I've been collecting mostly U.S.coins for many years and just recently I've become interested in many Australian and all of the surrounding Island coins that are minted by the Perth mint, Royal Australian mint and New Zealand mint but alot of the coins I see are either on ebay or a dealers site and the ad almost always says sold out at the mint and then has some crazy price for instance the Masterpieces of art series Da vinci Mona Lisa 3oz silver and gold coin with swarovski crystals or the Tiffany coins.Where these coins at the mint when released or are they directly distributed to dealers. thanks RB
In many of these cases, a major dealer/distributor will contact a government and suggest an issue. Once they have the OK, the distributor has the pieces made; the government will then get part of the revenue (or maybe a fixed amount, dunno). If for example the Perth Mint is the producer of such coins, they may well sell some of the pieces themselves. In other cases there is no way to buy directly from the manufacturer ... Christian
The Pobjoy Mint has struck commemorative and circulating coins for the Isle of Man, Ascension Islands, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bolivia, British Antarctic Territory, British Indian Ocean Territory, British Virgin Islands, Burundi, Cook Islands, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Falkland Islands, Gambia, Gibraltar, Jamaica, Kyrgyzstan, Liberia, Macau, Nigeria, Niue, Peru, Philippines, Pitcairn Islands, St Helena, Senegal, Seychelles, Republic of Sierra Leone, Somaliland, South Georgia & South Sandwich Islands, Spain, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Tokelau, Tonga, Tristan da Cunha, Uzbekistan, Western Samoa and Vanuatu. From "About Us" pobjoy.com Hope this helps.
