Why I am boycotting new issues from the Mint.

I have many issues with the mint today but my biggest one is who are they catering to these days. Obviously, the average collector has taken a back seat to the "for profit" side. If the mint was truly on the side of the collector they wouldn't set production limits but cater to the demand for a product. I wonder how many of these special Morgans would be produced if it was based strictly on demand.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Apparently, some people are glued to the mint website daily in the hopes of getting the Morgan O/CC scraps. It's sort of sad/pathetic that it has come to this to get what you want from the mint.

 

The mint, I know him, I put him in a dark attic and in about two life times from now I'll check to see how he tones. I'll see how he likes being ignored.

 

There should be even though there wouldn't be. You're talking about less than 10 (I think it's actually less than 5) entities that qualify all of which have spent millions with the mint. Bartenders pay better attention to regulars/known good tippers, frequent flyers get added perks, if you get a luxury box at a spots game you're going to get treated better than the person in the nose bleeds etc etc etc. That's just how life works and every business on the planet will have some perks or some form of better service for elite customers

That's not really whats happening for the bullion markups. For the ASEs for example the mint sells those for spot +1, the authorized distributors then have to distribute them out and their ability to profit from it is limited. If they were to strong arm the supply chain they'd lose their status as a distributor.

The markups you're seeing are for a variety of reasons, the first is the bullion will always have markups as the mint itself sells over spot. Then you have the extra online markups to cover the fees of where they're sold, payment processing fees, and if there's free shipping offered thats never actually free.

And if you really want it at it's most simple level, if the market is willing to buy for x then theres no reason to lower the price to y

 

The Mint’s mode of operation when it comes to sales started many years ago with the concept of public private partnerships where they sold ASEs exclusively to big dealers who in turn sold them to the general public. While this was arguably a good move before the advent of computer assisted sales, this has become a boondoggle where favored big name customers receive near guaranteed profit at the expense of the little guy. Time to give the big guys the heave hoe and bring fairness back in to the equation where all customers are treated with respect. Otherwise they can kiss ....

 

No they do that with the bullion to protect themselves from moving spot prices. They have to put in HUGE orders and are not allowed to return or cancel anything. They get the order they make it and ship and are done with it immediately.

Bullion will never be sold direct to public that would be a financial disaster for them

 

Whatever deals the Mint makes with the big guys (ASEs for example) they can make with the general public. If they insist on having low mintage product then they should be fair when it comes to distribution. Have a lottery for crips sake!

 

Just CANCEL the Mint. It no longer serves the Public and is just another corrupt public agency manufacturing trinkets to friends for a lower cost than they could make it themselves and gives it legitimacy and prestige it no longer deserves.

 

Nothing will happen until people stop buying from the flippers and let them get stuck with them. Like scalpers at a ball game.

 

I wish I could stop, but I never started. I'm still upset that a Government Agency is promoting this insider manufacturing and trading CRAP. It makes me, a taxpayer, an unwilling accomplice to criminal behavior.

 

No they can't at all. Theres exactly 13 that can buy bullion from the US and only 10 are in the USA one of which can only buy silver and one in Japan can only buy platinum. Out of the many criteria to qualify you have to have a net worth of over 10 million dollars for the last three years.

For the ASE the MINIMUM order size is 25,000 yes 25 thousand OUNCES and any increase over that is in 500 ounce increments. Orders are final, no cancellations, no returns

The big guys hedge their bullion with metals contracts and making up for loses on spot with the graded 70s etc, the mint doesn't get to do that. There is no chance the mint will sell bullion direct to the public nor should they it would be a financial disaster for a programs that has almost no margins and operates on sheer volume.

They are. Everyone has the same chance to get it when it's released

 

Edit also I was wrong about the premiums earlier. The US Mint charges the distributors spot +2 for ASEs

 

I was on the mint sight 12:00 and tried to get 1 each. I kept getting the runaround. Finely I was able to get my order,but they removed the coins from my bag and said out of stock. It seems like that only the big boys can get them.

 

The flipper can ASK any price he wants. An asked price doesn't mean anything unless someone agrees to it. If no one does, the ask price will come down.

It is, and you can buy gasoline for about $2.12 a gallon. It will be deliverable in September and you have to buy it in 42,000 gallon lots. It's called a futures contract. That's why there are middlemen. Where is the average consumer going to put 42,000 gallons of gasoline?

I'm not so sure about just covering their costs on these, and the Unc Commemorative dollars would be a better comparison. Same condition, similar mintage limit, same size and composition. The Morgans were $85, the commemorative dollar is $74 and that includes a $10 surchage that the Morgan doesn't have. Without that surcharge the commemorative would be $64.

I'm not sure but I thought the charge was now spot +$2.50

And I am sure there were a lot of dealers who had dozens of people also trying to get through and buy them as well who were also having the same problem as you. In the end some were successful and some failed. Every time a hot item come up for sale the same thing happens because the website can't handle the load, and itwon't change because it doesn't make economic sense to spend the big money to upgrade the site so it could handle it and then have all that expensive capacity sit idle 99%+ of the time.

And if they DID upgrade the system people would STILL be unhappy because if it could handled everyone who called in on their first call it probably would have sold out in under 30 seconds. On sale at 12:00:00 and you get there at 12:00:30 only to find they are sold out. They handled everyone with no crashing. Do you feel good now?

 

Only way to win is not to play the game.

 

I'll second that!

 

It certainly could be higher now. I went off their site for it which said +2 with the disclaimer of prices subject to change

 

And, I became a winner.

 

I can just break out a few AU rolls of Morgan and Peace dollars to look at if I need a fix. $16 each doesn't hurt either!

 

I'll take 10 at that price. Oh? I can't get them? I can get two for the price from the sweetheart insider network that gets ten for what I pay for two?

CRIMINAL!