FIFA WORLD CUP 2026: The precious metal coin summary The 2026 FIFA World Cup, the 23rd tournament, is taking place in North America, spread across 14 cities in Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Comfortably the most watched (by over half the world population), and loved sporting event in the world, this time (it's held every four years) it's been steeped in controversy, and divided opinions due to the nature of the US Trump administration, and the usual crap we have to put up with from FIFA, who appear to have taken monetisation to [...]

EASTERN CARIBBEAN 8 COLOURED PROOF (2018-) by Scottsdale Mint Scottsdale has been issuing some great limited run bullion coins over the last few years, such as the Cayman Islands Marlin and Hokusai, The Great Wave, but their most ambitious is an eight coin program that will see issues for eight different countries released per year. The eight island nations included in the programme are Anguilla, Antigua & Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, Saint Kitts & Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent & the Grenadines. All these small island nations share a currency and a central bank. [...]

TUDOR BEASTS (2022-2026) by The Royal Mint We think it’s fair to say that the Royal Mint’s ‘Queen’s beasts’ series has been one of the most popular and admired coin series in recent years, especially in the bullion realm. Tudor Beast’s has an identical base concept. Take ten of the most powerful and iconic heraldic beasts from history, and then have a talented coin designer reinterpret them for a numismatic canvas. The Queen’s Beasts dipped back in time just a few decades, but for this series we’re going back half a millennium for inspiration. Let’s [...]

JAMES BOND 007: A multi-mint guide to the 007 world on gold & silver coins Spanning over sixty years, the James Bond film franchise is also one of the industry's most successful, having grossed over $7 billion at the box office. It was based on a series of spy novels by British author Ian Fleming, starting in 1953. He lived long enough to see the first two films, Dr. No, and From Russia With Love, both fine productions. There have been dozens of coins, in both silver and gold, released for the franchise since [...]

VIDEOGAMES ON COINS: A multi-mint round-up of gaming and numismatics Video games have grown from the weird little hobby of the far-sighted few, to a mainstream juggernaut that drawfs the movie and music industries. It’s easy to understand why. Other forms of entertainment generally involve soaking up someone else's vision, but gaming allows you to control the narrative personally, to a quite extraordinary degree in some modern titles. From early, pixelated beginnings, to today's AAA titles, video games have muscled in on the formerly sedate entertainment industries, with a huge variety of game types, like [...]

PREHISTORIC LIFE S2 (2024-2027) by Emporium Hamburg Prehistoric Life was a series of twelve coins, issued three-per-year over a four-year period from 2020-2023. Each issue came in three variants, with the primary one being the classic one-ounce silver bullion coin. The others were a coloured version of that, and a half-gram minigold struck to a proof finish. It was popular, no doubt due to a high level of design, and some great subject picks. In 2024, Emporium Hamburg embarked on a second series, called Prehistoric Life II, and it's a direct continuation, carrying over [...]

PREHISTORIC LIFE S1 (2020-2023) by Emporium Hamburg Never let it be said that we don't love a good dinosaur coin here, and that goes double for a keenly priced bullion coin. One of Emporium Hamburg's ranges, alongside the hugely popular Somali Elephant and others, Prehistoric Life debuted in 2020 with, of course, a coin depicting that biggest of dino stars, Tyrannosaurus Rex. The coin looked good, although like many bullion series, early renders were a little crude. Having seen the coin in hand, it's a fine piece. The design, on this and subsequent issues, [...]

STAR WARS: An overview of silver foils from Agoro/NZ Mint We've had a long-running Thematic Guide to the New Zealand Mint's (now Agoro) Star Wars franchise since it kicked off running in 2016. However, while we expected it to slow down over time, it's actually done no such thing, and we ended up with an article that just outgrew itself, to the point even editing it was painful, and it would bring the computer to a crawl. Clearly, we had to do something, and the first step we've taken is to remove all the silver [...]

LEGENDARY WARRIORS (2023-2026) by T&S Coin and Pinehurst Coins T & S Coin have quickly built up a fine reputation with their range of silver coins over the last couple of years. They're mainly known for their selection of two-ounce, high-relief, antique-finished coins, all designed in-house, and they cover subjects from mythology, history, and literature. They do have a small selection of their own warrior coins, but in conjunction with North Carolina based US dealer, Pinehurst Coins, their biggest endeavour to date is Legendary Warriors. This is a 15-coin series, each of which will feature [...]

TWO-OUNCE CAST SILVER BAR PROGRAMME (2024) by Germania Mint First appearing in early 2024, Germania Mint debuted a new two-ounce silver cast bar featuring some very striking artwork, and a set series length. Entitled simply 'Goddesses', it mined the rich vein that is Norse mythology for inspiration. It was a huge hit, if auction prices are any indicator. The mint started a programme allowing for other producers to have their own custom designs made in the same format, and while it's still new at the time of writing, it looks like it's going to [...]