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Message:: [QUOTE="Sunbird, post: 7857947, member: 116324"]The claims about the Krugerrand being the world's most popular gold bullion coin are wildly false. It's not even close to being true. Production fell rapidly since the 1980s, and the market for them now is minimal. The South African Mint doesn't even release mintage figures anymore, and hasn't since 2010... And even the figures from the 2000s are not trusted by dealers. (See Chard's page on Krugerrand mintages.) Mintage of the American Gold Eagle was often 10 or 15 times the reported Krugerrand mintage up to 2010 when the South African Mint stopped reporting. Contrary to the OP, the Krug has little status internationally, in part because of tax laws around the world. In most jurisdictions that exempt precious metals bullion from consumption taxes like VAT or GST, they specify a required purity, and for gold it's always 99, 995, or 999. Examples include Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, and possibly the UK and EU. Since the Krug is a Crown gold alloy, 91.67% gold and the balance copper, it's fully taxed in all those jurisdictions. It's terrible law design – governments shouldn't be playing favorites or setting arbitrary thresholds for what counts as bullion – but that's the current situation. The Eagle is also taxed in those countries for the same reason, but it's not the same alloy as the Krug as someone claimed. It has silver too, at 3.00%, and so 5.33% copper instead of 8.33%. That's why Eagles are so much prettier than Krugs, with the brighter color closer to pure gold, compared to the Krug's ugly coppery hue. But the Eagle has a huge domestic market, and in some states there are legal advantages that make it more liquid. For example, dealers in Florida can't flip most gold right away. I think they have to wait a week or something, which makes them offer less for gold given the price movement risk of that waiting period. But Eagles are exempt from that. They can flip them immediately, which makes them more valuable. (I think the law is part of an anti-crime package having to do with stolen goods, ID requirements, etc. like the state laws that require ID and reporting when people sell a certain mass of copper to scrapyards, to reduce all the copper theft from homes and construction sites...) Generally, a given country's gold bullion coin tends to have various advantages when transacting in that country, from tax exemptions to subtle preferential treatment like the Florida example. Pure gold is preferred most other places, especially in Asia with their chuk kam standard, which I think is 99.5% pure. I think security features are becoming more important, and the Royal Canadian Mint, and now the (British) Royal Mint, lead the way. They're very innovative, and the Maples have multiple security features plus their Bullion DNA system for dealer verification. The Britannia has a ton of new security features, starting with the 2020 I think. Fine radial lines like the Maples and a lot of other microprinting stuff. I thought the new Type 2 Eagles were supposed to have security features, but I'm not sure what happened there. They don't seem to have done anything – the US Mint is incredibly lazy. I like the Maples most because they're so gorgeous, technically advanced with the security features, significantly cheaper than Eagles, and more liquid internationally since they're tax exempt, being 9999 pure. I wish that Canada wasn't a knee-bender country with that ridiculous old lady on the obverse, but at least they don't have that ugly old Amish guy like the Krugerrand. I also like Britannias and the Aussie Kangaroos. Low premiums, excellent quality. I think the Buffalos are ugly as sin – I'm very surprised that they approved such an ugly design and went and put it into production. Why the ugly Indian? Couldn't they just as easily have chosen a strapping handsome Indian visage? Strange.[/QUOTE]

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