Are all silver and gold bullion coins, government coins?
Would people trust a bullion coin made by a private company individual?
Why wouldn’t privately minted coins be trusted? There have been many private mints throughout history.
Edit: Also, here is a talk given by George Selgin at the Austrian Scholars Conference 2009 on The Private Supply of Money:
Yes, all silver/gold coins are government “coins” in the technical sense. IIRC, only governments have the legal right to use the word coin.
There are some private companies produce silver. Some companies, call them medallions, rounds, tokens, coupons, as they cannot be legally called a coin.
Here is one example of one silver standard:
So, any “coin” is always produced by a government?
Are they banned from calling them gold and silver coins here in the USA? Or are they bannded in Europe, South America and Australia as well?
“So, any “coin” is always produced by a government?”
I believe so; or else, they are commissioned by the government and minted with government approval. From looking at the site where my wife and I have been buying gold and silver, I noted that “coins” seem to be minted with government approval regardless of the country of origin while anything not approved is called a “round”–as ViennaSausage mentioned above.
PS: ViennaSausage, I replied to your question, albeit belatedly.
Really? Because the Mises Institute calls its Mises Silver Coin a coin: http://store.mises.org/Mises-Silver-Coin-P624.aspx
On Topic: As far as I know, the main reason why people often prefer government coins to private ones is that reproducing them without authorization by a government (if they have a face value) is considered a crime and therefore government coins have better protection against replicas.
Private minters can guarantee a coin at least as well as a government mint. Abraded bits of metal would not be accepted as coin. People would use the coins of those minters with the best reputation for good quality of product. We have seen that this is precisely how the “dollar” became prominent—as a competitive silver coin.Opponents of private coinage charge that fraud would run rampant. Yet, these same opponents would trust government to provide the coinage. But if government is to be trusted at all, then surely, with private coinage, government could at least be trusted to prevent or punish fraud.
What has government done to our money? Murray Rothbard
“Really? Because the Mises Institute calls its Mises Silver Coin a coin: http://store.mises.org/Mises-Silver-Coin-P624.aspx”
maybe they’re able to call it a coin because they are charging about 10 dollars more than any other .99 bullion silver coin…
hehe…sorry…just being a smartass…