There’s a little-known factory being built outside San Antonio.
To most people, it looks ordinary… just another industrial site.
But to Google, Tesla, and Microsoft, it may be the most important factory in the world.
Because inside, machines are producing a new “miracle metal”…
A material so powerful it can slash AI’s energy use by 99%… and unlock billions in savings for every tech giant on the planet.
That alone would be a story.
But here’s the part almost no one is talking about:
This company is so promising that even its waste is worth billions.
Every ton of this miracle metal they make also produces clean hydrogen, a fuel America is short on by 11 million metric tons a year.
In other words… while Big Tech fights for the metal, the byproduct could quietly become a second fortune.
And the stock behind it? Still trading for under $20.
Chris Rowe
Why the Precious Metal Nobody Talks About Could Be Your Best Bet
Written by Jordan Chussler. Published 10/4/2025.
Key Points
- Precious metals are outperforming the stock market this year, with gold setting a flurry of record highs in 2025.
- Palladium, despite receiving far less fanfare, is also outperforming the S&P 500 with a 41% year-to-date gain.
- One ETF provides exposure to the underappreciated precious metal, and a technical indicator suggests it could have more in store.
Amid ongoing geopolitical uncertainty, a weakening U.S. dollar, persistent market volatility, and creeping inflation, precious metals are having a banner year. Gold has recorded 11 all-time highs and posted a year-to-date (YTD) gain of more than 45%. Silver, which often follows gold, has outperformed the yellow metal with a YTD gain of nearly 57%. Meanwhile, platinum is up 75% in 2025, trading near a 17-year high.
In September, the Federal Reserve's first rate cut since 2024 added another tailwind for precious metals. The asset class historically moves inversely to interest rates, and that relationship could act as a catalyst again in October. According to the CME Group's FedWatch Tool, there's currently a 96.7% chance the Fed will cut rates at its October meeting.
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While gold, silver, and platinum have handily beaten the market this year, another—often-overlooked—precious metal has also delivered strong returns.
Palladium's YTD gain of more than 41% has justified its place in portfolios, yet it doesn't receive the same fanfare as those other metals.
For investors looking to diversify their commodities exposure, keeping palladium on the radar makes sense. One easy way to do that is by tracking the abrdn Physical Palladium Shares ETF (NYSEARCA: PALL), which is up more than 36% YTD — outperforming the broad market and even top S&P 500 sectors, including 2025's index-leading communication services sector.
From Dentistry to Fuel Cells, Palladium Demand Runs the Gamut
Many people last heard about palladium during the pandemic, when thieves across the country made headlines for stealing catalytic converters from vehicles' exhaust systems. While catalytic converters remain the metal's primary use — accounting for roughly 80% of demand — palladium's applications span numerous industries.
Today, the metal is in surgical instruments, implant components, and fuel cells. Its conductivity and corrosion resistance make it valuable to the electronics industry, where it's used in capacitors, printed circuit boards, semiconductor frames, and hard drives. Palladium's high melting point suits aerospace applications, and its bright white appearance and hypoallergenic properties make it a lower-cost alternative to platinum in jewelry.
That industrial demand has held up despite the global shift toward emissions-free electric vehicles (EVs), which reduces the need for catalytic converters. Rising industrial consumption — particularly from electronics — is offsetting lower automotive demand, and palladium prices are at their highest levels since 2023, driven by supply concerns and rebounding industrial use.
Those supply constraints make the metal particularly attractive in the near to medium term. Russia and South Africa account for around 80% of global output, leaving the market exposed to supply-chain and geopolitical disruption. That structural tightness should continue to support prices.
PALL: 2025's Market-Beating Palladium ETF
The abrdn Physical Palladium Shares ETF is — as its name suggests — backed by physical palladium. abrdn, which manages the fund, holds palladium bars in a secure vault in London. The ETF offers a straightforward way to access the precious-metal market. At $114.17 per share, it can be a cost-efficient way to gain exposure to palladium, whose spot price is currently about $1,264 per troy ounce.
With $208.74 million in assets under management (AUM), PALL is a fraction of the size of large index funds like the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF (NYSEARCA: VOO), which has $758.02 billion in AUM. PALL also has lower trading volume, with a three-month daily average of about 316,720 shares versus VOO's more than seven million shares, which raises liquidity concerns for some investors.
PALL has outperformed VOO in 2025, posting a YTD gain of over 36% while the S&P 500-tracking VOO has returned less than 14%. Its expense ratio of 0.60% is relatively high for a passively managed ETF, but PALL can be an appealing buy-low candidate.
That may seem surprising for a fund that has outperformed every stock market sector in 2025. Zooming out, PALL is still down more than 59% from its all-time high on March 4, 2022. After consolidating since Jan. 2024, the fund appears to be staging a genuine breakout.
That view is supported by the ETF's one-year chart, which displayed a bullish golden cross on June 26 (green circle in the chart above). A golden cross — when the 50-day moving average rises above the 200-day moving average — often precedes upward price action. Since that signal, PALL is up nearly 17%, and the trend could continue through the remainder of the year.
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