As one of the world’s preeminent minting facilities, the Royal Canadian Mint’s sales figures are watched closely for signs of strength and weakness in the global precious metals marketplace. Its signature Canadian Gold Maple Leaf and Canadian Silver Maple Leaf coins are perennial best sellers in the global market. Second-quarter figures for 2016 are now available from the Royal Canadian Mint, so let’s have a look!
General Recap
The Royal Canadian Mint releases quarterly and annual reports, but you can still see in these reports a monthly breakdown of performance in each quarter. Both gold and silver experienced steady growth compared to the same time period, Q2, in 2015. Silver was down from Q1 of this year, but that was a record sales quarter for the mint, while gold was up year-over-year for the quarter, quarter-over-quarter for 2016, and year-over-year for the first-half period.
Gold and Silver Bullion Sales
Royal Canadian Mint silver bullion sales rose in the second quarter of 2016 by 24% compared to Q2 2015, jumping from 6.8 million Troy ounces last year to 8.4 million ounces for the same period in 2016.
For the first half of 2016, the Royal Canadian Mint has sold 19 million ounces of silver, a 21% increase of the first half of 2015 when it moved 15.7 million ounces of silver. While the news is mostly good, second quarter activity is down from the mint’s record quarterly sales figure of 10.6 million ounces of silver in the first quarter of 2016.
On the gold bullion sales front, things are heating up. The second quarter of 2016 saw gold bullion sales rise 53% compared to Q2 2015. Sales of gold bullion in Q2 2015 were 163,800 ounces, while Q2 2016 had sales of 251,400 ounces of gold bullion. The story was the same for the first half of 2016 compared to the same time period in 2015. The Royal Canadian Mint sold 342,900 ounces of gold in 2015, and 464,000 in 2016’s first half. That’s an increase of 35.3%.
Unlike silver, which had a record first quarter of 2016, gold bullion sales in Q2 2016 were up from Q1 2016, which had sales of 212,600 ounces.
Long-Term Views
The Royal Canadian Mint experienced record sales for its Canadian Silver Maple Leaf coins and bullion silver bars in 2015, moving 34.3 million ounces of silver bullion between the two formats. That marked an increase of 5.2 million ounces (18%) over 2014, which had then been the record for the Royal Canadian Mint. With 19 million ounces sold to date in 2016, the Royal Canadian Mint could be in for another record-breaking year in silver sales.
With gold, the Royal Canadian Mint has experienced more steady riches in terms of sales. Dating back to 2008, the RCM has averaged 1 million ounces of gold bullion sold annually. Sales for the Canadian Gold Maple Leaf coin and gold bullion bars in 2015 totaled just under 1 million, at 953,000 ounces. While that was a 34% increase from 2014’s gold bullion sales, it marked the second straight year of sub-1 million sales for gold. However, the 481,200 ounces of gold moved to date in 2016 puts the mint on track to once again push towards its average of 1 million ounces for 2016.
