The Modern Gold Commemorative King Has Been Made *Updated Numbers*
HalfDime
Posts: 147 ✭✭✭
The 2024 commemoratives just went off sale and they have made new low mintages for the series of modern coins. The 2024-W Uncirculated Harriet Tubman $5 Gold Coin only had sales of 1,264 as of last week, and the 2024-W Uncirculated Greatest Generation $5 Gold Coin had sales of only 1,314. Final numbers will be out in a few weeks, but they are likely to be close to those. These become the last group to add to others that make up five gold uncirculated commemorative coins to fall under 2,000 mintage in this series.
2021 Law Enforcement 1,753
2022 Negro Leagues Baseball 1,507
2022 Purple Heart 1,677
2024 Greatest Generation 1,377
2024 Harriet Tubman 1,293
If anyone wants to put together a small set of modern gold, these five may be good candidates while they are all still selling for below $1,000 each. These mintages are below the gold spouse coins, below the platinum eagles, even below all classic gold commemoratives except for the PanPac.
A few of the one dollar silver commemoratives have also fallen below 10,000 mintage which beats all classic commemoratives by type, and so far only three have done so.
2021 Law Enforcement 9,422
2022 Negro Leagues Baseball 8,445
2024 Harriet Tubman 7,300
These are now record lows for these series. A few things are likely happening that is contributing to these new lows. The mint has raised prices on coins, which tends to drop sales. The coin designs themselves may play a part, and the precious metal prices also factor in. Whatever the reasons, the coins have become interesting low mintage plays for the long run collectors.
Updated: The latest sales numbers are the final sales to the end of the year. So these are close to where they end up, probably within a couple of coins. The Harriet Tubman gold unc finished just under 1,300 coins, with a new low at 1,293. The Greatest generation was close with 1,377. It will be hard to get sales below these. The latest marine gold unc had sales of 531 in just the first week.
Comments
Down down down in a Burning ring of fire.
Jackie is looking like a high mintage
Martin
Low mintage means little if no one wants them other than as bullion.
@HalfDime
Congratulations if those are your coins!
Well done, someday those and the Spouses will get their due!?
how did low mintage affect current prices of the other four?
The government is incapable of ever managing the economy. That is why communism collapsed. It is now socialism’s turn - Martin Armstrong
The lower gold mintages mean declining interest, so back issues will drop in price to bullion value. However, that is a plus for collectors because it gives two ways for appreciation for these five. Also the historic low mintages will eventually matter, it is unlikely they drop to under 1,000 mintage in future releases. I know few people like these, but they have broken well under classics now except for the PanPac. That will eventually matter to the market.
PS The five gold coins combined are priced at what one Jackie Robinson was about eight years ago.
@HalfDime
I can see a sub 1000 mintage.
Bad design, soaring gold price, and a raise in the mint premium.
The $5 gold commemorative is a dead series and getting deader by the issue.
Sub 1000 I can see it. 10 years ago I would have agreed with you no way under a 1000 but it could easily happen if things keep
Going like they have been
Martin
"king has been made"
you new to the forums?
these are just another casualty in what we call "race to them bottom"
make your 3 item list this year and in a couple of years there will be new entries
another race to the bottom series is the first spouses
proof platinum?
modern morgan and peace next?
palladium eagles, too?
new kings get made every year. it's good to know the mintages and how the modern commems are doing, but we're all expecting new kings will be made
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The 2020 V75 Gold eagle is selling for 14k or higher at 1,945 mintage.
PS Nobody wanted the gold buffalo fractionals and they sat around until they finally sold out with little interest.
the v75 does commemorate but it would be most sought after as a coin in the type 1 age series, which would explain the realized prices
also, the true components of the commemorative series are those specifically authorized by a devoted law to make them. the specific commemoration via a congressional act sets them apart from something the mint just decided to do
Apples and orange. Gold and silver eagles can not be compared with the commems. They're are thousands of series collectors fire the Eagle's while there are about 6 collectors of the $5 commem series
If you look hard enough, you can find threads saying the same thing about the spouse coins. How did that work out for prices in that series?
