China Snakes Alive!

[Catseye]

First real pics of the 10Y silver round.

First Retail Issue Listings: http://www.pandaamerica.com/sresult.asp?keyword=China&sortby=entrec

China 2013 Year of the Snake 5 oz Gold Colored Coin - Coming soon Price: $15,900.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1 oz Silver Proof Coin - Coming soon Price: $199.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1 oz Silver Coin (Flower-Shaped) Price: $229.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1 oz Silver Coin (Fan-Shaped) - Coming soon Price: $169.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1 oz Silver Colorized Coin - Coming soon Price: $219.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1/10 oz Gold and 1 oz Silver Colorized 2-coin Set - Coming soon Price: $599.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1/10 oz Gold Proof and 1 oz Silver Proof 2-coin Set - Coming soon Price: $529.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1/2 oz Gold and 1 oz Silver 2-coin Set (Flower-Shaped) - Coming soon Price: $2,299.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 1/3 oz Gold & 1 oz Silver 2-Coin Set (Fan-Shaped) - Coming soon Price: $1,069.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 5 oz Gold Proof Coin (Rectangular Shaped) - Coming soon Price: $17,900.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 5 oz Silver Colorized Proof Coin - Coming soon Price: $899.00

China 2013 Year of the Snake 5 oz Silver Proof Coin (Rectangular Shaped) - Coming soon Price: $859.00

 

[jc888888888]

Love that design, I collect China lunars for my 2 girls collections!! Very proud to say I have a 70 2009 flower ox ,started with just the fans and flowers ,then added the colored ,for some reason the 2009 ox (which is the first year of the new design) is a super expensive coin despite the high mintage ,you can expect to pay 700 to 100 for the colored ! and 500 to 700 for the flower!But the fans are still cheap??,
If anyone is interested I have the 2013 Snakes in both the fan and flower variety going to NGC as we speak (only a handful). I concentrate in the fans and flowers as they are the lowest mintage of the silver series .I dont remember the exact # but between 60,000 and 80,000 . the round is over 200,000 same with the colored.BTW those are decent prices in general coming out of Panda America..........

 

[Catseye]

Joe, you have flower plum blossom silver 10Y already? Please post pic.
The series is beginning to hit eBay but no silver flowers yet.

Gold & silver round coins.

Gold Obv.

Silver 10Y Fan

 

[silverstar1]

Any idea why these are so damn expensive ? who is actually making the big bucks on these, is it the mints? CGCI? Chinese Govt. ?? Take the flower edition 1 oz silver $229+ , mintage of 60,000 ,where do the get the extra $200 in expense? I love these Chinese coins but can anyone seriously answer this, it is a serious question although maybe a dumb one.

 

[silverfever]

I think even with the 60000 mintage they are better value than the Canadian 1 oz lunars which have a mintage of 28888 and priced at $100.

 

[silverstar1]

I think even with the 60000 mintage they are better value than the Canadian 1 oz lunars which have a mintage of 28888 and priced at $100.

I agree, and maybe a better "value" than many or most new release coins out there. The answer may be as simple as ,that is what they can get for it, i just wonder who gets the cream off these. At least they seem to be honest about it , here is the mintage , here is the price ,some a little more , some a little less depending on the dealer, but all very expensive. And someone correct me if I wrong but I believe the mintage IS the total mintage including the sets in different packaging.
I sure wish they would make bullion type coin of these with similar mintage at panda type prices.

 

[picturefun]

PandaAmerica.com sure gets a lot of cream from being the only official dealer for PRC Mint in the U.S. Just look at their Brand New nice looking office Building they just built last year in CA.

 

[spannermonkey]

Wouldn't this belong in the Lunar section ?

 

[silverstar1]

Wouldn't this belong in the Lunar section ?

Probably ? but it seems the lunar section is geared more towards the perth mint lunar stuff and the panda section deals more with the chinese coins ,who knows why???

 

[silverstar1]

PandaAmerica.com sure gets a lot of cream from being the only official dealer for PRC Mint in the U.S. Just look at their Brand New nice looking office Building they just built last year in CA.

