British 2018 Silver Bullion Coins

The Royal Mint is an old mint with a long history.  It is not quite as old as the Monnaie de Paris, but it is almost as old, with over a millennium of making quality coins.

Many mints, such as the United States Mint and the Royal Canadian Mint, do not sell bullion coins from their website.  The Royal Mint has a website devoted to bullion coins.  It is a well-organized site, and one can make purchases directly from the mint.

In 2018 the Royal Mint produced two different silver Britannia coins.  One is the Britannia coin we normally would expect.  The other is similar, except it has an Oriental border.  The coin with the Oriental border celebrates the long-standing trade between the Britain and Asia.  It will be interesting to see of this was a one-year coin, or an annual variation to the Britannia.

2018 is the Year of the dog, the eleventh year in the twelve year Oriental Lunar calendar.  The Royal Mint has not been minting lunar coins for twelve years, but has for the last several years.  In 2018 the one-ounce silver dog is the Royal Mint’s addition to its silver Lunar series.

The Two Dracon coin features the Chinese dragon on the top, and the welch Dragon on the bottom, separated into two halves of the coin indicating the Yin-Yang symbol.  The dragons appear to be chasing each other.

2018 was the second year of the Landmark series.  In 2018 the second and third coins were released.  These are the Tower Bridge and Trafalgar Square.  These follow the lone 2017 coin representing Big Ben.

The Queen’s Beasts coins are a ten-coin series of coins representing houses important to the Queen’s claim to the throne.  These coins come out two per year.  What is different here is the two-ounce coins and the ten-ounce coins are not matched.  In 2018 the two-ounce coins were the Unicorn of Scotland and the Black Bull of Clarence.  The ten-ounce coins were the Red Dragon of Wales and the Griffin.  The ten-ounce Unicorn of Scotland is now coming out bearing the year 2019.

What was once limited to the silver Britannia, then the Britannia and Lunar series, has grown.  In 2016 we had the first of the Queen’s Beasts.  In 2017 came the first coin in the Landmark series.  In 2018 we find the Two Dragons silver bullion coin, along with a distinct variety of the Britannia.  It will be interesting to see that the Royal Mint adds, if anything, to its silver bullion in 2018.

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