They made the V75 one year. They make commemoratives every year. Mintages are low because no one buys them.
On the contrary, the 08 W gold buff fractionals were a one-year issue that never sat around. The mint had to actually quit selling gold coins because of a gold planchet shortage in 08. I was fortunate to purchase dozens of buffalo and burnished eagle four coin sets direct from the mint before there was even a hint of a planchet shortage. Three year run (06, 07 and 08) on the burnished W gold eagle fractionals also resulted in coins that didn't sit around, especially the 08's. Likely that the gold buff and burnished eagle fractionals were halted after 08 because of unknown future planchet availability.
The government is incapable of ever managing the economy. That is why communism collapsed. It is now socialism’s turn - Martin Armstrong
Despite opinions, you’re correct. Little kings and queens still don’t drive collectors to the feeding trough, anymore. Remember when that ‘95 W (30,125) silver eagle was selling for $10,000 ? Now it’s about one third the cost.
They are selling for melt but higher than what collectors paid for them, so I doubt the spouse buyers who have held are complaining. They also have higher mintages than these.
The floor level can't go much lower unless gold prices keep going higher. If it does then people will still make out with these. I would love to see the mintages break under 1000. I doubt gold coins with mintages under 2000 trade at melt long-term.
Anyone who bought spouse coins from the Mint and is happy that they made money on the bullion is simply ignorant. They could have bought more actual bullion for the same money.
@HalfDime
What was the issue price on these?
And what is - was spot price for these now?
I can find at least 10 right now on eBay for sale from mid $800 to a little over a grand.
Martin
i'm a first spouse collector who is buried in many of them because of the dual threat: pr70 and first strike
I'm complaining
you want those in the land of declining mintages (and sellers) and rising gold prices? that means still buried for so many issues. the next issue will be off the rails expensive because few are left to make pr70/'lite label. and I'm still trying for a pr69/'lite label set. i got lucky last issue because 69's were generously handed out despite the coins being the cleanest gold spouse issue of them all by far! (they were spectacular and the portrait was perfection in its rendering!
way back when, pr69/'lite label used to be sold for just over issue price with losses taken on seller's fees and grading fees. i have a set in 69s. i'm going to be buried in the next 69 if ever they generously hand out 70s then.
and then there is the 70/label markup. way back when you'd pay 50% at least over issue, but you could also resell them easier than now. the latest issue, the markup for a 70/label was s a lower percentage over issue, but you can't resell them. so who cares about that?! just think of the percentage markup over melt.... which is what the market is really accepting!
complaining!
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I am pretty sure that the economic collapse in 2008 had a lot to do with the low sales in 2008. Also, the US Mint was expecting to continue doing fractional gold buffalo , gold eagle, and platinum eagle coins but the low demand in 2008 made them cancel them for later years. Also, at the end of 2008 the gold buffalo fractionals sat around without selling out even though anyone who followed them knew they were going to have very low mintages. It was a demand issue and the mint overloaded the market with all these issues.
Here we are today and the commemorative market has collapsed as well. These have broken below classic commoratives except for the King Panpac. The five gold coins above are selling for what one Jackie did five years ago.
It was a
Long time ago for my memory. But I ordered 12 1/4 gold burnished and 12 1/4 buffs and only got the burnished eagles. Buff were sold out.
I might be wrong but I don’t think so
Martin
@MsMorrisine
I feel your pain. Although I gave up on them shortly after Lincoln. I just came across a couple unopened un marked boxes with some spouse inside. They are first strike eligible I just don’t know what ones they are😀. Not that even matters
If I would have just bought gold at the time my stack would be bigger and worth more than buying the gold from the mint. At least as of today
Martin
2024 Greatest Generation 1,314
2024 Harriet Tubman 1,264
Both pretty low, unfortunately just bullion unless the US Mint stops this program in favor of another... However, there is a collector base for this stuff so you never know. I like them in ms70 PCGS holders. May be a good buy and hold for 10 or 20 years....
I was buying many gold fractionals from the mint in 2008 and as I stated it was a supply issue (shortage of gold planchets) and not a demand issue. . Apparently you weren't buying gold from the mint in 2008 or you would not be claiming "demand issue."