Yeah but PA and Chinese , Australian , German ect. dealers all have similar prices , there has to be a place climbing up the chain where it stops at that price.
For example a bullion American silver eagle is about say $2-$3 over spot and the proof version in box , COA is maybe $15 -$20 over spot , Although not a very interesting coin in my opinion.

 

[silverstar1]

PandaAmerica.com sure gets a lot of cream from being the only official dealer for PRC Mint in the U.S. Just look at their Brand New nice looking office Building they just built last year in CA.

Well I would applaud Panda America on their success , as long as they are being honest and sending nice coins, Congratulations on the new building!

 

[jc888888888]

My discussion ,s with a couple of guys in Shanghai who buy directly from the mint say the mint sets the price to dealer,s and they are very expensive from the mint, I looked at Panda America,s prices and they are really not to bad, the china mint did lower the prices 20% this year on the snakes from last years crazy high dragon,s, but since the new series and design came out in 2009 they have substantially raised the mintage and the price.

 

[Justfishin]

While a little steep, they are gorgeous, and excellent packaging

 

[jc888888888]

While a little steep, they are gorgeous, and excellent packaging

Absoulutely! My twin daughters where born in 2009 ,so I started a collection of lunars ,(first 2 sets, fans and flowers ,then I gave up on 2 sets and said they could share 1 (as they will inherit my whole collection anyway) ,then I went back and added the colored ,As a sidebar 2009 was the start of the new design with the ox ,the single biggest mistake I ever made IMHO is not to buy more ox flowers and colored, I could be retired !, This is only my opinion ,forget the published mintage !! IT WAS NEVER MADE........ you never see but a couple of ox flowers and even more rare colored ox,s for sale, dealers in Shanghai are selling wholesale price colored ox,s for 900usd ++++++and you could walk the shanghai coin markets all day and not find 10, flowers 450/500usd wholesale,considering for a brief moment in time you could have bought colored ox,s for 125usd and flower,s for 190 when 1st issued, quite a return , Dragons 2012 are a different story very popular lunar year lots around but have held . tigers 2010 really nice appreciation, Rabbits 2011 have held value and appreciated ,The mystery is the colored coins despite there very high mintage in all years since 2009 they have appreciated the most,This is my THEORY only everyone shy,s away from buying them because of the 220,000 mintage ,subsequently the mint does not make that many and BINGO instant rarity,I have been told they do not produce the whole mintage at once, They are addicting and beautiful! And once you get a couple of years you get committed .I myself am going to see the whole lunar cycle thru! 1fan, 1 colored and 1 flower for all 12 years 5 years down ,7 to go.......... hope I make it,I started thinking about adding the 1/2oz gold fans but I threw that idea away ,have to buy groceries, mortage payments, car expenses ,stupid trivial stuff like that!

Note: only 14 2009 colored ox,s have been graded by NGC IMHO impossible with a mintage of 100,000 hence the rarity.....................

 

[Catseye]

PandaAmerica.com sure gets a lot of cream from being the only official dealer for PRC Mint in the U.S. Just look at their Brand New nice looking office Building they just built last year in CA.

Yeah but PA and Chinese , Australian , German ect. dealers all have similar prices , there has to be a place climbing up the chain where it stops at that price.
For example a bullion American silver eagle is about say $2-$3 over spot and the proof version in box , COA is maybe $15 -$20 over spot , Although not a very interesting coin in my opinion.

To compare an ASE to these works of art is sacrilege.
The effort to bring these state of of the art coins out as a product is no small feat.
The dealers are required to buy in large lots and for the most part don't get to pick and choose between sheets of coins.
One list of dealer costs shows the 1 oz natural silver snake cost at about $134.73 US (selling for $199 at PA) but you must buy 100 coins to get this price from China Mint.
Considering each sheet coins may have between 30 - 50% of the coins in ungradeable condition (as was the case with the Wutai and Dragon fan) we are fortunate to even see these coins in gradable condition outside of China at these prices.

