bars or sovereigns . . . long term invest want to keep it simple 💰👑

[Bigmarc]

1 hour ago, Silverlocks said:

I suspect the flat surface is to do with the die making.  I have read somewhere that the dies are chrome plated now, although they still produce some with satin finishes, which suggests they can make dies with the texture used on the historical sovs. 

I'm not convinced of the argument about production volumes, as the 2000-2015 figures (see below) suggest that the mintages are something like 1% of what they were (about 30m) at the peak of production just before WWI.  In terms of die cutting costs, the die numbering of the 19th century suggests that a small handful of dies made with 1860s technology would be enough for the entire production run of today (let alone what's possible with current tech), so I'm unconvinced of there being significant benefit to chrome plating the dies either.

Unless they've got some hard constraints on the sale price, the cost of manufacture is dominated by the cost of the gold, and I don't see a lot of benefit to penny pinching elsewhere.

 

	Sovereign	Proof Sovereign	Half Sovereign
2000	129,069	12,159	146,822	7,458
2001	49,462	15,000	94,763	4,596
2002 *	75,264	20,500	61,347	10,000
2003	43,230	16,220	47,818	4,868
2004	30,688	12,685	34,924	4,446
2005 +	45,542	15,458	30,299	5,011
2006	33,012	11,485	Mintage Unknown	4,173
2007	27,628	11,418	75,000	2,442
2008	58,894	10,872	75,000	2,465
2009 x	60,292	9,770	50,000	5,412
2010	243,158	8,828	250,000	5,370
2011	253,773	8,209	50,000	5,287
2012 #	432,925	8,158	250,000	2,303
2013	261,581	10,158	1,051 + 124 Brilliant Uncirculated (BU)	1,863
2014	261,216	7,500	9,900 BU	4,075
2015	113,177	9,800	5,000 BU	4,600

 

Like I said was just a shot in the dark on why. 

The company I work for just purchased two robots for £130 grand. They sacked 3 people and this move saved them 2 euros per item on a £30,000 product. They make 500 items a day. 

I can imagine someone is there at the royal mint doing a similar role. 

Edited December 6, 2023 by Bigmarc

[Silverlocks]

11 minutes ago, Bigmarc said:

Like I said was just a shot in the dark on why. 

The company I work for just purchased two robots for £130 grand. They sacked 3 people and this move saved them 2 euros per item on a 30,000 product. They make 500 items a day. 

I can imagine someone is there at the royal mint doing a similar role. 

I don't doubt the possibility of penny pinching going on at the Royal Mint.  The only thing they're obliged to have in the sovereign is gold.  However, I don't think they're under any obligation not to charge more, so I think they could easily recoup the cost of the silver in being able to sell the sovs at a higher price.  Unless there's some constraint on the price we're not aware of, I think it's a false economy, which is why I wonder about some other motive.

PAMP-MMTC could flog their I mint mark sovereigns at a significantly higher price than the RM's ones, and they made a point of doing a yellow alloy with some silver in it and using it as a selling point.

[Bigmarc]

Found this on bbp, thought it was quite interesting. 

 

[MBTPSilver]

Also worth remembering that Royal Mint don't produce their own blanks anymore, and I believe the change in the Sovereign alloy lined up with this change in production policy.

[SeverinDigsSovereigns]

1 hour ago, Silverlocks said:

I don't doubt the possibility of penny pinching going on at the Royal Mint.  The only thing they're obliged to have in the sovereign is gold.  However, I don't think they're under any obligation not to charge more, so I think they could easily recoup the cost of the silver in being able to sell the sovs at a higher price.  Unless there's some constraint on the price we're not aware of, I think it's a false economy, which is why I wonder about some other motive.

PAMP-MMTC could flog their I mint mark sovereigns at a significantly higher price than the RM's ones, and they made a point of doing a yellow alloy with some silver in it and using it as a selling point.

They could revert to the old die making methods and satin finish (and alloy), and while this may add some cost, they can just add a few pounds onto the sales price of each sovereign. I'm pretty sure the sovereigns would sell better this way and they end up making more money.

Some people on TSF suggested that they deliberately make sovereigns more pink so to distinguish from the more yellow Britannias and other ouncers. But I seriously douby if that has anything to do with chromium plating dies. The Krugerrands are still satin. The buffalo, the eagles, libertads, Phils, 100 coronas, etc, all have satin finish so it's definitely not a problem technically or financially.

But I guess satin finish is heavily vulnerable to dents and scratches. Maybe they did it so their coins don't look brutally tortured as they already are.

[Bigmarc]

Another reason maybe. 

They wish for it to stay as a sovereign and not get melted down and turned into jewelry. Is a sovereign cheaper to buy than jewellery making material?

[Silverlocks]

12 minutes ago, Bigmarc said:

Another reason maybe. 

They wish for it to stay as a sovereign and not get melted down and turned into jewelry. Is a sovereign cheaper to buy than jewellery making material?

It is to some extent, because gold casting shot will attract VAT as it's not investment gold.

Edited December 6, 2023 by Silverlocks

[Britannia47]

1 hour ago, Silverlocks said:

I don't doubt the possibility of penny pinching going on at the Royal Mint.  The only thing they're obliged to have in the sovereign is gold.  However, I don't think they're under any obligation not to charge more, so I think they could easily recoup the cost of the silver in being able to sell the sovs at a higher price.  Unless there's some constraint on the price we're not aware of, I think it's a false economy, which is why I wonder about some other motive.

PAMP-MMTC could flog their I mint mark sovereigns at a significantly higher price than the RM's ones, and they made a point of doing a yellow alloy with some silver in it and using it as a selling point.

The sovereign alloy has been discussed many times over the years.

It’s still a mystery as to why the RM persists in using ‘Red’ gold for its Sovereigns. Only once has it admitted using red gold In the past. That was in 1997 when it included the bi-metal £2 in the Gold Sovereign set, describing the outer rim as ‘red gold’ and the inner as ‘yellow gold’!  It may be that ‘red gold’ visually separates it from its 9999 gold products ( Brits, QBs, TBs etc) so as not to be in competition with each other?

I was not aware that the Indian Delhi Sovereign was using  ‘yellow gold’ - appears identical to the RMs to me, at least between 2013 and 2018. See photo with original 1918 Bombay mint and the colour differences.

Also included another comparison photo of different use of alloys on sovereigns from a previous post…..

 

 

[MrStacker]

5 hours ago, MBTPSilver said:

Also worth remembering that Royal Mint don't produce their own blanks anymore, and I believe the change in the Sovereign alloy lined up with this change in production policy.

Is there any information on when they stopped producing their own blanks and outsourced?