U.S. Mint Suspends Buffalo Gold Coin Sales
The government is incapable of ever managing the economy. That is why communism collapsed. It is now socialism’s turn - Martin Armstrong
Exactly. I collect the Australian Wedge-tailed silver eagles, all but a few over the 10 year span reached figures above 10,000, several below 5,000. So, correct, popularity is the key factor. It doesn't help with theU.S. Mint charging way beyond reasonable from the start.
the individual set of commemoratives are each authorized by an act of congress. the mint does not decide anything
one notable point, as of my last check a few years ago, there was no existing law mandating a commemorative program. tho, if the sales get so low, causing prices to soar... the mint may notify congress about the sales problem. who knows, maybe congress goes to 1 a year or just stops
I collect classic commems, you know, and classic commem collectors get no respect, no respect at all. I mean, when I went to a coin show and asked where the classic commems were, the dealer pointed and said go through that door. So I did...it was to the parking lot! I tell ya, it's not easy being a classic commem collector!
I went to see my doctor about my coin collecting habit, you know my doctor, Dr. Vinnie Boombatz. I asked him why I was accumulating so many quarters. He told me to keep my wife off of street corners.
I tell ya it ain't easy being me!
USAF (Ret) 1974 - 1994 - The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of miseries. Remembering RickO, a brother in arms.
Those articles have nothing to do with the gold buffalo fractionals, or the other fractionals that the mint made. Those were already struck and were not selling because the price of gold/platinum dropped but the mint did not drop the coin prices like they do now on a weekly basis. So yes it was a demand issue, and not a shortage of blanks. Coins were still available for sale past the November price drop except for the 1/10 ounce unc, which had sold out. It was too late in the year to strike more. The rest languished until they finally sold out at the low mintages due to demand, high prices, the economy, and too many products. Here is a link to what happened to them. Yes I bought many of them, and had them graded by PCGS.
The 2008 low sales caused the mint to discontinue many products, and is why we have so many one ounce offerings. Here is the article that came out about this late in 2008.
Note that your link identifies two categories: Discontinued items (including bullion items) and Last Chance items (items still on the shelf at the end of the year). The Last Chance item list does not include any bullion because they sold out early in the year. The reason they sold out early in the year was because of a gold and silver planchet shortage mid-year and high demand from the 2008 Financial Crisis. If you had been a buyer of gold and silver from the mint in 2008 you would have known this. There was great discussion on this forum about this planchet shortage and the early sellout.
Buffalo fractionals and AGE burnished fractionals were both ended after 2008 because of the unknown future of planchet availability. Bullion coin planning and production for 2009 began well before 2009 in the midst of the planchet shortage. The decision to end the four coin sets was made well before the 2009's were struck because of uncertain logistics.
background on silver eagle production cut.
"Production of United States Mint American Eagle Silver Proof and Uncirculated Coins has been temporarily suspended because of unprecedented demand for American Eagle Silver Bullion Coins. Currently, all available silver bullion blanks are being allocated to the American Eagle Silver Bullion Coin Program, as the United States Mint is required by Public Law 99-61 to produce these coins "in quantities sufficient to meet public demand . . . ."
background on gold eagle production cut
"The United States Mint will resume the American Eagle Gold Proof and Uncirculated Coin Programs once sufficient inventories of gold bullion blanks can be acquired to meet market demand for all three American Eagle Gold Coin products. Additionally, as a result of the recent numismatic product portfolio analysis, fractional sizes of American Eagle Gold Uncirculated Coins will no longer be produced."
The government is incapable of ever managing the economy. That is why communism collapsed. It is now socialism’s turn - Martin Armstrong
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As I posted, they did not sell out until the end of the year and were already struck. It had nothing to do with planchets. This link explains it.
https://goldbuffaloguide.com/2008-w-uncirculated-gold-buffalo-coin/
The mint discontinued them because of low sales, not planchets. The planchets were only a factor with the one ounce bullion coins, not fractionals.
