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The Coin Analyst: How the U.S. and World Mints Are Dealing with Increased Precious Metal Price Volatility

by Louis Golino for CoinWeek

Spot prices on the futures markets for precious metals have always been volatile, especially for silver.

But since last year’s roller coaster ride, in which gold and silver reached previous or new nominal highs then plunged dramatically for months, spot price volatility has reach new heights.

To be sure, circumstances were similar at the height of the 1980 metals mania, but back then the big jumps mostly took place over just a few days, and the decline that followed them took place at a more measured pace.

Today’s circumstances have put pressure on the U.S. and its foreign mint competitors to try to keep up with a constantly moving target.

Last year as silver prices rose dramatically, various foreign mints took a number of different steps to make sure their products were priced appropriately.

Foreign Mints

Germany, which issues a series of 10 euro commemorative coins in proof and uncirculated finishes, decided to change the composition of the uncirculated coins to cupro-nickel metal while keeping the proof coins, which are priced higher, in silver.

Austria, which issues a series of 5 euro silver commemoratives, took the unusual step of melting tens of thousands of one issue, and since then has decided to offer two versions of the coin. One is a copper coin with a higher mintage, and the more limited mintage coin continues to be made in silver.

France, Austria, Canada, and Australia all issue a wide range of non-bullion commemorative coins that are widely collected. They did not have to make changes because their coins tend to be priced a levels well above their metal value.

Canada, Austria, China, and Australia also issue widely traded bullion coins, but those are mostly sold through bullion dealers at small markups over melt value.

France began issuing circulating silver bullion coins a couple of years ago, although they don’t actually circulate. I will be discussing them in a separate article.

US Mint

The U.S. Mint, which is probably the largest coin seller in the world unless one considers all e-Bay sellers in the aggregate, has taken a different tack.

Its silver commemorative dollars are also priced sufficiently above metal values because of the $10 surcharge for the affected constituency or organization, and each coin has about 77% of an ounce of silver. As a result, so far prices have always been well above melt.

Pricing Grid System

But for other precious metal U.S. Mint products, pricing became a daunting issue last year that resulted in multiple sales suspensions and new price grids.

Gold and platinum collector coins have had a pricing grid in place for several years now. Once a week Mint officials review the average price for the previous week, as well as the London pm closing prices, and then decide whether or not prices should be increased or decreased.

For large coins, this usually means a $50 increase or decrease for gold, and a $100 increase or decrease for platinum, even though that amount does not correspond to the actual change in spot prices.

During the summer, a similar grid was developed for gold commemoratives when prices for the Medal of Honor and Army $5 gold coins began to get very close to their metal content. The coins were pulled from sale until a grid could be created for those coins.

Silver coins have been the biggest problem because they still have no grid, and when silver prices move substantially the Mint has no choice but to remove the coins, and re-price them after a notice is published in the Federal Register.

This is a deeply unsatisfactory system for all parties concerned. The Mint has to stop sales of coins for weeks at a time, which is also frustrating for collectors.

Moreover, the grid system for gold and platinum coins is simply unsuited to the volatility of today’s metal markets.

A case in point is the patently absurd situation that developed on Feb. 29. On the very day when gold and silver had their biggest drop since last fall, the Mint raised prices on gold and platinum products because of the increase in prices over the previous week.

That seems like a sure recipe for lower sales in the subsequent week and a lot of unhappy customers.

During the previous week, the Mint suspended sales of a number of silver products like the five-ounce America the Beautiful coins to re-price them because silver had increased by at least $5 an ounce since the price of the coins was last adjusted. But the drop on Feb. 29 meant the repricing might not be necessary.

This whole system simply does not work for collectors or for the Mint, and a more nimble approach is needed.

Need For A New System

The Mint should implement some kind of real-time, or at least daily, pricing of its precious metal products, as major coin retailers already do.

The current system, which uses different pricing systems for different products, is simply too complicated and surely inhibits sales of the Mint’s products. Greater transparency would likely spur more coin sales.

An easy to understand system based on real-time pricing like what bullion dealers use, or one that at least updates once a day, would be a major and welcome improvement over the current system.

Looking forward, spot metal prices are widely expected to be even more volatile than they have been in the past year, especially as large moves in gold become more normal. As gold prices approach $2,000 an ounce, an increase or decrease of 5% or more in a day is not unusual.

Why should Mint customers have to pay $50 more for a coin one week when the price of gold actually declined by almost $90 the day before, as happened at the end of February?

And why should silver coin buyers have to wait weeks while products are repriced?

It’s time for the Mint to develop a 21st century pricing mechanism, and that is putting aside other issues with the ordering system, such as how to handle high-volume periods and limited edition sets.

Louis Golino - WriterLouis Golino is a coin collector and numismatic writer, whose articles on coins have appeared in Coin World, Numismatic News, and a number of different coin web sites. His column for CoinWeek, “The Coin Analyst,” covers U.S. and world coins and precious metals. He collects U.S. and European coins and is a member of the ANA, PCGS, NGC, and CAC. He has also worked for the U.S. Library of Congress and has been a syndicated columnist and news analyst on international affairs for a wide variety of newspapers and web sites.

Louis Golino
Louis Golino
Louis Golino is an award-winning numismatic journalist and writer specializing on modern U.S. and world coins. He has been writing a weekly column for CoinWeek since May 2011 called “The Coin Analyst,” which focuses primarily on modern numismatic issues and developments at major world mints. In August 2015 he received the Numismatic Literary Guild’s (NLG) award for Best Website Column for “The Coin Analyst.” He is also a contributor to Coin World, where he wrote a bimonthly feature and weekly blog, and The Numismatist, the American Numismatic Association’s (ANA) monthly publication, where he writes a monthly column on modern world coins. He is also a founding member of the Modern Coin Forum sponsored by Modern Coin Mart. He previously served as a congressional relations specialist and policy analyst at the Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress and as a syndicated columnist and news analyst on international politics and national security for a wide variety of publications. He has been writing professionally since the early 1980s when he began writing op-ed articles and news analyses.

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3 COMMENTS

  1. Today the U.S. Mint released the Star Spangled Banner commemorative coins, a silver dollar and $5 gold coin in various packaging options and finishes. For those interested in the gold coins, I would wait until Wednesday before purchasing, as it is likely there will be a price reduction. The current price is based on gold being in the $1750-1800 tier, but given the drop in gold during the past week, the price on Wed. should be based on gold in the $1700-1750 tier, depending on what happens between now and Wed. morning. If the coins were priced the way I suggested in my article, they would be available today at a lower price.

  2. There are certainly disadvantages to the current pricing scheme. At the same time, it can have some benefits to collectors from time to time. Last year I picked up the medal of honor and army unc gold commems the day before they were suspended for repricing (which resulted in the new pricing grid being rolled out). Having fixed prices allowed me to play mint chicken and pick up some low mintage commems at close to spot!

    Despite this advantage I have to concede that a daily or ‘real-time’ re-pricing strategy would make more sense.

  3. Hello Lewis. Very timely article. In fact, the US Mint has suspended the sale of the 2011 Uncirculated, (burnished), Silver Eagle. Specifically…..

    “This product is temporarily unavailable for product repricing.” Louis, the only thing is, it has been “repricing ” for about 2 weeks, and not available to buy. 2 Weeks ? What’s going on ? Thanks, Phil.

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