Bron so when the Perth Mint shop buys back a 2oz Kookaburra (200x) and they melt them down because its much too complicated to sell back to the public it loses about $110-120 per coin in premium. I wont discuss the lunars lol but clearly its too complex to sell all these coins in the secondary market. Much easier to destroy these wonderful coins and lose a premium, which in many cases is many times the bullion value. It makes no sense in this time of fiscal stress and shrinking State revenue. I know its all too complicated as I have been here before...........
1. As I understand it, what was happening was people were asking us to look through coins, or put them aside, etc, which took up a lot of staff time that cost us money, but such people never offered to pay for that staff time and just bought the coins at spot. Basically we weren't making any money. 2. I would think there was ethical issue in us buying back a coin from someone knowing that it commanded a big premium and then just selling it at that premium. We would have to offer a fair buyback with premium. This would reduce our profit, in addition to the cost of a staff member would have to spend time keeping in touch with what coins had what secondary market premium. 3. Buying back at spot and melting is ethical as we aren't excessively profiteering from client ignorance. 4. Melting down reduces the number of coins in the market, increasing the remaining coins' secondary value. Is that a bad thing. Maybe you consider us not getting involved in the secondary market as being shortsighted, but it is not a cost free exercise developing that skill set and so the net return is not clear. In addition, we would be competing with what our coin dealers already do and I'm sure they would be happy with us getting less involved in the retail market.
Bron the Perth Mint shop is a retail outlet bullion store. It's no different to other bullion stores that buy and sell items. When people go to coin or bullion dealers and sell coins or bullion they (owners) know their subject matter and the value of the coins. When they make an offer it is with some knowledge. It's the seller who needs to do research on prices and with the Internet and catalogues available at low cost there is no excuse. My experience is that there is no one person at the Perth Mint shop who has any idea of retail coin prices. There is no one with any true knowledge of Australian or foreign coins. Most of the staff are there to sell trinkets and collectables. So unlike other bullion dealers who are there to offer a fair price and re-sell at a profit, the Perth mint shop does not do this. I think your answer is poor and to use the guise of benefitting us the collectors by destroying these coins that are usually from deceased estates is not founded. If you documented this destruction and corrected the mintage figures, I would agree with you, but you don't. I would have no problem paying retail prices for old bullion coins. The shop can set up an eBay account like most bullion dealers and sell on line. There is simply no will to do this.
Yep sorry I didnt understand so if customers bought allocated 2ozers for years advertised as for sale that wernt actually minted pm would have discovered the advertising error because the coins would not have existed to vault for the customers.
Surely it's the Mint's job to price it's staff time and charge customers accordingly. If you couldn't do it profitably without a surcharge, add a surcharge. Plenty of people would pay (and pay well) to have first pick of the Perth Mint's buy-backs if you presented them with the opportunity. If you were hoping people would just make a donation out of the goodness of their hearts, you're doing it wrong. So a very wide bid-ask spread either side of spot is ethical, but the same spread would be unethical if it falls above spot? E.g. you've got a $53 spread on 10oz silver coins. Assuming that's a "fair" spread, ethically speaking, why does it matter that you buy a rare 10oz coin for $50 over spot and then sell it for $103 over spot? Apply that logic to historic houses: the more you bulldoze, the rarer the ones that remain become. Then people come to realize how much history is being destroyed and they get protected (I mean, the Perth Mint building is pretty old. Why not knock it down and build a nice, big modern building instead?) One of my (ignorant) acquaintances sold you guys a pile of old pour bars a while back, including some rare ones from Harringtons, Geomin and BHAS. I would have bought them myself if I'd known he was getting rid of a 10oz BHAS bar (yeah, there might still be some in existence) but you guys are "trustworthy" so he sold them to the Perth Mint and you guys would have chucked them into the pot. That's a lot of Australia's precious metals history that's gone forever. If some little old lady sent an original Holey dollar to the mint, would you guys melt it in the name of ethics and increasing the value of the others remaining out there? So just sell your buy-backs to any of your dealers who wants them at your standard rates. 2oz Kookaburra Random Year - Product Code ABCDXXXX Easy. Dealers get to make a few extra bucks. Customers have more choice with their stacks and collections. You guys make the same money without having to actually mint the coin. A little bit of history gets preserved for future generations of people interested in precious metals.
I would say they wont melt it down. Put it aside and contact appropriate coins dealers for that.... I am sure they would do that... Just make sure all get melted down.... keep doing what is best for the market... Doing a good job there....
