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How are premiums so low?


Bimetallic

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Hi all — I've long been confused by how premiums on silver and gold bullion products are so low. I'm talking about the markup on a 1 oz coin or round. Especially when they come from another country, often an ocean away.

Examples:

  1. 1 oz silver round that is $1 over spot. Not on sale, just the normal price on "house" rounds, the ones that major dealers commission with their own design, logo, etc.
  2. 1 oz Britannias about $2.20 over spot, in the US.

I'd say that most non-PM products that we buy have much larger markups from a wholesale price. Spot price for silver is equivalent to wholesale.

Those rounds have to be designed by an artist, then an agreement signed with a refiner/mint, shipped from the refiner/mint, then sold at a profit after all costs are accounted for. From my conversations with dealer staff, one cost that stands out is fraud. I don't understand the details – stolen credit cards? No idea. But it's a cost that has to be baked into their prices. Most dealers in the US also offer free shipping on orders over $99. Their websites are also extremely expensive.

Fulfillment is another cost. For example, a number of major dealers in the US use big wholesalers like A-Mark or Dillon Gage for fulfillment. Silver.com, one of the lowest priced dealers here, uses A-Mark. Right now they're offering new SilverTowne rounds for 90 cents over spot for 1+ quantities. How much are they paying for them? How much is A-Mark's cut? How does Silver.com make money in this scenario? SD Bullion sells their house rounds for about $1.10 over spot for 1+ quantities, or $1.00 if you buy at least a tube. (Their rounds are made by SilverTowne too.)

They also offer Brits and Kangaroos for around $2.20 - $2.40 over spot for 1+, and less if you buy more. These coins have to be flown in from the UK and Australia. I don't know what kind of shipping major wholesalers like A-Mark use for this sort of thing, but it can't be cheap. Even if they were shipping flour from these countries, it wouldn't be cheap, not by air. And I assume bullion is more expensive, has more security considerations and so forth. Silver.com has to make a profit after A-Mark and all their other costs are accounted for. I don't understand how this works. What do you all think? Do you see similar markups in your country, not counting VAT?

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It does seem quite amazing that premiums are so low when you factor in every level of development to make a coin or bar. It's just another argument as to why gold/silver are real money and paper isn't. Gold/Silver require real effort and labor to produce.

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What I find amazing is that Brittish bullion, both gold and silver, are available for sale in America a few weeks before they are available for sale in Britian, take the 2020 silver valiant coin for example, it was available for sale in America a good few weeks before it was available for sale in the U.K. yet it's minted in the U.K.

As to how they can keep their premiums so low, the difference in insuring US$5million and US$10 million in inventory, is not double, i's not even 25% more, it's closer to 10% more, I think that you will also find that the companies who supply the dealers band together, all the dealers seem to have these coins available for sale, pre order at the same time, so it stands to reason that they ''band together'' almost like a group order and split the cost of delivery, insurance... between themselves, or their suppliers may be arranging it for them on their behalf without the U.S. based suppliers even knowing that they are having the costs split between them to save on costs.

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Exactly...why can I get a 1 oz Silver Britannia for less than premium than a 1 oz American Silver Eagle!?! I know why, but it just boggles the mind!   My understanding is that ASEs have inherently higher premiums imposed upon them by the US Mint with a limited trusted PM dealers...Brits don’t have similar impositions in the US...and no VAT. @mr1030, please correct me if in error. 

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1 hour ago, CadmiumGreen said:

Exactly...why can I get a 1 oz Silver Britannia for less than premium than a 1 oz American Silver Eagle!?! I know why, but it just boggles the mind!   My understanding is that ASEs have inherently higher premiums imposed upon them by the US Mint with a limited trusted PM dealers...Brits don’t have similar impositions in the US...and no VAT. @mr1030, please correct me if in error. 

That's interesting that an ASE cost more to buy in America than a silver Britannia.  In the U.K. after having a quick look at several online dealers, and I'm just talking about buying 1 single silver one ounce coin and having it delivered to your door, you can actually buy ASE from as much as £2.00 less than a Britannia, to ASE costing £0.70 more, as I said that's just buying one coin and having it delivered to your door.  I would have thought and expected that America would be the cheapest place in the world to buy ASE, after all they are the American national silver coin, but using that same logic you would expect that the U.K. would be the cheapest place to buy Britannias, but the U.K. is actually one of the more expensive places to buy Britannias.

