Next year they will be leading with the slogan "Lunar Snakes!!! Just like small leggless dragons if you think about it!"
When I tried to buy some Bavarian Lions last week I saw the same message: "This product is currently not available for your region. Please try again later or choose another product in order to continue." Having a relative in Perth I tried the Perth Mint Shop and managed to grab 20 (limit per person). And my relative bought 20 for herself. Then LO and BEHOLD I managed to buy 60 online a few days later. So, try again tomorrow. They may restock the online store.
silber-corner.de are still selling them, if you don't mind fudging your way through a german website Including delivery to Australia (excluding forex fees), it is 600 Euros or at the current exch rate approx $755 for a roll of 20. Thats $37.75/ea.
There is 7% German MwSt (GST) on the above which should be excluded when the coins are exported from EU.
It's more than 3 years later. The privy mintage numbers are as follows: 2012: 200.000 2013: 56.241 2014: 60.269 In Europe, I see the following prices for the privy mark compared to normal ones: 2012: -15% (prices for privy mark are 15% lower than the normal ones) 2013: -20% 2014: -30% 2015: -20% After all these years, how do you feel about the privy mark 'program'?
They did what they did and although I don't think it was a good idea, apparently the people running the company did and they made a lot of money out of it. The company is still going and many of the people who were angered by this move are still customers, so the Mint's gamble paid off. So far the Mint has discovered that it can... Give misleading information about the mintages, Re-mint previous year's coins, Work around their own 'limited editions' by adding a privy, Churn out product of questionable merit, Include milk spots Use questionable designs And still many of their customers will keep coming back. I know many of the issues have been dealt with and much is down to personal taste, but it does open your eyes a bit, this is not a company whose aim is to promote the hobby of numismatics, it is a company designed to take money off of numismatists, and it does it very well. The fact that their policies annoy a lot of numismatists doesn't stop them making money, and when your key performance indicators are "how much profit you can make" and not, "how well though of is the company by numismatists" then it really doesn't matter. There are plenty of people who have committed themselves to getting a complete set of Kooks, or Lunars or Koalas or whatever and they will continue to buy them no matter what the design or price. In a way we are our own worst enemies, we continue to buy from them despite all the issues we know about. In the case of the Privy, I liked having a variety because I made an effort to collect the dragons and this was at least affordable. I haven't bought any more Privy coins from them. And really if you look up the definition of a Privy it is something along the lines of... But now it is just another marketing gimmick to go along with Mint Marks, counterstamps and any of the other ways they can sell you the same coin multiple times. The Dragon program in itself was ridiculous and I still don't know how many different types of coins were released. The stupid prices on the secondary market put me off trying to collect the coins that were released in low numbers so I think I only have one proof version. I bought a couple of the lunar sheep and I usually buy one each of the various series just to sort of keep them going but beyond that I haven't bought anything from Perth Mint for a while, I was buying a roll of the coins as investments each year but I haven't bothered with that for a while.
I can't speak for anyone else but when the Perth Mint released the privy dragon I stopped buying their products. I used to get a few mates together and put in a combined order with a wholesaler to split up amongst us. We did this 3-4 times a year until we got backdoored by the privys and saturation of assorted dragons. None of us have purchased a single ounce of Perth Mint silver since and probably never will again. As far as I'm concerned they lost all credibility in the year of the dragon. When you're in business nothing is more important than being honest and transparent, particularly when your business is precious metals. The Perh Mint does not possess these qualities.
Privy mark 1 oz Goat was max 35.000 coins and sold out. What a tumble from the starting point (200.000 in 2012). I know a lot of you will be very happy if the privy mark coin would disappair completely.
