kimchi

SOTD currently back in stock at Chards if anyone wants.

Those are dead handy for Chapel/church collection boxes 🙈

@kimchi For me the drop off in overall quality/workmanship of proof sovereigns  (don't get me wrong they are still vey nice) Is when the RM switched to the digital image/laser machined dies.   They are just very low relief compared to sovereigns only a year or two earlier.   I had a good spread of  2000's  proof sovereigns  in hand and they are just noticeably better quality than modern proof sovereigns.   I think it was 2019 (i might be wrong) when the very flat George and the Dragon reveres started to appear.   You really need to have a few years in hand in front of you and the quality difference is huge.  Again not saying they are bad that would be silly and the 2022 proof sovereign is a nice design, I just feel the technical skill and quality has been replaced by the new technological techniques it just feels like it's being mass produced and made to a price first rather than setting out to making the best possible.  
I'd love to see a modern proof sovereign on par with the quality of the gold gothic. 
 

Kamasutra special move?

For sure some people have trouble saving, but some just don’t wish to save in paper currencies.
@Bigmarc As for being a latecomer to gold, that’s probably why many silver stackers wish for the ratio to go back to 15:1; so that they can swap their silver for gold and be further ahead without having spent the higher amount to get gold in the first place. Not a bad idea really, if it happens.

No, I am John!

James is giving this one a miss before he's no1 in the A&E queue. 

For what it's worth I never got my original coa returned....thibk it was low hundreds but received high thousands. 

@Yorkshiremanc A damn shame and perhaps a shred of evidence to the widely held feeling that defective returns are being sent out to unsuspecting victims. I do hope that you are adequately compensated.
All completely unsurprising though with the steaming turd of a reputation they seem to have garnered. If you have a spare moment the trustpilot reviews really do make for some entertaining reading material.

 

I got my x2 sovereign sets returned to me on Friday. I had specifically requested that my COAs be returned and was told they would honour this. Anyway, two of the six coins that have come back are in worse state than the ones I sent! So they need to be replaced.
 
However main annoyance is that, surprise surprise the two sets arrived with different COAs! Head of customer service tells me this is wrong: the sets should have gone into a specific area, so the individual coins could be replaced and then the set itself, with the COA I sent, returned to me! She tells me what has happened is the sets have been processed as returns and she says the COAs have likely been sent to someone else now. She will investigate, though if the COAs can’t be located (which they won’t be!) she said we will have to think of a contingency (perhaps ‘reserving’ me a low COA on a future release). Very disappointed, but then again, it’s the RM so anything that can go wrong, does goes wrong! 

Another Yellow v Red comparison - this time the MMTC-PAMP  Indian Sovereign. Which one do you prefer? For me its no contest. The original 1918 George V is a stunner - Its the right colour for a start! 
Did the Swiss/Indian concern not realise that the 100th anniversary in 2018  deserved a special mint mark? Apparently not. Reinstating the helmet 'streamer' would have been a good idea as well.
They just don't make 'em like they used to! 
 

During the great debasement of the silver coinage under Henry 8th and, I think, perhaps his immediate successors, it was said that the new coins 'blushed for shame' because there was so much copper in them that they looked reddish rather than silver. Seems an appropriate comment now, too. Elizabeth I restored the silver content. Rather a shame that her namesake should now have to be associated with coppery sovereigns. 
 

Sorry I know it's not the point of the post (I too have faith in silver, and everyone I've ever shown a 999 coin can't believe how cheap it is).
Isn't land and property extremely cheap in certain parts of North America (including some very good ones if you want to be fairly self-sufficient)...I watch a lot of off-grid channels from here in rip off Britain with very envious eyes? A million for a house has me very very surprised!

Sorry I know it's not the point of the post (I too have faith in silver, and everyone I've ever shown a 999 coin can't believe how cheap it is).
Isn't land and property extremely cheap in certain parts of North America (including some very good ones if you want to be fairly self-sufficient)...I watch a lot of off-grid channels from here in rip off Britain with very envious eyes? A million for a house has me very very surprised!