 

Another reason why buying an ASE in America is more expensive than buying a Britannia in America could be pride, Americans are a lot more patriotic than the Brittish, out here it's almost a dirty word, and just about considered one step down from being racist.  Americans will not only go out of their way to look for and buy ''Made In America'' but they are happy to pay extra for ''Made In America'', in Britian it's the almost the complete opposite if you where to ask 100 British people if they would be willing to pay an extra 10% for something that is ''Made In Britian'' and guaranteed to last you 5 years, or pay 10% less for the same product made in a different country that you would be lucky if you didn't have to replace before the warranty expired, 99 of them would pick he cheaper option.

 

1 hour ago, Brazil2001 said:

Is it because of the VAT situation??? It’s cheaper for me to get mine from Germany than it is the Uk because the VAT is not paid rightly or wrongly?!?!?! 

Germany has a different level of VAT on silver than the U.K., the U.K. charges 20% VAT on silver, in Germany it's 19% - it was 7% until 2014.

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20 minutes ago, Seth said:

That's interesting that an ASE cost more to buy in America than a silver Britannia.  In the U.K. after having a quick look a several online dealers, and I'm just talking about buying 1 single silver one ounce coin and having it delivered to your door, you can actually buy ASE from as much as £2.00 less than a Britannia, to ASE costing £0.70 more, as I said that's just buying one coin and having it delivered to your door.  I would have thought and expected that America would be the cheapest place in the world to buy ASE, after all they are the American national silver coin, but using that same logic you would expect that the U.K. would be the cheapest place to buy Britannias, but the U.K. is actually one of the more expensive places to buy Britannias.

One would have thought that their own country’s mint would be more cost effective, but one of my go to lower cost dealers, Bullion Exchanges, has the Silver Britannia (Random) almost two dollars less than an American Silver Eagle (Random), also baselined as a single coin purchase. APMEX is about $0.90 difference, and JM Bullion is actually the same price with a sale on ASEs!😄

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@Seth I think you're right that the average person's patriotism drives up the price for eagles here. I'm a proud American but truthfully I don't find the silver eagle to be that appealing of a coin.(I do find gold eagles to be very attractive though ) I also like the idea that my bullion came from a far away land. For me it makes it feel more exotic, mysterious and luxurious. That's why I prefer Australian most of all and then UK, Canadian and Korean silver.

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3 minutes ago, CadmiumGreen said:

One would have thought that their own country’s mint would be more cost effective, but one of my go to lower cost dealers, Bullion Exchanges, has the Silver Britannia (Random) almost two dollars less than an American Silver Eagle (Random), also baselined as a single coin purchase.

It makes sense to think that, there are less people between the mint and the final customer. Yet for some strange reason it's not, I can understand how the U.K. having 20% VAT on silver would make buying silver in the U.K. more expensive than buying it in most oher countries, but still you would expect even with the VAT that the Britannia would be cheaper to buy in the U.K. than an ASE, after all they are produced here, so the transportation costs are minimal, compared to the tranportation costs of getting ASE into the U.K., and there is still VAT added to the cost of ASE in the U.K., yet even with the cost of importing ASE into the U.K., they are generally cheaper than buying Britannias, though this could also be down to the fact that Britannias are classed as ''legal tender'' in the U.K. and even have a face value - just like the ASE has a face value of US$1.00, so in the the U.K. Britannias even though like all silver has 20% VAT, they are exempt from Capital Gains Tax - CGT.

This is me just spit balling off the top of my head

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13 minutes ago, AgCoyote said:

@Seth I think you're right that the average person's patriotism drives up the price for eagles here. I'm a proud American but truthfully I don't find the silver eagle to be that appealing of a coin.(I do find gold eagles to be very attractive though ) I also like the idea that my bullion came from a far away land. For me it makes it feel more exotic, mysterious and luxurious. That's why I prefer Australian most of all and then UK, Canadian and Korean silver.

