The United States Mint increased its weekly allocation of American Eagle silver bullion coins following two weeks of declines. The agency has limited sales of the popular 1-ounce, 99.9% pure silver coins since their return after temporarily selling out in July.
Matching the rationing levels that started September, this week’s allocation increased 33.3% to 1 million coins. Last week’s amount fell 7.4% to 750,000 coins from the prior week’s supply of 809,500 million coins. The next weekly allocation will be announced Oct. 5.
Weekly inventories have disappeared quickly this month. For three straight weeks, authorized purchasers for the U.S. Mint ordered all available Silver Eagles within two days.
American Silver Eagle sales at 35,054,500 for this year are sprinting at a record pace, up 12.5% through the same time in 2014. Last year when Silver Eagle sales ended at a record 44,006,000, the coins through Sept. 28, 2014 logged sales of 31,161,000. The U.S. Mint also limited sales in 2014 but not during the summer months.
The United States Mint does not sell bullion American Silver Eagles directly to the public but through a network of authorized purchasers who buy them in bulk at melt value, plus a premium of $2 per coin, and then resell them in smaller quantities. Authorized purchasers consist of major coin and precious metals dealers, brokerage companies, and other participating financial intermediaries.
I don’t even know why they bother. What with it the end of the year, the supposed Silver shortage and next year being the Silver Eagle’s 30th anniversary. Save it for Hi Releif, Fractional sets and other innovative coins like other countries make. If you haven’t gotten one by now, you missed the bus.
BFD, you see the premiums the sellers are hitting retail buyer with- $7 over spot —profiteers……….
Hi Mike, thank you for the article. I’m a bit of a newby to the coin collecting space. I wanted to inquire about the significance of allocation and what impact it has on the value of the coins. Is it a means of measuring the potential volume of production (i.e. high allocation = less value; low allocation = more value). Just trying to wrap my head around this. Thank you.