As I was reading Jordans monthly expenditure, I was thinking silver is the least of his worries 😟 

there you see, i took it that it was you that wouldnt buy 1oz of silver 😂

LOL
This isn’t a post about me. This is a post about humanity. You can view it as each line having been said by one individual at some point in his/her life. Or you can view each section as being said by a different person each time.
Life is full of needs and desires. We all have both to varying degrees. Maybe some people live more within their means and focus purely on the necessities of life. Others may lack direction and spread themselves out over all their wants and desires.
However one spends their hard earned currency this much is true, you need to prioritize your goals so that you aren’t wasting your dollars. As you correctly pointed out, if the person paying $1500 a month rent was indeed the same person looking to buy a house for $1,000,000, then that person would clearly be wasting their dollars.
All these things have a cost to them. Just look and analyze the situation at hand. The goods gradually increase in price and people will pay what they have to for their wants and necessities to be fulfilled. Seems ludicrous to me that people are willing to pay increasingly high prices for all these things, but are unwilling to spend $30 on an ounce of silver. Especially when $30 is a bargain.

I Wouldn't Buy Silver
By: Jordan Graveline

I would buy a nice haircut for $30
But I wouldn’t buy silver for $30 an ounce
I would buy a tank of gas for $60
And I have bought a night out for $90
But I wouldn’t buy silver for $30 an ounce
I would buy a TV cable package for $120/month
And I have bought a pair of shoes for $150
And I need to pay my cellular bill of $180
But I wouldn’t buy silver for $30 an ounce
I would buy car insurance for $200/month
And I have bought groceries for $400
And I need to pay my credit card of $700
And I want to buy a new snowblower for $1000
But I wouldn’t buy silver for $30 an ounce
I would rent a nice place for $1500/month
And I have bought a nice diamond ring for $3000
And I need to pay off my student loan of $7000
And I want to buy a vacation getaway for $20,000
And I should have my savings account at $50,000
But I wouldn’t buy silver for $30 an ounce
I would buy a washer and dryer for $3000
And I have bought artwork for $5000
And I need to pay off my car loan of $10,000
And I want to buy a new truck for $90,000
And I should have a portfolio worth $500,000
And I am going to pay $1,000,000 for a modest house…
But I wouldn’t buy silver for $30 an ounce
Overpriced?

It's important to distinguish the differences between bullion, BU (brilliant Uncirculated) and Proof. Bullion and BU are often used interchangeably and therefore assumed that they are the same thing which isn't the case, the number of strikes, creation of the dies, the time taken on the full process is very different:
Bullion - 1 strike and machine finished. NGC grading designation MS
BU (brilliant Uncirculated) - 2 strikes and hand finished. NGC grading designation MS and usually followed by an additional description to differentiate from bullion coins eg MATTE or DPL (deep proof like)
Proof - 6 strikes and hand finished. NGC designation PF
Here's a link on the Royal Mint's site that summaries the differences in a little more detail than above:
https://www.royalmint.com/discover/coin-collecting/striking-standards/
Here's a video produced by the Royal Mint that goes deeper into the differences in the creation process between the 3. Only 5 minutes long and very informative:
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Yep definitely ms 
I have two already in the Sotd series graded 
it would be a fantastic mini series to collection but there has been a few dud reasons for the striking on the day, silly I know, but at the premiums they demand on some you have to think of resale later on 
 

I didn't as RM loves me it saves me from spending to much by never putting me low in the s**** queue thus never buying anything 😂
it's an amazing system and very thoughtful of them
Tell a lie.. i did get a Tudor Beast that i had to send back five times 😂 lol

Not SOTD but ukgoldcoins have 2022 proof sovereigns for sale at £750. You can make an offer and he accepted mine at £700. Might help someone who is still looking. Called the chap who promised to check the coin over before sending for any errors/damage

If you have the (or rather a good amount of spare) money and are looking to pass down something to your heirs, that would be a nice set imo
Much as I hate First Strike tomfoolery, if I was in that boat (too much money!), I'd be buying loads and getting them all off to NGC asap for that elusive (possibly one of a kind) First Strike 70s set!

Absolutely! As many as possible for me this year, I'll be selling some other modern sovs to buy these for a few quid more
The Proofs are definitely not what they were just a few short years ago alas, and from the photos these don' seem to be either, so I think you're right, or the Mint have just dropped their standards...

See it loud and clear
It's a no-brainer really isn't it?
Once the rush has stopped and premiums go down a bit mind, and with hopefully a drop in gold closer to £1300. As the jokers at the Mint might say 'we're here all year'!