Agree with @AgCoyote, I only have one tube of ASEs, a couple slabbed 2018s and the one awesome 2010 ASE gifted from @jonrms! I prefer the Silver Britannia design, but also the Silver Krugerrands and the odds and ends of some series I like in design. When I buy Silver from The Royal Mint, obviously being from the US, there is no VAT charged on top of the price of the coin. So even with shipping costs, it is generally still cheaper. But therein, I don’t buy a great deal of bullion Silver and stick primarily to Gold.

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Do ASE not have a tax advantage in America? The Britannia is Capital Gains Tax exepmt in the U.K., so for example if you bought just one Britannia for £22.00, even though the spot price at the time was $14.00, and the spot price of silver was to suddenly jump to £150.00 an ounce, and you sold your Britannia for the new spot price of £150.00, you wouldn't be taxed on the £128.00 profit you made from that sale.  Do ASE not have that same sort of tax advantage in America?

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2 minutes ago, CadmiumGreen said:

Agree with @AgCoyote, I only have one tube of ASEs, a couple slabbed 2018s and the one awesome 2010 ASE gifted from @jonrms! I prefer the Silver Britannia design, but also the Silver Krugerrands and the odds and ends of some series I like in design. When I buy Silver from The Royal Mint, obviously being from the US, there is no VAT charged on top of the price of the coin. So even with shipping costs, it is generally still cheaper. But therein, I don’t buy a great deal of bullion Silver and stick primarily to Gold.

I feel like the US Mint is so unimaginative compared to the other mints which is another reason I don't reward them with my business. Obviously you have to have your standard bullion coin which is the eagle but the US Mint offers little else.  Perth gives you Kooks/Koalas/Lunars along with many other options and gives you great alternatives with the sizes of coins. Royal Canadian Mint offers nice designs on different coins, and the RCM is fantastic for stacking with 10 oz and 100 oz bars. The Royal Mint has a lot of good offerings and is starting to match the RCM with their own twist with artistically beautiful bullion bars for stacking.

I wish the US Mint had cool series like Perth, and offered cool bullion bars. 

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13 minutes ago, AgCoyote said:

I feel like the US Mint is so unimaginative compared to the other mints which is another reason I don't reward them with my business. Obviously you have to have your standard bullion coin which is the eagle but the US Mint offers little else.  Perth gives you Kooks/Koalas/Lunars along with many other options and gives you great alternatives with the sizes of coins. Royal Canadian Mint offers nice designs on different coins, and the RCM is fantastic for stacking with 10 oz and 100 oz bars. The Royal Mint has a lot of good offerings and is starting to match the RCM with their own twist with artistically beautiful bullion bars for stacking.

I wish the US Mint had cool series like Perth, and offered cool bullion bars. 

But there is a huge advantage to having the single unchanged design, it's instantly recognisable, you don't need to be a coin expert yet alone interested in coins to know that you have an ASE, if you look at certain years for the Britannias, especially the 2001 - and maybe the 2003 I don't have one to hand and can't recall if the design had me stumped, you need to have quite a bit of knowledge and interest in coins and specifically Britannias to know what you have is a Britannia.  Sure it's nice that the design of the Britannia changes, and it's interesting to see these changes every year, but I often wish that they would simply stick to a classic design instead of changing them even slightly every year.  I'm not a coin collector though I should point out, I buy for weight, tax advantages and things like that, besides looking at my coins for a minute or two after I've bought them, I don't look at them again, the appeal to me is not the coin, but the material it is made of, and any potential future gains it may make for my child.

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5 minutes ago, Seth said:

Do ASE not have a tax advantage in America? The Britannia is Capital Gains Tax exepmt in the U.K., so for example if you bought just one Britannia for £22.00, even though the spot price at the time was $14.00, and the spot price of silver was to suddenly jump to £150.00 an ounce, and you sold your Britannia for the new spot price of £150.00, you wouldn't be taxed on the £128.00 profit you made from that sale.  Do ASE not have that same sort of tax advantage in America?

I don’t think ASEs are CGT exempt, but they are Individual Retirement Account approved. 

“American Eagle Gold and Silver coins are an easy way to make investments in the two types of precious metals. As with any kind of investment, the IRS will collect capital gains tax if you generate capital gains on your investment. Gains on collectible coins like American Eagles fall into a different category for capital gains taxes. 