I knew I was stepping into it with that comment Perth Mint Shop is a tourist attractions getting over 80,000 visitors a year selling high margin "trinkets", with a bullion desk attached. It is not a specialist business like http://www.perthbullion.com/ Yes exactly, because it is not a coin dealer, emphasis on coin - we sell bullion, ie investment, and new issue collectible coins at RRP. The skill set of being in touch with secondary market prices we don't have and there is a cost in getting someone up to that skill set. To pay for that we need a certain volume of buybacks of which a good percentage have collectible value on which we can make money. You think we get in so much buybacks but my gut feel from the figures is that there isn't enough volume to justify the staffing. To beef up the revenue then we would have to actively, rather than passively just get buybacks as we do now, go after secondary market. And even if there is a business case in that, should we really be giving http://www.perthbullion.com/ yet more competition? If as you say "it's the seller who needs to do research" then doesn't that mean they would also know our buyback prices are crap and they are better off talking to http://www.perthbullion.com/? Again, there is a cost to researching and being aware of secondary market prices, then sorting through our buybacks to identify the few that have value, then entering that data into ebay, then managing the sale and packing the goods. The Perth Mint can do many things, but there is limited management time to research opportunities and put together a business case to justify new staffing (which with Government crackdown on public service costs, we have to do) so the opportunity has to be big. My guess is that we are not talking about thousands of coins/bars with secondary market premium being "lost" via our buybacks.
I guess that is because the mint stated(on comlaw.com.au) each year after 2009 there will be no 2oz kook.why would anyone try to order it then?or what am I missing?
Only that following that statement the Perth Mint's documentation/advertising didn't reflect the actual state of affairs - from what's been written it seems that they couldn't afford the staff time to check that their online documentation matched what they were putting down (that's just how I'm reading the response to date). Fortunately for the Perth Mint, it appears that everyone understood that when they said they weren't going to make any more 2 oz kooks, that was that (I just didn't know that they had stated that). This may be your point, that realistically there's no way the Perth Mint would have honoured an order based on their dodgy documentation/misleading advertising - the fact that they were ignorant of the premiums for the coins they really have never been offering (despite their documentation/ads) is actually beside the point. On the other hand, it seems to me that they have relented to customer outcry in the past regarding mintages but how many 2 oz kooks would you have to have ordered in order to even begin to get them to consider striking the coin instead of scrambling to avoid any obligation!!! Someone somewhere on this forum has the signature to the effect that whoever holds the metal makes the rules, case in point. That's just how it is, isn't it?
No one asked because they thought that following the Perth Mint's statement, those coins were not available any more. People believe and trust what the Perth Mint states. I investigated getting coins through the Perth Mint depository online long after 2009, I never asked for those 2 oz coins to be made for me - my research into sourcing coins from the Perth Mint led me to hypothesise that 2 oz Kookaburras were technically on offer, however I never seriously considered that those coins would be made for me had I placed an order.
You are way over playing this with your claim of misleading advertising, of what was just a communication breakdown between our minting guys and our depository guys. Geez mate there was a mistake on a list of products, which had a disclaimer that products were subject to availability anyway.
Sorry, Bron, you're entitled to your personal opinion of course but I'm not overplaying anything. I agree it was a communication breakdown (of six years' duration) and I have not intended nor attempted or endeavoured to cash in on this error. In fact, I happen to have been the person that pointed it out and do not appreciate being told that I'm doing the wrong thing. Personally I think that you have jumped to the wrong conclusion far too quickly in this instance. It's not a big deal, I'm not making it a big deal but I will defend my integrity. It may be best if the whole issue is dropped but I can honestly say that I have done nothing wrong at all and resent your insinuations to the contrary. I happen to be on the side of the Perth Mint, I feel I need to state this openly to you.
Using the words "dodgy" and "misleading" to me imply you're saying the Perth Mint was engaging is deliberate bait and switch type advertising. That is all I'm taking exception to. I was not saying you were trying to catch us out with our mistake. In any case a listing of products does not constitute a binding contract. I didn't say you were doing the wrong thing, did you miss this http://forums.silverstackers.com/message-852397.html#p852397 "Thanks for the heads up" No intent to question your integrity or insinuate anything, apologies if you got that impression, just saying I think "dodgy" and "misleading" is a bit harsh.
Right, I see. Glad that's clear. No I didn't, I actually acknowledged "Thanks for the heads up" as post #15 (your post was #13), but perhaps you didn't know that, no worries. Ok.
