I think the answer to your silver and gold miners question is bankruptcy. Consider the coal mining companies for example, although the methods used to complete the objective may differ the goal of suppressing the prices of commodities remains the same. The price of coal was suppressed by government subsidies and over regulation by the EPA which enabled natural gas to capture a large amount of market share and create a permanent foundation. In my opinion, the same will be true for precious metals; however, I think that the prices will continue to be suppressed with contracts regardless of the mining companies solvency. With that said, I expect mining companies to file bankruptcy multiple times until they are considered worthless and at that point, either the banks or the government will own the assets.