Producing a Capital Gain

You have a reportable capital gain on American Eagle coins if you sold coins you own and received a price greater than the price you paid for the coins. It is important to remember that there is not a taxable gain unless you sell your coins. If you owned the coins for one year or less, your profits will be classified as short-term gains. Owning the coins for longer than a year before selling puts the profits into the long-term gain category.

Taxes on Collectibles

American Eagle coins are classified as collectibles by the IRS. The long-term capital gains tax rate for collectibles is 28 percent. At the time of publication, other types of investments are taxed at a 15 percent rate for long-term gains. Short-term gains for all types of investments, including collectibles, are taxed at your marginal tax rate.”

IRA...

Congress created individual retirement accounts to give earners a tax-advantaged way to save for their retirements. The rules encourage account-holders to keep their money in their IRAs until at least age 59 1/2 by penalizing (with exceptions) withdrawals taken earlier than that. In a traditional IRA, you deduct your annual contributions (up to $6,500 if you’re 50 or older, $5,500 for younger individuals) and pay ordinary taxes only on the money you withdraw. A Roth IRA doesn’t provide a tax-deduction on contributions, but let’s you withdraw money tax-free if you follow the rules.

Subsequently, Congress passed a special type of individual retirement account known as Self-Directed IRA (SDIRA).  These accounts give individuals the opportunity to designate specific investments such as Real Estate, Notes, Precious Metals, Private Company Stock, and etc. Below is an in-depth review of Precious Metals held within a Self-Directed IRA.

Precious Metals in a Self-Directed IRA

Many people know about IRAs, but fewer realize that your IRA can buy precious metals, namely gold, silver, platinum, and palladium bullion, in the form of coins and bars.  To qualify, the precious metal must meet certain criteria:

Gold: Coins but have 0.9999 fineness, with the exception of the Gold American Eagle, which is 0.9167 fine. Gold bars must be of 0.995 fineness and must be hallmarked by the NYMEX or COMEX futures exchanges.

Silver: Coins and bars must be of 0.999 fineness

Platinum, palladium: Coins and bar must be of 0.9995 fineness, sourced from an assayer/refiner approved by the NYMEX or COMEX futures exchanges.

These standards prohibit IRAs from holding some well-known coins, such as the South African Krugerrand and U.S. silver coins pre-1965, which are not fine enough.

Though there are many coins that pass IRA muster, the U.S. Eagle and the Canadian Maple Leaf are popular and easy to obtain. By design, coins in a Self-Directed IRA should be of bullion, not numismatic, quality.

 

I have other Retirement investment strategies at play with planned double retirement from the government, 401K, Thrift Savings Plan, corporate pension plan from commercial sector and kids college paid for by Post-911 GI Bill. And I am not concerning myself with CGT or taxes as I would make sales below a $10k taxable threshold.

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1 minute ago, Seth said:

But there is a huge advantage to having the single unchanged design, it's instantly recognisable, you don't need to be a coin expert yet alone interested in coins to know that you have an ASE, if you look at certain years for the Britannias, especially the 2001 - and maybe the 2003 I don't have one to hand and can't recall if the design had me stumped, you need to have quite a bit of knowledge and interest in coins and specifically Britannias to know what you have is a Britannia.  Sure it's nice that the design of the Britannia changes, and it's interesting to see these changes every year, but I often wish that they would simply stick to a classic design instead of changing them even slightly every year.

Britannia silver coins haven't changed in a while and doubt they will anytime soon. I don't mind that the standard Eagle doesn't change. Kangaroos and Philharmonics don't change either. While you're correct that there is value in instant recognition, the Silver Eagle apparently has counterfeit issues that have forced them to make some changes to the coin.

I just wish the US Mint had their standard Eagle and then had semi-numismatic offerings in the same vain as Kooks/Koalas and Pandas. With the US you could really do a lot. You could do a semi-numismatic Eagle and then you could pick another animal that's fairly unique to the US such as a Mountain Lion, Bison, Alligator, Grizzly Bear. I'm sure there are others worthy of consideration.

