$1 Million Gold Coin
Would you like anchovies with that?
Yesterday the Royal Canadian Mint unveiled a pizza-sized gold bullion coin with a denomination of C$1 Million. The coin is 21 inches in diameter and 1.2 inches thick, and is made of 99.999% pure gold bullion at a weight of 100 kg. Although the denomination is C$1 Million, the coin is worth more than double that due to the current spot price of gold bullion ($686.90 USD). Needless to say, these novelty coins are being produced in extremely small quantities, as I can't imagine the market for them is very big. It sure would be nifty to own one, though.
Once upon a time I was hoarding up silver and gold bullion on a much smaller scale, but I have since turned my attention to the stock market due to the couple of decades between now and my retirement and the stock market's higher potential for gains. Precious metals are just plain cool to own, though, and once in a while I wish I hadn't sold my bullion coins, even if I did turn a pretty nifty profit on them because of the low price of metals when I originally purchased them. Plus my family has always had a bit of a survivalist mentality, so having bullion coins around eases my sense of impending doom about the potential collapse of our civilization (Okay, that sounded a bit overdramatic). I suppose if our whole society were to collapse, though, I would have bigger problems than whether I had any gold coins stashed away like a chipmunk! I do think about adding a gold or silver ETF to my portfolio from time to time, but I always try to overcome the urge for novelty in my portfolio and would rather just stick to my current long-term strategy.
