Australian Silver Kangaroo 1 oz

Specifications

Weight

1 oz

Purity

.9999

Mint

Perth Mint

Country

Australia

First struck

1993

About the Australian Silver Kangaroo

The Australian Silver Kangaroo is the Perth Mint's flagship .9999-fine silver bullion coin. Each coin holds one troy ounce of pure silver, carries a face value of one Australian dollar, and is legal tender under the Currency Act 1965. The reverse rotates the kangaroo design every year, which is part of the appeal for buyers who like a slightly collectible angle on an otherwise pure bullion piece.

Do not confuse this coin with two of the Perth Mint's other silver lines. The Silver Kookaburra has been struck since 1990 and is sold in multiple sizes including the chunky one kilo. The Silver Lunar series rotates through the Chinese zodiac. The Silver Kangaroo is the simplest, lowest-premium product in the Perth Mint stable, closer in spirit to the Royal Canadian Mint's Maple Leaf than to the mint's premium numismatic releases.

Quality control is what you are paying the modest premium for. The Perth Mint is government owned, wholly held by the Government of Western Australia, and operates under LBMA Good Delivery accreditation for its larger bars. Each Kangaroo is struck to bullion finish, sealed in mint tubes of 25, and packed in monster boxes of 250. The .9999 purity puts it half a fineness step above the American Silver Eagle's .999 standard.

For stackers, the Kangaroo competes directly with the Canadian Maple Leaf and Britannia. All three are .9999 fine, all three are produced by sovereign government mints, and all three trade at similar premiums in the US market. The pick between them usually comes down to which design you want in your tube and which dealer happens to have the best price on a given week. The Kangaroo's annually rotating reverse gives it a small edge if you like variety in the stack.

The coin's tax treatment outside the US is worth noting if you ship internationally. In Australia it is GST exempt as investment-grade bullion. In the UK and EU, silver bullion does carry VAT, so most US buyers will simply order from US-based dealers and avoid the cross-border tax question entirely.

Liquidity in the US secondary market is good but not excellent. You will find buybacks at most major dealers, though spreads are typically a hair wider than they are on Eagles or Maples. If your priority is the absolute thinnest buy-sell spread you may prefer one of those two. If your priority is the lowest premium on .9999-fine silver from a sovereign mint, the Kangaroo is hard to beat.

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