Gold sales rise, but silver continues to struggle at the Perth and United States Mints

A quick look at sales of the gold and silver American Eagle coins, as well as minted gold and silver at the Perth Mint, has uncovered no signs that the woes of silver will be abating any time soon. Both mints have seen a continued collapse in sales, with only an unexpected bump in the popularity of gold as a bright spot.

What’s going on? We look at things from the collectors point of view first of all, and to be honest, there’s never been a better time for people that like bullion coins in that regard. A greatly increased range of ever improving silver and gold bullion designs has made this a kind of golden age, so there’s clearly demand when mintages are low. For example, the Perth Mint has reported sell outs of the Emu, Bird of Paradise, Swan, and Wedge-tailed Eagle silver bullion coins, with the lunar dog approaching sell out (even the 10kg has sold out now), as well as the Dragon & Phoenix gold coin.

As for the big guns, the reduction in big volume buyers has been very telling. We’ve long ago given up on trying to guess which way the market will move as for the last few years there seems to be a huge disconnect between the spot price for precious metals and the wider financial situation worldwide. No doubt manipulation is a large part of that, but it hasn’t stopped the low-mintage market bouncing along fine and that’s enough for us at least.

Don’t forget to check out our graphs of all these numbers on the blue button link below.

JUNE/JULY 2018 SILVER SALES

JUNE/JULY 2018

The green bars above tell the whole damning story. The American Silver Eagle stays firmly stuck in the mud and can only look on forlornly at what the numbers were in the equivalent period of 2017. Worst of all, 2017 sales hovered at just half what they’d been over any of the previous three year periods to date. In seven months the AGE has attracted buyers for 7.7m ounces. The same period in 2017 – 14.6m. For 2016 – 27.6m. Not a pretty trend. Looking shorter term, the AGE has shown little change in June/July over April/May, but the collapse from June/July 2017 is particularly evident.

Conversely to the situation with gold, Perth Mint silver sales are worse than their US based compatriots. Ad rop of almost 30% on April/May is a tough pill to swallow, but numbers also failed to hit one third of the June/July period in 2017. Sales for the year-to-date are down from 6.1 to 4.8 m/oz. Apoorshowing, but still better than the halving of numbers at the US Mint.

SILVER - YEAR TO DATE

JUNE/JULY 2018 GOLD SALES

GOLD - JUNE/JULY 2018

Gold continues to outperform silver at both mints, with numbers improving over the prior two months of 2018, and over the equivalent period in 2017. Perth is showing some subtle improvements over 2017, and better ones over April/May 2018, but it’s the US Mint that is surely celebrating a very healthy increase in interest. Sales of American Gold Eagles (AGE) have doubled over the two comparitive periods being discussed here, and while neither June or July are particularly good compared to similar periods from 2013-2016, it must be some relief to see numbers climbing from a real trough. A sign of things to come?

Year to date numbers at both mints remain below 2017, but the gap is shrinking. The AGE still sits around a quarter lower than 2017, although Perth’s numbers are only down around 15%. Perth continues to outsell the AGE, although their number does include their various ranges and minted bars.

GOLD - YEAR TO DATE