Edit: I pulled up the old mint sales for these and it looks like they first sold out end of November, and the rest quickly after that. The platinum and eagles were the last ones.
https://www.coinnews.net/2008/11/27/us-mint-gold-platinum-and-silver-coin-sales-figures-nov-27/
The gold buffalo 1/2 ouncers barely sold over 2000 singles.
Nothing in your links addresses the planchet shortage, my earlier links do. If there were low sales as you believe, then the items would have ended up in the mint's "last chance" offerings. They did not. They were sold out by year end.
As I presented earlier, the one-year buffalo fractionals and the three-year running AGE "W" fractional coins (which all sold out by year end) were not ended because of demand. Sell out proves that. In mid 2008 the mint experienced a shortage of planchets and made the decision to cancel all the fractionals begining in 2009. Because of logistics and supply issues at the time a decision was made prior to 2009 coin minting to drop the gold fractionals.
I stand by my comments that the end of the fractionals was a supply problem. Anyone who was actually buying these from the mint at the time will confirm. You apparently were not a mint buyer at the time.
Forum post 1/09 about planchet shortage
Forum post 8/20/08
Your "demand" issue is not supported by anything you have posted. Fact remains mint experienced a documented raw material issue in 2008.
The government is incapable of ever managing the economy. That is why communism collapsed. It is now socialism’s turn - Martin Armstrong
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The shortage of one ounce bullion blanks doesn't mean there was a shortage for the buffalo fractionals. They struck what they wanted and sales were slow because of precious metal price swings and the bad economy. People wanted bullion coins due to the lower cost, that is why they ran out of bullion blanks. The banks were collapsing in 2008 and people ran to gold bullion, not the overpriced collector coins the mint was selling. This is why in 2009 they came up with the weekly change in price adjustments for collector precious metal coins that still exists today.
Since you keep claiming that there was a shortage of gold buffalo fractional planchets, please post a link specifically about those fractional coins (not one ounce coins), or else I assume you don't have one. And it has to be from a reputable source like a news site or the us mint itself, not someone on a message board guessing about it. The usual person back then to give out that information was Michael White.
Oh, IMHO, just take it easy.
I am one of those that bought the Jackie Robinson gold unc. from the late Paul Sims just after issue for $197 and saw them go up and down. Still glad I have it though; I was excited like others by the mintage and this type of mintage has taken its perspective since with lower mintage issues like the two of this year. I got them too but am not deceived by these "orphan" series - I would be shocked if they rise in the foreseeable future.
Still, I like getting them and like the satin finish on the designs. Kind of fun but nothing serious & I root for each to be lower than the last....
PS. I am also one of those suckers that bought the Betty Fort First Spouse in Unc. Who cares? LOL
Anyway, take it easy and enjoy what you do...._
Well, just Love coins, period.
I’ve had an unbelievably hard time finding PCGS MS70 commemorative
half dollars from this year. I got a Harriet Tubman FDOI MS 70 on eBay for $89 earlier this year only to be told two weeks later that the entire shipment had been destroyed in the mail
There are more gold coins available than the clad half dollars
I was at a coin show once and I left a large group of classic commemoratives in a suitcase in the backseat of my car. When I returned from the show, I found my window smashed and three more suitcases full of classic commemoratives inside 😁
Fractionals were first to go when the gold shortage of 2008 appeared.
Aside from the one time Jackie fluke how's those gold comms working out for you? Gold comms have always been a sucker's game, I got sucked in myself for a short while.
The government is incapable of ever managing the economy. That is why communism collapsed. It is now socialism’s turn - Martin Armstrong
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Since when is owning gold coins a suckers game? Too bad you were wrong about the buffalo fractionals, I forgive you, lol.
I find the Harriet Tubman‘s to be interesting… I might seek out the uncirculated gold as I have decided to do the five dollar gold pieces from all eight mints.
The big question was, which West Point coin do I want? This sounds like a good fit…
My YouTube Channel
Yours was a valiant effort to convince people of the importance of low mintage modern commemorative gold, at least until you made this comment. But there is zero comparison between that
GE and the gold commems.
If the value of gold plummeted to the point where it was not a factor in pricing then maybe people would start collecting low mintage gold just for kicks, but that isn't going to happen.
