Gold and Silver Coins

Many nations mint coins, and the most widely used are Gold and Silver Coins.  Unless one has learned a little about precious metals, bullion, coins and “numismatics”, the typical person would not think of coins as bullion.  I know I didn’t know this until a few years ago.  Although nominally issued as legal tender, a coins’ face value as currency is far below that of their value as bullion.  In the United States, the Silver Eagle coin is one (1) troy ounce of .999  pure silver.  This silver dollar has a face value of $1, but is worth at least $32.38 USD, which is the current spot price of silver, as of the time of this writing – December, 12, 2012 at 7:45 p.m. Central Time.  I made the point of specifying the date and time, to point out that the price of silver, gold, and other precious metals changes every day, and even every second.  Another example – Canada mints a gold bullion coin (the Gold Maple Leaf) at a face value of $50 containing one troy ounce (31.1035 g) of gold—as of December 16, 2012  at 7:45 p.m. Central Time, this coin is worth about $1,692.80 USD as bullion.  Bullion coin minting by national governments gives them some numismatic value in addition to their bullion value, as well as certifying their purity.

The 10,000 dollar Australian Gold Nugget coin is one of the largest bullion coins in the world .  It was minted in Australia, and consists of a full kilogram of 99.9% pure gold.  There have been a small number of larger bullion coins, but they not practical to handle and are not produced in mass quantities.  China has produced coins in very limited quantities (less than 20 pieces minted) that exceed 260 troy ounces (8 kg) of gold.  A popular coin minted by China is the Gold Panda.  Silver Pandas are also minted in China, where silver is such a raw and sought after commodity, that by the end of year 2012 China will no longer allow silver to be taken out of the country.  Austria has minted a coin containing 31 kg of gold (the Vienna Philharmonic Coin minted in 2004 with a face value of 100,000 euro).  As a stunt to publicize the 99.999% pure one-ounce Canadian Gold Maple Leaf series, in 2007 the Royal Canadian Mint made a 100 kg 99.999% gold coin, with a face value of $1 million, and now manufactures them to order, but at a substantial premium over the market value of the gold.  It takes far less room to store a lot of value in gold and silver bars; however, Gold and Silver Coins are probably the most usable and versatile form of bullion.