On Oct. 26 Australia’s Perth Mint unveiled the world’s largest ever gold coin: a legal-tender $1 million face value 1,000 kilo (1 metric ton) mega-monster.
It contains a ton of cast .9999 fine gold and measures some 800 millimeters across (31.5 inches) and 120mm deep. With the current spot price of gold the new coin has an intrinsic value of some $55.5 million. This allows Australia to put its hand up for having produced the biggest, heaviest and inherently most valuable gold coin in the world.
Pulled directly from 2012 U.S. Coin Digest, the most complete and detailed color guide to U.S. coins!
Perth’s million dollar baby is 10 times heavier than the Royal Canadian Mint’s $1 million Maple Leaf unveiled on May 3, 2007. That piece is 500mm across and 30mm thick and contains “just” 100 kilograms (tenth of a ton) of .99999 fine gold. The RCM was pleasantly surprised to subsequently sell five of these beauties for some C$3.5 million a pop.
In launching the Perth monster, the Mint’s CEO, Ed Harbuz, wryly observed, “To cast and handcraft a coin of this size and weight was an incredible challenge, one which few other mints would even consider.” That is putting it mildly. It took the Mint’s team of artists and technical staff months to create the coin from scratch. What was arguably the largest single casting of .9999 fine gold ever undertaken took place in Perth’s refinery. The hand finishing was undertaken in the mint proper and kept the staff occupied for many months.
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Details of the stages involved in making the coin can be viewed either online at 1tonnegoldcoin.com, or at youtube.com/user/perthmintbullion.
The coin’s reverse features Dr. Stuart Devlin’s bounding Red Kangaroo that has decorated Perth’s annual $3,000 1 kilo bullion issues for more than 20 years. The inscription reads AUSTRALIAN KANGAROO 1 TONNE 9999 GOLD, along with the 2012 date.
The obverse shows the classic Ian Rank-Broadley effigy of Queen Elizabethh II and the legend ELIZABETH II, AUSTRALIA, plus that all-important 1 MILLION DOLLARS denomination. As a legal-tender coin, it is part of Perth’s 2012 bullion series.
Wonder if you can buy one slabbed?
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