More Sellers Then Buyers?

Mint is sold out of 2013 SAE's until end of month. Just checked a few online stores and premiums have jumped (many stores have no supply of silver). The 2012's are $5.99 over spot for over 100 coins. They are $7.50 over for under 20 coins. Other years as well. Wow, the game in silver has changed.

I've found ASEs in stock and ready to go for premiums running from $3.50 to $5.10 on a quantity of 20 coins. Nonetheless, there are still lots of options out there that
come with a premium of a lot less than $3.50. If the US Mint wants to constrict ASE sales, they just took one major step toward doing that. The RCM gang must be
laughing themselves silly while their number-crunchers project their increased sales volume...

Yep, BB, that's true, but on the other hand, they ARE 0.1808 Troy oz. of silver.



I figured that you did something like that. I would not have thought of ebay as a source of inexpensive proof sets, though. Good call on that. Much of what I have seen for sale there tends to be over-priced, although some good deals come along now and then. I suppose that one has to spend the time necessary to find them and I just don't have a lot of interest in doing that. If I was in the buying and selling business, though, that would put a whole new slant on watching ebay for good deals.



A business would look at those numbers and then raise the price they charge for ASEs until they did not constitute a loss. Seems as if they would not need to raise their price very much to make that happen.

@Ed_B: My method of bidding on ebay is pretty simple. In my case I was simply looking for silver proof sets and I didn't care which year or if I got duplicates. I just bid on everything ending within 24 hours with my max bid including shipping set at spot. The next night I would check what I won and repeat the process. I only won maybe 1-2 auctions per night but I got the price I wanted without spending much time. Of course I was bidding on 20 or do auctions at once so there was the potential to spend a bunch of money if I somehow wont them all! It never happened and I had the cash to cover that possibility.

The Mint is not a business, it is governed by Congress. They do all sorts of things that don't make sense because of Congressional mandates. If the Mint was a business they would have eliminated the penny, nickel, and dollar bill a long time ago, along with changing the composition of the rest of our coins to less expensive metals. The bill that created the ASE also requires the Mint to sell them at cost.

The trick for me is to find someone selling a number of sets that combines shipping. If you can get the first one cheap enough, your price on later sets can be higher and still come out below spot. I've bought 20 plus sets this way over the past year.

The American Silver Eagle was originally authorized as a way to use the Federal Governments surplus supply of silver. It was reauthorized in 2002 and the mint was allowed to purchase silver on the open market once the stockpile was depleted. The reauthorization was sponsored by Senator Reid of Nevada, the largest silver mining state in the US.

Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Commemorative Coin Act (1985):

Sec. 202. Minting of Silver Coins.

Section 5112 of title 31, United States Code, is amended by striking out subsections (e) and (f) and inserting in lieu thereof the following new subsections:

``(e) Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary shall mint and issue, in quantities sufficient to meet public demand, coins whichâ€"

``(1) are 40.6 millimeters in diameter and weigh 31.103 grams;

``(2) contain .999 fine silver;

``(3) have a designâ€"

``(A) symbolic of Liberty on the obverse side; and

``(B) of an eagle on the reverse side;

``(4) have inscriptions of the year of minting or issuance, and the words 'Liberty', 'In God We Trust', 'United States of America', '1 Oz. Fine Silver', 'E Pluribus Unum', and 'One Dollar'; and

``(5) have reeded edges.

``(f) The Secretary shall sell the coins minted under subsection (e) to the public at a price equal to the market value of the bullion at the time of sale, plus the cost of minting, marketing, and distributing such coins (including labor, materials, dyes [sic], use of machinery, and overhead expenses).

``(g) For purposes of section 5132(a)(1) of this title, all coins minted under subsection (e) of this section shall be considered to be numismatic items.

``(h) The coins issued under this title shall be legal tender as provided in section 5103 of title 31, United States Code.´´

According to the US Mint 2012 Annual Report, the mint lost $4.4 million (0.4%) minting bullion ASE's in 2012. That compares to a profit of $13.6 million (0.9%) in 2011.

From the Mint Report: "The $4.4 million loss from American Eagle Silver Bullion Coin sales in FY 2012 was primarily due to the decision to offer American Eagle Silver Bullion Coin production at San Francisco to meet demand. American Eagle Silver Bullion Coins carried a large portion of San Francisco overhead expenses during periods of low numismatic sales. As demand decreased, spreading these additional costs to the 18.4 percent fewer ounces sold during FY 2012 compared to last year."

The mint doesn't break out specific data for the ASE Proof's but they made $49.2 million(32.7%) on numismatic silver coin products.