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2 minutes ago, AgCoyote said:

Britannia silver coins haven't changed in a while and doubt they will anytime soon. I don't mind that the standard Eagle doesn't change. Kangaroos and Philharmonics don't change either. While you're correct that there is value in instant recognition, the Silver Eagle apparently has counterfeit issues that have forced them to make some changes to the coin.

I just wish the US Mint had their standard Eagle and then had semi-numismatic offerings in the same vain as Kooks/Koalas and Pandas. With the US you could really do a lot. You could do a semi-numismatic Eagle and then you could pick another animal that's fairly unique to the US such as a Mountain Lion, Bison, Alligator, Grizzly Bear. I'm sure there are others worthy of consideration.

Britannias have changed quite a bit over the years, since the silver Britannia was introduced back in 1997 - 1997 silver Britannia, to the 2001 silver Britannia, the design has changed quite a lot, granted in the years between 1997 and 2001 the changes where gradual and slight sometimes, but there is even differences between the BU Britannias and the Proof Britannias from the same year - sorry I don't know how to embed pictures but if you check the Royal Mint's website and compare the 2020 silver 1 ounce proof Britannia against the BU silver 1 ounce Britannia you will notice that there are a few differences, the position of the date for example is different on the proof version compared to the BU version.

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3 hours ago, AgCoyote said:

I just wish the US Mint had their standard Eagle and then had semi-numismatic offerings in the same vain as Kooks/Koalas and Pandas. With the US you could really do a lot.

I am inclined to agree with you on this point. The US mint got a lot of potential but for some reason they do not use it, hence on my list the are one the worst of the big mints. Here’s my list (best to worst): Maples, Britannias, Kangs, Phils, ASEs, Libertads, Krugs.

For gold: Maple, Britannia, Kangs, Phils, Libertads. The rest do not come on the list because of their impure gold look...

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13 hours ago, CadmiumGreen said:

Exactly...why can I get a 1 oz Silver Britannia for less than premium than a 1 oz American Silver Eagle!?! I know why, but it just boggles the mind!   My understanding is that ASEs have inherently higher premiums imposed upon them by the US Mint with a limited trusted PM dealers...Brits don’t have similar impositions in the US...and no VAT. @mr1030, please correct me if in error. 

Yeah, and the US Mint charges a flat $2.00 over spot per silver Eagle, regardless of quantity. That sets the floor. Retail price is typically a bit under $3.00 over spot at the best dealers.

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10 hours ago, Seth said:

Do ASE not have a tax advantage in America? The Britannia is Capital Gains Tax exepmt in the U.K., so for example if you bought just one Britannia for £22.00, even though the spot price at the time was $14.00, and the spot price of silver was to suddenly jump to £150.00 an ounce, and you sold your Britannia for the new spot price of £150.00, you wouldn't be taxed on the £128.00 profit you made from that sale.  Do ASE not have that same sort of tax advantage in America?

There's no capital gains tax advantage to buying precious metals in the US, whether ASE or any other. You can buy PM through an Individual Retirement Account, deducting the investment from the present year's taxable income (it's taxed later, when funds are withdrawn during retirement), but there's no advantage to ASE in that scenario – it's the same deduction as with buying stocks. The only investment I know of that is exempt from capital gains tax in the US are homes, with the exempt gain capped at a few hundred thousand dollars.

The only tax advantage for ASE is that many states exempt precious metals bullion from sales taxes, which are typically 7.5 - 9.5%. That helps, though it's not specific to ASE – it usually applies to all PM, including rounds and bars.

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10 hours ago, AgCoyote said:

I feel like the US Mint is so unimaginative compared to the other mints which is another reason I don't reward them with my business. Obviously you have to have your standard bullion coin which is the eagle but the US Mint offers little else.  Perth gives you Kooks/Koalas/Lunars along with many other options and gives you great alternatives with the sizes of coins. Royal Canadian Mint offers nice designs on different coins, and the RCM is fantastic for stacking with 10 oz and 100 oz bars. The Royal Mint has a lot of good offerings and is starting to match the RCM with their own twist with artistically beautiful bullion bars for stacking.

I wish the US Mint had cool series like Perth, and offered cool bullion bars. 

