Yes, it is so true. the quality of Somalia elephant coins since 2011 has been very bad. I bought 1 roll from ebay, most of them are toned or foggy or have milky spots. Same thing for 2012 (bought a roll from APMEX), was ok when I got them, now also started to develop some milky spots. 2013 I bought 10 from another dealer, quite a few of them also developing milky/foggy spots or marks. I bought a roll of 2014, one of them toned so bad, almost copper color, but APMEX did an exchange for me. But for earlier years of elephant coins I bought from a dealer, they look great, none of them have milky spots. So I am done with buying those. I will only buy 1 for my own collection. It does make a huge difference when a mint churning out a million coins, the quality is usually going down.
I was hoping someone would of replied saying the PM milk spots were confined to only the Aus-US alliance Pacific war 1/2 Coin.. i have no proof the same fate awaits this issue.. It is not a foregone conclusion, merely a consideration to those "thinking" types and a warning to those who walk first without looking ahead at the path they are treading.. IF they do milk, even if you keep them sealed, people who will potentially buy them will be able to research online that these milk, you only have to look to the RCM Animal set to see the destruction of prices Milk Spots cause.. my moose, grizzly and cougars are all basically worth spot now.. so even if you paid low premiums expect them to erode additionally. RE: stick with Bars... Agreed.. i will be strong.. might get some southern cross bullion instead..
That's if you want bullion. Personally I think Kooks, Lunars of all different sizes have outperformed bullion far far and away. If we look at trends then paying a little more for kooks, koalas and lunars appear to have far more promise. Limited mintages help sometimes but look at mintages of 5,000 coloured coins, there are many that head back to spot, then we see others double or more, so it can be a mixed bag. But in the kooks, koalas and lunars series, we see a much more smoothed out value and demand. These coins have international appeal. If we look at the trends and look ahead we can see year over year silver sales soar and spillage into the semi numismatic market. Will this continue? It's highly probable. Crocs are a different coin, looking down the road with this series if bullion becomes more popular will we see them become collectable? Well there's a million of them, which is reasonably large but give it 3 or 4 years and if they change the animal then it may fetch a little more but I don't see it touching the prices of Kooks, certain koalas and Lunars. I sold a half oz koala on ebay for $64 a while back. I don't think you'd get that kind of return with Crocs. Bullions vs. bullion coins. At the price crocs are reasonable but have their place. I welcome them but I'm prepared to pay more for other coins than these.
Kitco is the first major North American online vendor to offer the Saltwater Croc and they're offering it for the same price as the Canadian Silver Maple, which is around $1.10 less per coin than ASE's. This is mixed news, because that's a great price for buyers but the RCM attitude about the milk spots on their Maples at that price is "we couldn't care less and we're not about to try to fix the problem at that price, so you can go pound sand." So---the whole thing is going to come down to what kind of attitude toward their products and customers Perth Mint is going to go with. Are they going to continue to put out quality milk spot-free products like the Lunars and Kooks and continue to care about customer relations? -- OR -- Are they going to cop a nasty anti-customer "this one is cheap so we're not putting any effort or quality control into it and we couldn't care less what you think" attitude (like the RCM has and has been very articulate about in their press releases)? I'd be disappointed if Perth Mint decides to go with an anti-customer/anti-quality control attitude like RCM has, but only time will tell whether they're going to "go RCM" or not. I really hope they don't get stupid. I've been collecting Lunars, Kooks and Koalas for a while and I'd like to continue to do so, but if Perth Mint enters the Milk Spot Derby that'll be the end of my buying their products.
My entire roll is 100% infected --- every single coin!.. will upload images this Month (next 30 days) as evidence...
wow. maybe all silver coins will get infected eventually. Damn. that blows. I bought a few Brits (older years), and pulled them out, and several had spots. I guess I'll be waiting a long time for spot to go up to make my money back. sucks. Other than antiqu'ish Chinese medals. I'm done buying silver for a while...gold here I come...be it small amounts 1/20 1/10 or full ounce...it's gold, here I come. :lol:
Whilst this may have been discussed previously, do we have any metallurgists amongst us, to advise what the problem is? Is it predominately contamination from within the coin, environmental or a combination of both? Knowing what the actual main issue is, may lead to an accepted course of action that would reduce the prevalence of the problem.
Milk spotting is the result of a deficient mint wash/rinse procedure and "when you got it, you got it." It can show up quickly and early or maybe much later on but when it does show up, there's no way to make it go away that doesn't totally screw up the surface of the coin. The only way to keep coins from falling prey to it is a matter of effort, expense and quality control monitoring during production at the mint. That's why Perth Mint's attitude is going to be critically important. They may continue to safeguard against milk spots or they may "go RCM" and stop giving a damn whether their products develop spots or not.
One thing to do that on a Maple, which is a POS bullion coin, a whole nother matter to do that on a lunar, kook or koala bulion coin...
So, going by this, it is a reaction to silver from another manufacturing substance which has not been fully removed. Is it then possible that environmental factors, such as temperature, humidity, lack of sunlight or airflow etc, exasperate the problem? If so then it may, just may, be prudent to alter storage conditions and methods. Just throwing it out there.
Environmental conditions after the coin leaves the mint don't have anything to do with whether or not milk spots will develop and neither do storage conditions or methods. The one and only thing that influences whether or not milk spots develop is mint washing/rinsing practices during the refining/ manufacturing process. Search the subject of milk spots here, in other PM forums and on YouTube. You'll find lots of info about this plague. Post-mint exposure to atmospheric conditions (specifically airborne sulfur-containing contaminants) will influence when and how much toning (a/k/a "tarnish") will happen to silver coins, but nothing post-mint has anything to do with milk spots. The dreaded spots are caused entirely by what the mint does (or doesn't do) and how well they do it.
We just need to keep the pressure on the PM not to screw their good quality up. Because as soon as they do, my hundreds/thousands of ounces go elsewhere, never to look back.
MAJOR +1 on that! Thus far, PM has a comparatively good track record --- no major mint/post-mint damage problems (like Royal Mint and RCM), no horrendous milk spot reputation (like RCM), mostly aesthetically well-designed series coins (except for that sorry Koala), some smashingly successful series (Lunars, Kooks), good packaging (capsules), etc... It'd be a real shame to see PM trash their good record and reputation by diving into the Milk Spot Slough of Despond. I feel the way you do --- the first confirmed, valid indicator of a serious PM milk spot problem I see will be the same day I'm done buying anything from PM. I'm glad to see PM start a new series --- and happily, without the lame paint jobs or imbedded glass chips that are too popular with private mints these days. I'm not into the paint jobs, glass chips or endless commemoratives honoring everything under the sun. I like traditional series coins like the Lunars, Kooks, etc and I'm looking forward to collecting this new series from the start. PM has a major marketing/sales/revenue opportunity with this new series and I hope they don't blow it all and drive a lot of us away by "going RCM" on us.
not sure if this is relevant... I have personally seen milked 2013 Kooks, and 2013 Stock Horse. Spots on PM silver bullion coins are not common but they do happen.
Ouch. I hadn't heard of Kooks with spots. I've got the whole series, and none have spots. When you say it's "not common" do you mean it's almost unheard of or it happens 5% or more of the time?
