cphine

Hi.
I'm really trying to figure out the math used by people who sell silver eagles on eBay and actually turn
a profit.
I'm guessing that there must be a sort of "wholesale cost" that dealers get from the mint when these
things are originally purchased.
For example, having scoured the web for hours upon hours, the best deal I can find right now for a box
of 500 2009 Silver Eagles is $9070.
The seller charges a 1% premium, bringing the total to $9160.70.
Shipping, insurance, etc is $30 bringing the final, in hand total to $9190.7.
Divide that by 25, the number of rolls, and the per roll price is $367.63.
Looking on eBay, the average sale price for a roll is $410. At first, that sounds awesome. But..
The eBay fees on a $410 sale are:
Insertion fee: $.15
Final value fee: $15.67
Paypal charge: $12.19
Total charges: $28.01
Most of the ones that do actually go for $410 or above also offer free shipping, which would be $5 via
USPS priority flat rate box.
That brings the total charges to $33.01.
Subtract this from the $410 we are paid, and we arrive at $376.99 from the sale.
Since it cost $367.63 to have it in hand, we are looking at a profit of $9.36 per roll, or $234 per box.
That's a meager 2 and change percent return on investment with an awful lot of risk involved.
What sort of prices must the original dealers be getting in order to turn a real profit?
Is this the typical margin dealt with by them?
If so, ouch!
Guess I'll just keep buying long term and play some price fluctuations for some profit, but avoid the
short term buy and sell. I just don't see how they make enough money to warrent the risk!
Thoughts?
~Christian

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To err is human, to ARRR! is pirate.