Yeah, I wish the US Mint made bars like Perth, the RCM, and the Royal Mint do. I like the US Mint and the work they do, and I think they would make awesome bars. I think the silver Eagle is stunning, very solid work.

I'd also like to see them move up to 9999 fine silver, like the RCM and Perth have done (and the Royal Mint has done with the Queen's Beasts).

RCM is very impressive too, especially with their research and development of the anti-milk spotting technology recently, MintShield I think it's called.

The RCM and Royal Mint might be more adventurous than the US Mint because they operate more like businesses – they make coins for lots of other countries. They're always trying to get the business of some smaller country's coinage, mostly on the regular circulation coinage side of things, but maybe bullion too. The RCM has an innovative Multi-Ply nickel and copper plating system for steel coins, and the Royal Mint pushes their nickel-plated steel technology. The US Mint doesn't make anyone else's coins, and they're not trying to, so their R&D seems much more modest (and they haven't made the sensible move to steel coins – pennies and nickels cost much more to make than they should).

By contrast, Perth is offering vaulted PM storage, maybe allocated, and the Royal Mint has some kind of digital gold offering that I need to look into more. The US Mint doesn't seem to have that kind of business mindset for some reason, though that could change. They might be more constrained by Congress than the other mints are by their respective governments and legislatures.

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10 hours ago, Seth said:

Britannias have changed quite a bit over the years, since the silver Britannia was introduced back in 1997 - 1997 silver Britannia, to the 2001 silver Britannia, the design has changed quite a lot, granted in the years between 1997 and 2001 the changes where gradual and slight sometimes, but there is even differences between the BU Britannias and the Proof Britannias from the same year - sorry I don't know how to embed pictures but if you check the Royal Mint's website and compare the 2020 silver 1 ounce proof Britannia against the BU silver 1 ounce Britannia you will notice that there are a few differences, the position of the date for example is different on the proof version compared to the BU version.

The Britannia also saw a major change in 2013, moving from .958 fine Britannia silver to .999 fine, coming into line with international standards for silver bullion.

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On 04/03/2020 at 09:22, Bimetallic said:

Hi all — I've long been confused by how premiums on silver and gold bullion products are so low. I'm talking about the markup on a 1 oz coin or round. Especially when they come from another country, often an ocean away.

Examples:

  1. 1 oz silver round that is $1 over spot. Not on sale, just the normal price on "house" rounds, the ones that major dealers commission with their own design, logo, etc.
  2. 1 oz Britannias about $2.20 over spot, in the US.

I'd say that most non-PM products that we buy have much larger markups from a wholesale price. Spot price for silver is equivalent to wholesale.

Those rounds have to be designed by an artist, then an agreement signed with a refiner/mint, shipped from the refiner/mint, then sold at a profit after all costs are accounted for. From my conversations with dealer staff, one cost that stands out is fraud. I don't understand the details – stolen credit cards? No idea. But it's a cost that has to be baked into their prices. Most dealers in the US also offer free shipping on orders over $99. Their websites are also extremely expensive.

Fulfillment is another cost. For example, a number of major dealers in the US use big wholesalers like A-Mark or Dillon Gage for fulfillment. Silver.com, one of the lowest priced dealers here, uses A-Mark. Right now they're offering new SilverTowne rounds for 90 cents over spot for 1+ quantities. How much are they paying for them? How much is A-Mark's cut? How does Silver.com make money in this scenario? SD Bullion sells their house rounds for about $1.10 over spot for 1+ quantities, or $1.00 if you buy at least a tube. (Their rounds are made by SilverTowne too.)

They also offer Brits and Kangaroos for around $2.20 - $2.40 over spot for 1+, and less if you buy more. These coins have to be flown in from the UK and Australia. I don't know what kind of shipping major wholesalers like A-Mark use for this sort of thing, but it can't be cheap. Even if they were shipping flour from these countries, it wouldn't be cheap, not by air. And I assume bullion is more expensive, has more security considerations and so forth. Silver.com has to make a profit after A-Mark and all their other costs are accounted for. I don't understand how this works. What do you all think? Do you see similar markups in your country, not counting VAT?

