The Legacy of the Gold Krugerrand – It Set the Style and Standard
It could easily be said that no gold coin collection would be complete without a South African Krugerrand. Introduced in 1967 by the South African Mint as a way to market and publicize South African gold, the Krugerrand was the coin that gave all countries the idea to produce their own collectable gold coins. Indeed, it was the success of the gold Krugerrand that made the Canadian, Australian, British, and American mints elect to create their own gold coins.
So what made this coin so special? The gold Krugerrand was a first in many respects. It was the first coin to use exactly one troy ounce of gold, although it’s quality was only 22 karats so the coin itself is comprised of 1.0909 troy ounces of metal – 1 oz. of gold and 0.0909 of copper. The coin was also very unique in its status as legal tender. The vast majority of minted coins today have a face value in addition to the coin’s intrinsic bullion value, however, the Krugerrand did not. It’s legal tender value was the value of the bullion itself. So if one troy ounce is $1000, the coin would have been legally worth $1000.

The scarcity of the Krugerrand also certainly had something to do with its initial popularity. Until 1994, sanctions against South Africa for its apartheid policies made the Krugerrand an illegal import into most Western nations. Hence, the coin had a sort of elusive appeal to it since getting one’s hands on a few of these coins meant instant profits when sold. Considering the gold Krugerrand was only sold by the Mint at at 5% premium, this meant that coins that did show up in the Western world could easily be sold at a handsome profit.
As one can see, the Krugerrand was in a class of its own. It was the catalyst that inspired many governments to launch their own collectable coin minting programs and it was also the first to include the standard one troy ounce of gold. Indeed, the Krugerrand has a tremendous amount of history that makes it a living legend in the gold coin market.
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