These guys are beautiful, bought a ton ( not literally) - absolutely brilliant. I try to buy most digital, and 30% physical. Just wanted to shout about it.
Most of my silver are these, mostly because of euro face value, design is well, failure is the thickness of the coin combined with the flat edge. It makes it look like they forgot a step in the production.
While it's been an overrated coin, the 2014 could be an interesting year. Sounds like their sales are anemic right now, especially in Europe due to taxation. Thus the mintage could end up being quite a bit lower in 14 vs other years. Something to think about.
Low mintage on Philharmonics? The question begs itself--- So what? The Phils are close to if not the lowest premium tube silver coin available today (at least in the US). They're almost always even with the spotted and mint-damaged Maples for lowest premium. If they have an ultra-low mintage year, maybe they'll climb up to being the second-cheapest tube silver coin (?)... I don't think I've ever heard of any serious Philharmonic collectors like I have with Kooks, Lunars, Britannias, Pandas and even ASEs. I actually like the Phils. I think the aesthetics are good and I don't much care about the plain edge---if anything, I think it's distinctive. Unfortunately, they're not very liquid in the US. Dealers don't like them and frequently treat and price them like generic rounds.
So what? The point is that if 2014 turns out to be a lower mintage year you'll find the secondary market will be higher. This is true of just about any legal tender coin. Don't take my word for it, just look at back date pricing for yourself on all sorts of coins. It's not strange to see particular good years to be $1-5+ higher in premium just because the mintages were lower. No risk for people to throw some tubes or maybe even some monster boxes of Phils away for safe-keeping.
In Germany the dealers move from sales to margin based tax caused Austria imported coins to be taxed at an Austrian rate. 22% or so. Not very sure of this though. About mintages, for what it's relevant here, anemic sales right now can be not representable for the whole of the year. These are the mintages, according to various sources. 2008 7,773,000 2009 9,014,800 2010 11,358,200 2011 17,873,700 2012 8,769,200 2013 14,600,000 (graphical estimate on usagold.com chart) In september 2012, they 'projected' 15 million for 2012. It ended up at 8,769,200. That's quite a miss.
On a theoretical and general basis, you're absolutely right and I won't argue the point, but... The likelihood of Phils producing anything more than a minimal to very modest return is unlikely. Phils just don't have a serious following the way Kooks, Lunars, Pandas and other coins do, which makes reselling Phils at an elevated premium a slow, difficult proposition. In addition to that, they have a history of being more prone to milk spots than most bullion coins (other than those sorry Maples) and that's a problem that limits their liquidity. If/when I can afford to set aside a couple tubes of something in anticipation of value appreciation and profitable resale a few years later, I'll do it with Perth Lunars. They have a serious following as well as a good history of noteworthy value appreciation. I do however like your idea about stashing a couple monster boxes of Phils in anticipation of value appreciation. You have no idea how much I wish I could!
