Australian Silver Coins

Silver Coins from Australia’s Perth Mint

The Perth Mint of Australia is one of the world’s most-respected minting facilities. In particular, its gold and silver coins are renowned among investors and collectors for the purity of the product and the beauty of the designs. Silver bullion investors are familiar with the mint’s many annual-release coin programs, and collectors will find that Perth often issues a variety of limited-run coin programs that deliver the same purity and beauty as their bullion counterparts. Learn more about Australian silver coins from the Perth Mint below!

Annual Issue Australian Silver Bullion

The Perth Mint is among mints such as the United States Mint, Royal Canadian Mint, and Royal Mint of England to offer popular silver bullion coins on an annual basis. While Perth’s coins enjoy similar demand from around the globe as products from its counterparts, none of these other mints can touch the variety and diversity of Perth Mint’s annual-issue silver bullion coins. The following list is a comprehensive look at Perth’s popular silver programs:

• Australian Silver Kookaburra: Introduced in 1990, the Silver Kookaburra is the longest-running silver coin from the Perth Mint and is available annually with a 1 oz silver coin guaranteed each year. The Silver Kookaburra’s reverse depicts the largest member of the kingfisher species in a new relief each year.
• Australian Silver Koala: After more than two decades, Perth Mint expanded its silver bullion with the Silver Koala. The lovable marsupial is associated by people around the globe with Australia, and since 2007 it has featured in new designs each year on the reverse of Silver Koala coins.
• Australian Silver Kangaroo: The Silver Kangaroo is the latest major addition to the bullion coinage. Available in 1 oz silver, it depicts the kangaroo on the reverse in a popular design each year. The Silver Kangaroo’s 2016 debut was significant as it became the first Perth Mint silver bullion offering with .9999 pure silver content.
• Australian Silver Wedge Tailed Eagle: With lower mintage figures, the Australian Silver Wedge Tailed Eagle is below that of the above-mentioned coins, but still stands as an important annual silver release. Available since 2014, former US Mint Chief Engraver John Mercanti creates the designs used on the reverse side of these coins depicting the Wedge Tailed Eagle.
• Australian Silver Emu: In 2018, the Perth Mint introduced another of its native species in the form of the flightless Emu. The second-largest flightless bird in the world behind the Ostrich, Emus are native to Australia and feature on the reverse of these exciting new coins.

Lunar Series Silver Coins

Without question, one of the Perth Mint’s most popular collections of silver for sale over the past three decades has been its Lunar Series collections. Launched in 1996 with the Lunar Series I program, the mint has gone through two full programs and is on a third as of 2020. The Lunar Series I program lasted from 1996 to 2008, the Lunar Series II program from 2008 to 2019, and the Lunar Series III program is planned for 2020 to 2031. Each series is a 12-coin release with distinctive designs for each of the 12 animals from the Chinese Lunar Calendar, or Zodiac. As of the Lunar Series II collection, the mint offers different designs for each animal on the silver and gold coins, with the silver coins often depicting a family unit of the representative animal, while the gold coin depicts just one figure.

The silver collection has seen various weights come and go in the series since 1996. The most common to date remain 1/2 oz, 1 oz, 2 oz, 5 oz, 10 oz, and 1 Kilo silver. A 10 Kilo silver coin is often issued as well, but is a very limited option in terms of overall mintages with any given design.

The true beauty of Lunar Series coins from the Perth Mint isn’t necessarily the diversity of weights or the ever-changing designs, but the number of options available. The coins come in Brilliant Uncirculated options across all the weights mentioned above, with the 1 oz and 10 Kilo coins the only ones typically capped in terms of mintage. Once those mintages sellout, the design is no longer available. The other weights have an unlimited mintage, meaning only that the Perth Mint will strike the coins only until the next release in the series is ready for production. Aside from the Brilliant Uncirculated coins, you will find more limited options that include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Gilded coins – a 24-karat gold layer is applied to the select animal design on the reverse field of the coin.
• Colorized coins – a thin layer of colorized lacquer is applied to the animals featured in the reverse design fields.
• Proof coins – often limited to 1 oz silver, 2 oz silver, 1/4 oz silver, and 1/10 oz silver options, the proof coins are typically offered individually in 1 oz, 1/4 oz, and 1/10 oz silver, with a three-coin release featuring the 2 oz silver coin.

Rectangular Silver Coins

Perth Mint is nothing if not innovative, and the Australian mint isn’t shy when it comes to pushing the envelope on silver bullion coin design. In 2013, it issued some of the first rectangular coins in the world with four-coin sets issued alongside the particular designs in the Lunar Series II collection. Examples include its 2013 Colorized Australian Snake Silver Rectangular 4-Coin Set.

However, there is a more recent option that stands out as more prominent than these limited-issue options. The 2018 1 oz Australian Rectangular Silver Dragon Coin was particularly important because it marked the first-ever issue of a rectangular silver bullion coin. The coins were originally available in protective plastic, tubes of 20, or Monster Boxes of 200 coins. With a limited mintage of 500,000 coins, it marked the entrant of a new option for those buying silver that provided a format never seen before for investment-grade coinage.

Marvel Series Silver Coins

Another recent addition to Perth Mint’s catalog is the Marvel Series of silver coins for sale. A popular addition given the recent surge in Marvel Cinematic films coming from Hollywood, silver investors are getting in on the act as well with Marvel Series silver coins as part of their investment or collecting strategy. The official silver bullion collection launched in 2017 with Spiderman, and continued into 2018 with Thor, Black Panther, and Iron Man. Each of these coins has a limited mintage of 50,000 per design and is issued to coincide with the release of a new feature film from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

About Perth Mint Silver Coins

The Perth Mint issues countless types of silver coins for both investors and collectors. As you shop through the categories of Perth Mint coinage, you’ll find high-relief proof coins, Star Trek proof coins, and countless other options. There are also other series of bullion coins similar to the Lunar Series II collection that have limited issue timeframes and low mintage figures. There’s no end to the variety of silver available to purchase from the Perth Mint.

Founded in 1899, Perth Mint was originally intended to be a piece of the Royal Mint system on the Australian continent. The role of the Perth Mint when it opened was to supplement the coining of British coinage in the colony by expanding the capacity already available from the Sydney Mint and Melbourne Mint.

As Australia moved through the federation process in the 1900s, the Perth Mint would emerge as the last mint standing from the Royal Mint days. By 1965, the Sydney Mint was closed and the Melbourne Mint was on the way out as the new Royal Australian Mint took shape. The official sovereign mint of Australia, the Royal Australian Mint took over the production of coinage and printing of paper money for the nation. The Perth Mint was eventually transferred from British control to that of the government of Western Australia. Today it operates independently of the Royal Australian Mint, but still enjoys legal tender status for its bullion coinage.

Buying Australian Silver Coins from the Perth Mint at JM Bullion

If you have any questions for our team, please don’t hesitate to contact JM Bullion with your inquiries about silver for sale. You can call us at 800-276-6508, chat with us live online, or email us directly.