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The Real Value of 2012 Olympic Gold Medals
Are gold medals really gold?
Olympic gold medals do contain some gold, but probably not as much as you think. The International Olympic Committee states that each of the Olympic gold medals should contain at least 6g of gold. We are struggling to find the technical specifications of this year’s medals from a reputable official source.
How much gold do they contain?
An article in The Daily Telegraph on Friday 3rd August 2012 stated that the gold medals weigh 412g and we have confirmed this on The Royal Mint’s website. However it then went on to state that the gold content* was 1.34%. We calculate 1.34% of 412g to be 5.5208g / 0.1775 troy ounces) so either the medals do not meet the IOC’s specifications or the journalist is wrong. Neither would surprise us.
How much are the gold medals worth?
Based on the live gold price on the afternoon of Friday 27th July (£1026.874**) the intrinsic gold had a value of £182.27 but don’t forget these medals also contain 92.5% silver*. The fix for silver on the opening day of the Olympics was £17.6119** so the silver* (381.1g / 12.25 troy ounces) was worth £215.75.
Ignoring the remaining 6.16% copper* this makes the precious metal value of the 2012 London Olympics gold medal £398.02 at the start of the Olympics. Obviously these values will now have changed and will continue to do so forevermore.
Unfortunately we do not know when the World Gold Council calculated their price of £454 for The Daily Telegraph so we do not know how accurate this is. Journalists tend to omit the price of precious metals at the time of going to press – perhaps so no-one can ever prove them to be right or wrong.
Worth their weight in gold?
We should imagine that to the winning Olympians these medals are worth much more than the intrinsic value, but we have to agree with the Royal Mint – the more that stay in Great Britain the happier we will be.
* We assume the metal content of the medals is based on the core weight, ignoring the gold plating. We could be wrong, but until someone tells us otherwise we don’t know any better.
** Gold and silver fixings taken from the LBMA’s website.
How does a person view what diamonds and silver/gold coins for sale?
We have several different websites for our products. If you view the homepage you will see links to http://www.taxfreegold.co.uk where we display all of our gold products and then http://www.24carat.co.uk shows our diamonds and silver products.
IN GOLD MEDAL PERCENTAGE OF GOLD IS SO LESS …………..
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I am not sure what you mean. The percentage of gold in a gold medal is 1.34%
The gold content of the 2012 gold medals is actually over 14%
According to the Royal Mint and the International Olympic Committee it’s only 1.34% gold. See their blog post here: http://blog.royalmint.com/
I toured the Royal Canadian Mint in Ottawa Canada in September 2012; they showcase a copy of the medals they minted for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics. We were told by the guide that the gold medals are sterling silver medals plated with 6 grams of gold.
Olympic Gold medals are made from Sterling Silver ie 92.5% Silver. The remaining 7.5% alloy is normally copper. The gold plating accounts for the added 6 + grams of pure gold to the outside surface = about one fifth of a Troy ounce = about £220 Sterling at present gold price.
Hi Patrick, thank you for your comments. Please could you quote your source, then we can perhaps update the blog.
Gold coins were one of the oldest forms of money. This was later followed by silver coins. Gold coins were in circulation in the United States from 1838 to 1933. The design was the Liberty Head bust but this was only made until 1907. The design was then changed to the Indian Head and Saint Gaudens motifs and was used until 1933 when the Great Depression began. This prompted the recall of gold coins which makes them very difficult to find today..^
With kind regards
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