silver offered him the chance to invest in a safe-haven asset quickly on the rise, whereas gold has become "too expensive".

Wong said that thanks to US President Donald Trump's mercurial policies, he and many others have the opportunity to profit from the inflated prices of the precious metals.

The price of gold surged to a record of more than $5,588 an ounce Thursday as investors sought safe places to put their money amid growing nervousness over rising global turmoil sparked by US policies.

Silver also struck an all-time peak above $119 an ounce, and is up more than 60 percent this year, having surged more than 140 percent in 2025.

Pakistani Meran Jawad waited in line outside the trader shop since around 6 am to purchase silver bars, which were in limited supply.

"If you have silver or gold, it will be good for wealth," the 38-year-old delivery driver told AFP, and the geopolitical impact brought by Trump was affecting "every person's situation".

"Everything is expensive," he said, adding that their salaries are not growing while the cost of living continues to rise.

- 'The real safeguard' -

Chen, a 40-year-old jewellery businessman based in the southern Chinese city of Shenzhen, told AFP that his firm's silver production sales so far this month were 10 times higher than in November.

The company, which employs nearly 20 workers, has reduced its gold jewellery stock with orders increasingly shifting towards silver, mainly to wholesalers.

"All of this hinges on market reactions... these developments are inextricably linked to the European and American markets, and Trump," Chen said.

Geopolitical tensions and rising inflation have driven the surge in precious metals investments, Samuel Tse, an economist at DBS Bank, told AFP.

"Central banks are now diversifying their portfolio to gold," Tse said, with "retail and institutional investors... allocating more assets into precious metals."

Outside another gold-buying shop, dozens also formed long lines, waiting to sell their precious jewellery.

Vivian Lam, a finance worker in her 40s who calls gold a "scarce resource", said she had not expected to see such a dramatic surge.

She told AFP she saw people selling bullion bars several centimetres long to gold dealers when she was offloading her jewellery.

Michael Ko, 55, stared at the fluctuating stock figures on his phone while waiting in line to sell the physical gold he had bought and stored in a home safe several years ago.

A retiree from the investment industry, he said the rapid rise prompted him to take the profits to fund other opportunities.

He told AFP that he purchased gold bars as it holds its value better.

If political and economic crises "were to occur, it is the real safeguard", he said.