 

[jc888888888]

PandaAmerica.com sure gets a lot of cream from being the only official dealer for PRC Mint in the U.S. Just look at their Brand New nice looking office Building they just built last year in CA.

Yeah but PA and Chinese , Australian , German ect. dealers all have similar prices , there has to be a place climbing up the chain where it stops at that price.
For example a bullion American silver eagle is about say $2-$3 over spot and the proof version in box , COA is maybe $15 -$20 over spot , Although not a very interesting coin in my opinion.

To compare an ASE to these works of art is sacrilege.
The effort to bring these state of of the art coins out as a product is no small feat.
The dealers are required to buy in large lots and for the most part don't get to pick and choose between sheets of coins.
One list of dealer costs shows the 1 oz natural silver snake cost at about $134.73 US (selling for $199 at PA) but you must buy 100 coins to get this price from China Mint.
Considering each sheet coins may have between 30 - 50% of the coins in ungradeable condition (as was the case with the Wutai and Dragon fan) we are fortunate to even see these coins in gradable condition outside of China at these prices.

Spot on catseye, my supplier in China tells me he will go thru 20 coins to get 5 or 6 I like ,he says Im picky,and after he goes thru 20 to get 5 , I will jump up and down and do an irish jig if 4 of 5 come back from NGC pf69 ,everyone that is pf68 I will for sure lose money on, thats why you will see big coin dealers team up ,they will grade out all the less desirable,after that 1 will grade them and sell,and the other will move out the less than perfect as OMP( sound familiar ala ANA,Signapore) ,usually a very notable dealer will grade 100,s to 1000,s of coins and use an early release label, so when you look in the ngc census , and you see a big block of coins with a huge % of 69,s and 70,s relative to the amount graded ,then you see the others with a much lower percentage of high grades that is the reason they are pre grading and have an outlet for the less desirable OMP, NGC I dont believe favors them ,they just pick thru first , you dont believe me??? perfect example 2012 Panda,s 36,000 early release graded ! almost 50% graded 70 the rest 69 ,the most astounding statistic out of 36,000 coins only 31 thats right 31 graded 68,67 ,now look at the regular label the suckers you and I ,who bought the omp... 1977 coins graded the % of 70,s drops to 25% apx and here is the real eyeopener 88 coins 68,67, I am not saying anything is wrong or illegal with what they do,its a business to them that,s all.

 

[gerald]

Any idea why these are so damn expensive ? who is actually making the big bucks on these, is it the mints? CGCI? Chinese Govt. ?? Take the flower edition 1 oz silver $229+ , mintage of 60,000 ,where do the get the extra $200 in expense? I love these Chinese coins but can anyone seriously answer this, it is a serious question although maybe a dumb one.

I don't know the answer to your question, but let me share this with you. I live in Beijing and a few days ago I visited one of the gold/silver jewelry vendors in the mall near my office. This vendor also happens to have a small selection of coins for sale and I wanted to see if they had the 2013 pandas. They didn't have the new panda, but they did have the 2013 lunar 1oz silver round set (1oz colored + 1oz uncolored) for 2100 RMB, which is about $333 US. Note that this is the official set, so in addition to the two 1oz coins you also get the box from the mint. I was tempted as this was much cheaper than what I remembered the 2012 dragon used to sell for, however I held off as I knew I could get a much better deal at the coin market (the prices at this place are 20-40% higher than the coin market).