You are hyper focused on one product and one profit margin. A companys profit margins are based on all of their products and all of their sales and acquisition costs combined. Some products have a small profit margin, some products have a high profit margin. Buying product on the low dips helps to offset the lower profit items. They also have silver contracts that are long and short with puts attached to control and offset when they buy and sell. Also look at their buyback prices... 

These are currently being sold for 2.19 over spot: https://www.jmbullion.com/american-silver-eagle-varied-year/#

The mistake would be to assume they paid $2.00 over spot for these when in reality since they are not BU they may have purchased them at $16 or less. So the profit is more like $3.50 per coin. So Joe the buyer buys a tube at $394 and their initial profit is $74 on a tube they paid $320 for. When they have sales or so called sales, they are not reducing the price they are reducing their profit margin by a little bit to move product.

Dealers use whats called a buy sell spread, they dont want to catch a falling knife. Thats why its always best to sell your silver to a dealer when the price is rising. I think another hidden assumption people make is that most of us buyers buy on the dips. Its quite the opposite for the masses. Experienced stackers buy on the dips but in all reality we are the minority and not the majority. Dealers know this...

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On 05/03/2020 at 03:36, AgCoyote said:

I feel like the US Mint is so unimaginative compared to the other mints which is another reason I don't reward them with my business. Obviously you have to have your standard bullion coin which is the eagle but the US Mint offers little else.  Perth gives you Kooks/Koalas/Lunars along with many other options and gives you great alternatives with the sizes of coins. Royal Canadian Mint offers nice designs on different coins, and the RCM is fantastic for stacking with 10 oz and 100 oz bars. The Royal Mint has a lot of good offerings and is starting to match the RCM with their own twist with artistically beautiful bullion bars for stacking.

I wish the US Mint had cool series like Perth, and offered cool bullion bars. 

What could the U.S. mint produce that hasn't or isn't already produced by another mint?  When it comes to wildlife the RCM has pretty much covered most of the animals found in North America, the ones that they haven't covered that are unique to America have been done by one of the many private mints based in America like the Sunshine Mint, or Scottsdale Mint, so the U.S mint would then be competing with private owned mints over design, cost and then there may even be issues with copyright.  I guess they could do a series on historical American figures, or American Presidents, a series on American States, I honestly don't know, I struggled to come up with those three ideas.  As for bars, I don't see the point, the Royal Mint only released it's first bar in 2019, I don't know if they are doing them again for 2020, but I honestly don't see a point, again the U.S. mint would be competing with every privately owned mint in America, and the mints that they would be competing against already have long established and proven track records when it comes to bars, a new comer to that market is not only going to have to be able to compete in terms of price, but will have to pull off something special in terms of design, especially if they're wanting people who have been stacking Sunshine Mint, or Scottsdale Mint bars for years to suddenly switch to buying bars from the U.S. mint, or else they just become a novelty purchase, something that you buy 1 or 2 of every year, while you continue to build your stack from bars by either the Sunshine Mint, or Scottsdale Mint.  With there being so many private mints in America, I don't think that the U.S. mint has much choice than to stick with the ASE, and tweak the design every so often - I hear the design is being changed for 2021, releasing a new design and series is a huge gamble, sure if it doesn't take off and sell well you can always melt down the already minted rounds/coins to reuse the silver, but what about the actual cost involved in intruducing a new design, the cost of the design itself, the cost of making the coin/round die, retooling costs, marketing.... how does those costs get covered if the coin/round is not successful and does not attract enough buyers.  And there comes a point where it just becomes a joke like with the Royal Mint, people on this forum are still waiting to receive coins that they ordered a while ago, meanwhile the Royal Mint has released two or even more special edition coins, it starts to put people off, it goes from being whats being released this quarter, to what's this Monday's special edition coin/round, and when you're getting that many new and special/limited ediion releases quality and quality controll starts to suffer, just look at the recenly released Queen coin - the band Queen, with the extremely badly alligned gold gilding.   I honestly think that the U.S. mint has the right idea with sticking to just doing ASE, they've been minting them since 1986, they know the design well, have all the quality, quality control, distribution all sorted out, tested and proven, why mess with something that's already working and working well.  I think if the U.S mint were to do anything, in my opinion it would be to offer the ASE in different sizes instead of just 1 ounce, release a 5 ounce version, a 10 ounce version,  a 50 ounce version, and even a 100 ounce version, all with the same design, just different weight/size, to me that makes more sense than trying to enter a new market where they would be the inexperienced new comer to the game.

