Gold and Foreign Retail buying

 

In the US physical gold buying centers around the US gold eagle 1 ounce coin, and the $20 gold liberty and St Gaudens.  There are bulk sellers selling these coin about 5 percent over spot.  This is as low as the premium ever gets.  Often it gets up towards 20 percent.  This shows the US public is just not buying gold yet.

We know the Central Banks are buying gold hand over fist, and anecdotally it seems the super wealthy are buying gold and storing it in secure Swiss facilities.  But what about the buying public outside the US?

There are persuasive clues that this market it much stronger.  We can see this in France, England, Mexio, Peru, Germany, Austria to name a few places where there is more of a history of the retail public protecting themselves with gold.

Where do we see this -  in France:

Here is an 1881 MS 62 gold 100 francs, about the same weight and time period as a US St. Gaudens or Liberty in a common grade, and a common year.  it sold very recently fort $3600 - thats' about a 60 per cent premium over spot.  Much higher graded coins bring much higher premiums.

In England:  

A common mintage gold 5 pound piece from 1993 graded MS 69 sold for $2760 that's a 22 percent markup over spot (when adjusted for the 1.1 ounce weight.)  Coins of much rare mintages in MS 70 bring much higher premiums

In Peru 

A 1963 MS 65 100 soles sold for $4300 - that's a 66 percent markup adjusted for weight.  Coins in much higher grades from rarer years sell for up to 600 percent of bullion.

In Mexco: 

a 1945 (the most common yearr) 50 gold pesos in MS 65 sold for $3600 thats's a 45 percent markup.  Rarer years bring much higher premiums.

5 years ago all of these coins sold at or near bullion.

These are a few examples of things that are going on all over the world.  It's only here in the US where the retail public can not see that times are unusually perilous both economically and politically.

YOLO - you only live once - has seized the US consciousness - a product at least in part of an intense addiction to Social Media - which destroys the attention span necessary for analysis.

My only point here is that it is inevitable that even the Tik Tok addicted US public will eventually join the rest of the world.

And that is when you will see the real rise in gold in US dollar terms.