 

[gerald]

While a little steep, they are gorgeous, and excellent packaging

Absoulutely! My twin daughters where born in 2009 ,so I started a collection of lunars ,(first 2 sets, fans and flowers ,then I gave up on 2 sets and said they could share 1 (as they will inherit my whole collection anyway) ,then I went back and added the colored ,As a sidebar 2009 was the start of the new design with the ox ,the single biggest mistake I ever made IMHO is not to buy more ox flowers and colored, I could be retired !, This is only my opinion ,forget the published mintage !! IT WAS NEVER MADE........ you never see but a couple of ox flowers and even more rare colored ox,s for sale, dealers in Shanghai are selling wholesale price colored ox,s for 900usd ++++++and you could walk the shanghai coin markets all day and not find 10, flowers 450/500usd wholesale,considering for a brief moment in time you could have bought colored ox,s for 125usd and flower,s for 190 when 1st issued, quite a return , Dragons 2012 are a different story very popular lunar year lots around but have held . tigers 2010 really nice appreciation, Rabbits 2011 have held value and appreciated ,The mystery is the colored coins despite there very high mintage in all years since 2009 they have appreciated the most,This is my THEORY only everyone shy,s away from buying them because of the 220,000 mintage ,subsequently the mint does not make that many and BINGO instant rarity,I have been told they do not produce the whole mintage at once, They are addicting and beautiful! And once you get a couple of years you get committed .I myself am going to see the whole lunar cycle thru! 1fan, 1 colored and 1 flower for all 12 years 5 years down ,7 to go.......... hope I make it,I started thinking about adding the 1/2oz gold fans but I threw that idea away ,have to buy groceries, mortage payments, car expenses ,stupid trivial stuff like that!

Note: only 14 2009 colored ox,s have been graded by NGC IMHO impossible with a mintage of 100,000 hence the rarity.....................

I have also been wondering why there is no premium on the non-colored lunars vs the colored, despite the latter having 3.5x higher mintage. Perhaps Chinese collectors just like the colored coins (buy the design, not the mintage?). I generally do not like colored coins, maybe I'm old school but I feel it's a gimmick. I prefer the design of the flower coins. But I will admit that the Chinese colored lunars aren't bad, they are sort of cartoonish which is nice in a way.

I would also like to know why the 2009 colored ox is so expensive. The overpriced vendor that I mentioned in my previous reply is selling a set of 4 silver 1oz colored lunars (ox, tigar, rabbit, dragon) for $2150 US. The interesting thing is that this is some sort of an investment product where they will pay out a minimum of 12% and a maximum of 20% interest if you return the coins in a year (of course you can also decide the keep the coins, in which case you won't get any money back).

 

[gerald]

To compare an ASE to these works of art is sacrilege.
The effort to bring these state of of the art coins out as a product is no small feat.
The dealers are required to buy in large lots and for the most part don't get to pick and choose between sheets of coins.
One list of dealer costs shows the 1 oz natural silver snake cost at about $134.73 US (selling for $199 at PA) but you must buy 100 coins to get this price from China Mint.
Considering each sheet coins may have between 30 - 50% of the coins in ungradeable condition (as was the case with the Wutai and Dragon fan) we are fortunate to even see these coins in gradable condition outside of China at these prices.

Could you elaborate on what you mean by "ungradeable condition"? I am finding that surprisingly large % of recent Chinese silver coins suffer from white spotting. I even saw a bad case on a 2012 1oz dragon flower. This is why I am hesitant to buy these coins sight unseen.

This is getting off-topic but since you mentioned it I am also looking to add the 2oz silver Wutai to my small (but growing) collection. I saw one that had damage on the reverse side, it was a small gouge in the mirrored surface. I need to visit the coin market again.

 

[silverstar1]

Thanks for all the wonderful insight and posts here ! Alot of questions I have had answered here really some great info! I really did not like the colored versions at first but they have really grown on me, after reading JC888.... s post I looked at the colored ox and I think that one especially is really a nice design, I am not sure what the coloring agent used is but it seems to be a much higher quality, almost like an enamel, compared to many of the other cheap looking colored printed paint from some other mints I have seen.I like the plain silver and gold the best still, Really beautiful coins! The Tiger and Dragon are my favorites at the moment but they are all very nice.

I agree Catseye its almost blasphemy to compare ASEs to these , I was just using an example that maybe they could make a cheaper bullion round or something at pricing similar to the pandas and sold in sheets so we could stack the hell out of them but yes a pretty bad comparison , please forgive me... LOL