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1 hour ago, Seth said:

What could the U.S. mint produce that hasn't or isn't already produced by another mint?  When it comes to wildlife the RCM has pretty much covered most of the animals found in North America, the ones that they haven't covered that are unique to America have been done by one of the many private mints based in America like the Sunshine Mint, or Scottsdale Mint, so the U.S mint would then be competing with private owned mints over design, cost and then there may even be issues with copyright.  I guess they could do a series on historical American figures, or American Presidents, a series on American States, I honestly don't know, I struggled to come up with those three ideas.  As for bars, I don't see the point, the Royal Mint only released it's first bar in 2019, I don't know if they are doing them again for 2020, but I honestly don't see a point, again the U.S. mint would be competing with every privately owned mint in America, and the mints that they would be competing against already have long established and proven track records when it comes to bars, a new comer to that market is not only going to have to be able to compete in terms of price, but will have to pull off something special in terms of design, especially if they're wanting people who have been stacking Sunshine Mint, or Scottsdale Mint bars for years to suddenly switch to buying bars from the U.S. mint, or else they just become a novelty purchase, something that you buy 1 or 2 of every year, while you continue to build your stack from bars by either the Sunshine Mint, or Scottsdale Mint.  With there being so many private mints in America, I don't think that the U.S. mint has much choice than to stick with the ASE, and tweak the design every so often - I hear the design is being changed for 2021, releasing a new design and series is a huge gamble, sure if it doesn't take off and sell well you can always melt down the already minted rounds/coins to reuse the silver, but what about the actual cost involved in intruducing a new design, the cost of the design itself, the cost of making the coin/round die, retooling costs, marketing.... how does those costs get covered if the coin/round is not successful and does not attract enough buyers.  And there comes a point where it just becomes a joke like with the Royal Mint, people on this forum are still waiting to receive coins that they ordered a while ago, meanwhile the Royal Mint has released two or even more special edition coins, it starts to put people off, it goes from being whats being released this quarter, to what's this Monday's special edition coin/round, and when you're getting that many new and special/limited ediion releases quality and quality controll starts to suffer, just look at the recenly released Queen coin - the band Queen, with the extremely badly alligned gold gilding.   I honestly think that the U.S. mint has the right idea with sticking to just doing ASE, they've been minting them since 1986, they know the design well, have all the quality, quality control, distribution all sorted out, tested and proven, why mess with something that's already working and working well.  I think if the U.S mint were to do anything, in my opinion it would be to offer the ASE in different sizes instead of just 1 ounce, release a 5 ounce version, a 10 ounce version,  a 50 ounce version, and even a 100 ounce version, all with the same design, just different weight/size, to me that makes more sense than trying to enter a new market where they would be the inexperienced new comer to the game.

 You raise some valid points. To be fair the US Mint, ATB series isn't bad but obviously has a shelf life.  I think an official US Mint bar would do very well in the marketplace. Royal Mint Britannia bars seem to do well and they entered a crowded market space. RCM bars are obviously very popular here. Given that Americans prefer their national bullion coin to Maples and Britannias, wouldn't a fair amount of this consumer base also like US Mint bars?  You're right that the US Mint does well with the ASE but I'd love to see what their international sales are relative to other mints. Obviously every situation is unique but clearly being in the US is a huge advantage for their sales. I see absolutely no reason anyone outside the US, Canada or Mexico would prioritize ASE's. 

It's pretty ****ing embarrassing that the Royal Canadian Mint has done numerous silver coins that depict our national bird/symbol far better than our own mint.

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The US Mint could do lots of things. Just because the Canadians have done the major animals doesn't mean the US Mint couldn't design coins with similar animals. There are a million ways to draw a bear, cougar, hawk, etc. They could do striking, gorgeous work.

And US Mint bars would sell in huge numbers. You think because there are private mints in the US that the US Mint couldn't make a killing? Come on man. If that were true, the Eagle wouldn't be the best selling silver coin. They could design a gorgeous bar.

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