There are low mintage coins that stayed under the radar until it was too late and then values increased, but these aren't them. People didn't buy these because they didn't want them. They aren't going to start wanting them now.
I remember when the Jackie Robinson uncirculated gold was king and had a huge premium, until new kings were crowned and the premiums got passed to each successive lower issue. I'm not sure that's even happening now.
Historically, low mintage foreign coins never had the same value that a comparable mintage US coin had, but things are starting to equal out. It's not because foreign coins are catching up, it's because modern US fancy widgets aren't attracting a collector base.
I was the kind of person who might have tried to collect every issue but I dropped out of the game long ago, and I know I'm not alone.
I think the first spouse gold was what really ended it for me once and for all. Pairing an expensive gold spouse coin for each base metal presidential dollar was simply absurd. It should have been at most a spouse half dollar.
IF the Mint ended the $5 Gold Commem program next year, these “super low mintage gold coins” from 2024 would likely be exceedingly popular with collectors (and potentially exceedingly hard to find close to the final Mint price). But, what are the chances? Not high enough chance for us to raise our price on Tubman on eBay even when it is now the “champ”. They are still sitting on eBay at the same price as last month as we try to make a relatively tiny net return after eBay fees, PCGS fees, shipping fees and US Mint cost. Oh well- it’s only money.
Just my 2 cents.
Wondercoin.
We all remember your heroic efforts with the spouse coins. Your two cents carries far more weight from having been in the trenches with these coins. It's easy to just stare at mintage numbers.
On a related note, shouldn't the "King" be the coin with the highest DEMAND not the coin with the lowest mintage?
Shouldn't the "King" be the coin with the highest DEMAND not the coin with the lowest mintage?
Finally! A quotable question! A "King" should be the coin with the highest demand...absolutely.
But, and there's always a but, we are told time and time again that rarity makes a coin valuable, thus lowest mintage may drive demand up, right? After all, low mintage creates a "key" coin...
But if few want a lowest mintage coin, how can it be in high demand? Better buy one fast cuz not everyone can have one...but truth be told, not everyone wants one.
The mint has raised prices on coins, which tends to drop sales. The coin designs themselves may play a part, and the precious metal prices also factor in.
Those are important factors, and I believe coin design plays a very important part.
As demand drops, mintage numbers fall, it slowly sputters out...
These are just another casualty in what we call "race to them bottom"
$1000 for .24ozt of gold? Not for me. THKS!
The whole worlds off its rocker, buy Gold™.
BOOMIN!™
The classic silver half dollar commems languished for years and years in spite of low mintages. Because of the much higher price of gold and because of so many other options in coin coinage, it does seem that it will be a very long time before these develop a premium. I've been wrong before, however.
I knew it would happen.
The difference is that the classics is a closed series with fewer coins. The modern gold commemoratives are a much more extensive series and a lot of other modern gold coins have low mintages.
They have crashed before. But yes I do think that there will be a new generation tired of Walker short sets that would take up classic commemoratives. They are more interesting than walkers as much as I like the design. You can also do sets within a set such as a set of Oregon trail or Texas halves. There are also many interesting things such as artists with talent that never designed a circulating coin or the first woman artist of a coin or first African American artist of a coin.
I do think congress should stop authorizing $5 gold commemoratives. It is pretty clear that not many people are buying them. It is also pretty clear that congress generally cut and pastes the commemorative coin format from the 1986 Statue of Liberty program for many programs.
What I would do is limit modern gold coinage as a whole to a more select few classic designs. Think Saint Gaudens, maybe reissue Pan Pac gold, bring back $5 and $2.50 Indian, bring back $20 Liberty or even do a gold 1795-1807 capped bust coin.
For the commemoratives I would have maybe two silver dollars instead of one like how the 2006 Ben Franklin program was done. Instead of a clad half dollar, I would look into doing one or two modern large cent commemoratives in modern programs also. The large cents I envision would have the same diameter as a half dollar but either be pure copper or the pre 82 bronze composition. If we are doing a base metal numismatic coin, might as well revive a historic denomination that has been beloved. We did that for silver dollars.
