Thu Apr 25 2013
Sales of gold coins by the U.S. Mint are heading for the highest total since December 2009 after prices in New York had the worst two-day slump in three decades. As of yesterday, sales totaled 196,500 ounces, up from 62,000 in March, data on the mint’s website show. The amount for all of December 2009 was 231,500 ounces.
The mint said on April 23 it
suspended sales of coins weighing a 10th of an ounce after demand more than
doubled in 2013 from a year earlier. Shoppers from India to China and Japan
joined consumers in the U.S. and Australia in the rush to buy jewelry and coins
following a price decline that sent bullion into a bear market after 12 years
of gains. “The crash in prices has provoked huge new interest in physical
bullion,” Miguel Perez-Santalla, a vice president at New York-based
BullionVault, said in a telephone interview. “Our business last week was 250
percent more than a week before.”
The mint sells 22-karat American
Eagles of 1 ounce for $1,760 each on its website. A half-ounce coin costs $895,
a quarter-ounce coin is $460 and one weighing a 10th of an ounce is $195. The
cost for a 1-ounce coin can vary weekly, depending on the average gold price in
the London “fixing,” which is used by some mining companies to sell output, the
mint said on its website.
“The 1-ounce gold bullion coins
are the most popular,” Michael White, a Mint spokesman, said yesterday. Demand
continues to be very strong for the Maple Leaf coins from the Canadian Mint,
Chris Carkner, a managing director at the mint, said in an e-mailed response to
questions from Bloomberg.
“Demand has increased from all
our markets, including North America, Europe and Asia,” he said.
UBS AG said on April 23 that
physical-gold flows to India, the world’s biggest buyer, approached the highest
since 2008, while Standard Chartered Plc said shipments last week were 20
percent above the previous record.
Volumes of gold products sold
jumped 150 percent in Hong Kong and Macau during the April 13 weekend compared
with the weekend before, Dennis Lau, director of sales operations at Chow Sang
Sang Holdings International Ltd. (116), said last week. Retail sales tripled
across China on April 15-16, the China Gold Association reported. Japanese
consumers are poised to become net buyers of gold for the first time in eight
years as the yen’s decline and looming inflation drive them to seek refuge in
bullion, according to Standard Bank Plc.
Gold futures on the Comex in New York climbed 1.1 percent to settle at $1,423.70 an ounce yesterday. Prices have plunged 26 percent from the record $1,923.70 in September 2011.
Source: Bloomberg