US Mint Sales: Products Debut, Demand Raises Arthur $1 Mintages

According to the latest United States Mint sales figures, buying activity was at its height last week with the debut of proof Silver Eagles and Chester Arthur $1 Coin Covers.

U.S. Mint unit sales surged with their release, but were also surprisingly assisted by rolls and boxes of Chester Arthur $1’s which were introduced nearly two weeks ago. In fact, new figures reveal that the amount of Arthur dollars sold went past their published production figures, meaning the U.S. Mint is unexpectedly striking more.

2012-W Proof Silver Eagle Sales Debut

Briefly, as this CoinNews.net article offers more detail, collectors ordered 299,539 proof Silver Eagles between their release on Thursday and Monday. It was the best numismatic coin debut of the year. At $59.95 a shot and without shipping and handling fees thrown into the mix, the U.S. Mint pulled in just under $18 million in sales over the five-day period. Last year’s proof Silver Eagle brought in a bit more than $22 million through its first six days.

Sales Debut for Chester Arthur Presidential Dollar Coin Covers

Released last Monday, Arthur $1 Coin Covers were the Mint’s second-best numismatic seller of the week with sales of 13,562. That was a tad down from the debut of the immediate previous coin cover which featured two Garfield dollars. Actually, the starting level is the slowest in the American Presidency $1 Coin Cover Series to date, with recent examples shown in the following table:

Increased Chester Arthur $1 Coin Mintages Due to Demand

Coin production figures from February revealed that the U.S. Mint struck 5.74 million Chester Arthur Presidential $1 coins. More are now being minted due to collector demand. Based on the Mint’s latest sales figures, the bureau has already sold nearly 6.2 million of the coins through roll and box products which were released on April 5. In particular, a big draw was for 250-coin boxes. Buyers ordered another 11,965 versus the initial debut total of 2,470. Here is how the current Arthur $1 coin products stack up:

All but the 500-coin boxes appeared on the U.S. Mint’s best-selling list of products.

U.S. Mint Top Numismatic Products of the Week

1. 2012 Proof Silver Eagles (+299,539)
2. Chester Arthur Coin Covers (+13,562)
3. Chester Arthur Presidential (P) $1 250-coin box (+8,665 to 9,919)
4. Chester Arthur Presidential (P) $1 Coin Rolls (+5,003 to 36,536)
5. Chester Arthur Presidential (D) $1 Coin Rolls (+4,631 to 33,922)
6. Chester Arthur Presidential (D) $1 250-coin box (+3,300 to 4,516)
7. 2012 America the Beautiful Quarters Silver Proof Set (+3,114 to 101,355)
8. 2012 America the Beautiful Quarters Proof Set (+2,705 to 82,002)
9. Star-Spangled Banner Silver Dollar Proof (+2,046 to 81,669)
10. 2011 Proof Set (+1,653 to 1,073,735)

Overall, 43 products improved over prior weekly sales as compared to the 54 out-performers noted previously.

Next week’s report will reflect another high level of unit sales with Tuesday’s release of the Chaco Culture Quarter Three-Coin Set and Thursday’s scheduled release of the 2012-W Proof American Gold Eagle products.

US Mint Sales: Bullion Coin Products

U.S. Mint bullion coins picked up slightly over the past seven days but they still remain sluggish. In the notable category, bullion Silver Eagles topped 11 million in year-to-date sales. That has happened sooner in a year only once, in 2011. The following table offers the latest bullion product sales figures:

*The as of date for US Mint sales of one-ounce and under bullion coins is Wednesday, April 18, 2012. These totals are for this year alone. The as of date for the five-ounce bullion coin product is Monday, April 9, 2012. These totals are for all the coins sold by design, and include sales from 2011. (Check this site’s gold coin sales and silver coin sales pages for always updated figures for popular U.S. Mint products.)

The following are the latest tallies for US Mint numismatic clad, gold and silver products:

US Mint Sales: Numismatic Products

*NLA – No Longer Available.

The collector coin sales figures above have an "as of date" of April 16, 2012. Visit the CoinNews.net page US Coins or the United States Mint website at http://www.usmint.gov/ for more information on any of the above products.