They won’t stop issuing $5 commems. Our political class uses them to virtue signal and to curry favor with whatever group is most in need of being placated. That said, I have been buying the older ones near spot and assembling a design run as a slightly more interesting bullion play than AGEs.
Nothing is as expensive as free money.
It's always the Uncirculated version of these coins that does not sell well. I only wanted the Uncirculated pieces when they were part of the four and six piece sets that came in wooden boxes. Otherwise I found them vastly inferior with respect to esthetic interest to the Proofs.
Some collectors and hobbyists have been taught that low mintage equals rarity and that's not always the case. I think these coins are a good buy and hold if you can get them at close to melt....
The odds are that the mintages can't drop much from here going forward unless gold prices go way up, as these gold unc commemoratives sell about 1,000 coins in two months, then languish in sales for the rest of the year until they finally go off sale in December. In order to get 1,000 or less, it may have to be a very late release in the year, where something delayed production, and the mint decided they could only sell 1,000 or less before sales stop in late December. That may be what it takes to go a lot lower, but coin dealers would probably sniff that out and crash the mint website to buy them all on day one. This would actually be a good thing for the mint to pull to get some interest in the series, but is unlikely to ever happen.
I was surprised when I read that the lowest mintage PanPac gold had over 1,000 coins melted by the mint after few wanted to pay up for the set that contained the round version. This latest gold unc modern King will also have coins melted by the mint, I am guessing it is around 400 gold unc coins. Many other Harriet Tubman coins will be scrapped, and packaging destroyed. The only unc version that sold out was the one ounce silver.
Right now nobody likes these coins, but they have broken to historical lows that few gold coins have by type in surviving mint state condition. At some point the mint may decide to reassess the commemorative program just like they did with the whole collector portfolio after the 2008 coins cratered in sales. They then scrapped 300 products.
The best alternative if they want to continue this and actually increase sales, is to change the commemoratives into a changing reverse design and use a classic obverse for all issues. For example, the one once silver coins could have the buffalo design on the obverse, with the commemorative design on the reverse only. All issues would then become silver buffalo coins and would sell 1000% more than what they currently sell. The gold 5 dollar coins could have an Indian Head on them on the obverse, and sell 10k or higher per year in unc alone instead of 1,300, and maybe 30k in proof. Suddenly all the coin dealers would want to buy them.
Either way I am happy to own these extremely low mintage modern gold coins, being released and sold at historically low numbers. Yes, chances are that continues, and I will buy any that fall under 1,500 going forward. There is a magical number that is so low it is way too low, and this newest King may have hit that number. It will be difficult to match or beat by any future commemorative gold coin without extra help from either a very bad design, a very bad topic, a late in year release, or very high gold prices (or a combination of these).
I still think the best approach is to buy these five gold and put them away, then buy the future releases that fall under a 1,500 mintage. The numbers will eventually matter, they always do. The Jackie Robinson unc gold coin showed the potential of what a single coin can appreciate to, and that was at 5,000 mintage. Imagine a whole set at under 1,500, what that may become down the road years from now. I am happy owning these, and it doesn't matter to me if sales drop and I get lower mintages, I will be happy with that. This latest king and these other coins have broken under all classic commemoratives by type except for the large PacPacs. These will eventually be rewarded for that by future collectors (all IMHO).
Yet another thread on these coins (modern commemoratives), where I haven't read a reason why anyone will or should want to buy it, other than for the low and falling mintages.
That's the mindset of speculators, not collectors and there is your answer for the declining demand and dead market. A long and growing list of uninteresting themes and mediocre designs with essentially no collector appeal.
What's going to make it more interesting to collectors later (as opposed to speculators) that doesn't apply now?
The mintage is approaching 1000 and may fall below it. I doubt there are more than a few hundred who want it as a collectible with most of this subset probably buying it just to fill a hole to keep their set up to date.
As low premium bullion for someone who wants variety in the gold they own and liquidity, it's competitive.
Otherwise, it's too expensive and not sufficiently interesting versus what the same money can buy in other coinage. There are more interesting coins available for the same price or near it.