Demand proved strong for the 2011-W Uncirculated American Silver Eagle during the opening days of its release. The United States Mint reported five-day sales of more than $11 million between its Thursday, September 15 launch and Monday, September 19.
At its $60.45 price, the exact sales total was $11,181,255.15. The unit total came in at 184,967 for a daily sales average of 30,827 coins, although the bulk of the uncirculated Silver Eagle orders were likely placed during the first and second day.
The unit amount was enough to make the debut the fourth best in U.S. Mint numismatic product releases this year, falling behind the 2011-W Proof American Silver Eagle (253,144), the 2011 Silver Proof Set (209,367) and the 2011 Mint Set (191,391).
As in the case of the proof version, the United States Mint has not indicated the uncirculated coin’s maximum mintage. Traditionally, the numismatic American Silver Eagle production rate has been sufficient to support several months of demand. In another point to keep in mind, at least 100,000 are likely to be reserved for the upcoming release of the American Silver Eagle 25th Anniversary Set which is expected to have a maximum mintage of 100,000 and will include one of the 2011-W uncirculated Eagles.
Past Mintages/Sales
The first uncirculated Silver Eagle appeared in 2006 with 466,573 sold. Of those, 198,553 were ordered individually, 248,875 were minted for the American Eagle 20th Anniversary Silver Set, and 19,145 were sold in the American Eagle 20th Anniversary Gold & Silver Set. Sales went up in 2007 to 621,333 but then dropped back down in 2008 to 436,702. The coins were not minted in 2009 or 2010 as the United States Mint focused its resources on fulfilling the unprecedented demand for the bullion version.
Other Eagle Sales Figures
In other Silver Eagle news, weekly sales of the proof version rose 5,785 to 746,731. The collector proof coin was released back on July 5 for $59.95, but its price was recently raised to $68.45. Additionally, a 30 million milestone was reached Monday for the investment-grade bullion Silver Eagle. Buyers have scooped up 30,230,500 to date, keeping the bullion coin’s sales pace on track to easily surpass the annual record of 34,662,500 set in 2010.
Orders for the 2011 Uncirculated Silver Eagle may be placed directly on the United States Mint website located here, or by calling the Mint’s toll free number 1-800-USA-MINT (872-6468).
Why always use variable units (i.e. dollars) to describe volume? Just like with movie box office numbers, dollars don’t relate to anything. How many coins were sold? How many tickets were sold? Those are the numbers that are meaningful when comparing against previous years’ performances and what should be in your headlines.
It is nice to know at least one Department of our Goverment is good at generating revenue!
The mint prices for these needs to drop. We know it won’t happen. Over priced!
The US Mint sent out everybodies subsciption Silver Eagles at the higher price, then made them unavailable for 2 weeks (the return policy from the Mint is 7 days) THEN, they made the Eagle available at the lower cost to those that didn’t have subscriptions. All that time, the price of Silver fluxuated a couple of dollars an ounce. And they refuse to refund the difference of the two prices to those that had subscriptions. Considering this is the FIRST year they started to sell the coins after a 2 year suspension, it appears they did this intentionally to make… Read more »