Gold Sales at Australia’s Perth Mint Doubled Last Month

Gold sales at Australia’s Perth Mint doubled in September. Meanwhile, sales of silver surged 78%.

Sales of gold coins and minted bars jumped to 46,415 ounces in September, up from 23,130 ounces a month ago. Silver sales during the month came in at 697,849 ounces, compared with 392,091 ounces in August.

Australia ranks as the second largest gold producer in the world behind China. The Perth Mint refines more than 90% of the country’s gold.

Officials at the mint said investors seized upon the opportunity offered by the drop in the price of gold in late September to buy. The price fell after a hawkish Federal Reserve meeting and hints that the US central bank would raise interest rates again in December. The unveiling of the Trump tax plan also seemed to strengthen the dollar, placing price pressure on gold and silver.

Late last month, “commodities king”  Dennis Gartman said investors should take this opportunity to buy gold, predicting the bull run is not over.

A year from now gold will be demonstrably higher than where it is now.”

Gold sales at the US Mint also increased over August’s totals, but lagged far behind sales at the Perth Mint. September sales of American Gold Eagles increased 21% over August totals, coming in at 11,500 ounces. But that’s still down 88% compared to 2016 sales. Officials at the mint said American Gold Eagle coin sales were at 38,500 ounces in Q3, up 45% from the previous quarter, but 80% lower than a year ago.

Silver coin sales at the US Mint were also sluggish. In September, the mint sold just 320,000 ounces of silver — the lowest monthly level since December 2016 and 81% lower than a year ago.

Peter Schiff talked about lagging precious metals sales in the US during an interview at International Metal Writers Conference last summer. Peter said  many Americans who typically invest in gold have been lulled into a false sense of security with the election of Donald Trump. Peter said that’s a mistake. Despite his intentions, Trump won’t be able to change the course we’re already on.

US stocks have continued to surge higher since the election. Some analysts have called this rise in stock prices the “Trump bump.”  During the campaign, Trump called the stock market a “big, fat, ugly bubble.” Now that he owns the bubble, it’s just a bull market. But as Peter pointed out, it’s the same bubble, only bigger.  Peter went on say that Trump’s election has had the opposite effect on gold, creating a sort of anti-bubble.

You have the opposite of a bubble in gold. Certainly, if you look at the United States, Americans are buying less gold now than they’ve done since the bull market began in 1999 – 2000.  Sales from the US Mint have collapsed. At SchiffGold, we just had our weakest quarter since the company has been in existence. And it’s not just my firm. It’s industry-wide. Americans are not buying gold, even though gold prices year-to-date are up more than the S&P 500. But the people who typically buy gold in America voted for Trump, and they’re no longer worried about the economy. So they’re not buying gold. They’re buying stocks instead, and I think they’re making a big mistake. They should be selling their stocks and buying even more gold.”

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