There is a global producer of silver, gold, palladium, and platinum precious metals known as A-Mark Precious Metals Inc. They produce bullion products including bars. In fact, their silver mining, refining, minting, and selling operation consists of 90 million ounces of silver per year. They get the silver directly from refiners, miners, and precious metal dealers that produce the amount of silver bullion needed to serve their clients throughout the world located on six continents. The 10 ounce A-Mark Silver Bar is the bullion product considered their signature piece and produced in-house. Besides that, they produce 1 Oz. Liberty Silver Rounds as well.
The Background & History of A-Mark Company
This company was originally founded all the way back in 1965. Throughout the years, the firm has expanded its reach and entered into the world of precious metals trading and offers a wide variety of products and services. Their products include gold, palladium, platinum, and silver bullion that takes the forms of grain, wafers, coins, and bars. They provide these precious metals for storage in a precious metals IRA or client delivery. Besides offering a wide range of bullion products including silver offerings, they also have many interrelated services to boot. These services include leasing, financing, consignment, hedging, and other financial programs tailored to meet your needs.
A-Mark takes great pride in knowing that they are an official distributor of a wide range of Government Mints that can be found in locations around the globe. Some of their top customers include being an authorized purchaser for the US Mint, the South African Mint, the Perth Mint of Australia, and the Royal Canadian Mint. Even more impressive, they have offices located in Vienna, Austria and Santa Monica, California, so they have a strong presence in Europe and the United States. This gives them the ability to provide sellers and buyers a market for their bullion products, which they offer 17 hours a day on Monday through Friday. As a customer, you can either buy from them or sell to them during these hours, which is convenient since many worldwide commodity centers have closed down although this one remains strong.
Even more impressive, this company has the largest network of dealers selling precious metals throughout North America, which means they are a dominant player in the market for precious metals. This allows them to service clients on every inhabited continent known to man, and if they could sell silver bars on Antarctica I’m sure they would! Their customers include coin dealers, precious metals dealers, investors, investment advisors, manufacturers, refiners, mines, merchants, jewelers, commodity brokers, central banks, collectors, and more. They operate their trading desk from 12 AM to 5 PM using Pacific Standard Time.
A-Mark Silver Bar Design
This company only has a single silver bullion bar product made of one size. It’s a 10 ounce silver bar, and it’s one of the most widely and heavily distributed silver bars available and you can purchase it just about anywhere.
On the front side of the bar you’ll discover bullion related identification elements. First and foremost, you’ll see the A-Mark logo and name. Then in the middle of the bar it says “.999+ Pure Silver,” and that the bottom you’ll see the words, “10 Ounces Troy.”
On the back of the silver bar, you’ll notice the same three things but written repeatedly and diagonally. The phrases you’ll find on the back include:
- .999+ Pure Silver
- 10 oz. Troy
- A-Mark
Each of these phrases is separated by bullet points and repeat five times in the same sequence.
Do you collect silver coins? If so, read this article about the top silver coins for investing.
A-Mark Silver Bar Specifications
The 10 oz. silver bar from A-Mark include the following specifications:
- 311 g in mass
- 10 Troy ounces of silver
- 9 mm x 50.8 mm dimensions
- .999 fine silver content
Every silver bar from A-Mark has a purity level of 99.9% silver, or .999 fineness.
Pricing the A-Mark Silver Bar
Unlike silver coins, silver bars aren’t presented with legal tender amounts dictating their face value. But silver bars do have advantages that you won’t get with certain bullion coins. As an example, none of these bars are ever going to be considered collectibles. Even better, they do not mint nearly as many silver bars as they would a collectible coin. And since there is no collectible market for these coins, you’ll pay a much fairer price a lot closer to the spot price of silver. That makes them incredibly cost-efficient and an excellent way to purchase silver.
The price of silver in the marketplace will determine the value of this asset as an investment or part of your IRA retirement portfolio. As silver prices fall and rise during trading days, so will the value of your silver bars. So the prices will fluctuate daily and you should keep up with it by checking the spot silver price regularly.
Buying A-Mark Silver Bars as an IRA Investment
The IRS sees that precious metals purchases are very valuable as a retirement investment, which is why they include A-Mark Silver Bars in their self-directed precious metals IRA approvals. Why? These bars meet the minimum requirement amounts of .999 silver purity, which is specified in IRS code 408(b).
To open a precious metals IRA account, you’ll need to make a minimum initial deposit of $5000 that you’ll use to purchase qualified silver, gold, platinum, or palladium bullion. All subsequent purchases will take place in $1000 increments.
The A-Mark Silver Bar best feature is that it’s a highly liquid asset. You can buy and sell precious metals bars and coins through dealers all around the world, and there are plenty of interested investors looking to purchase them. The A-Mark bars do not contain serial numbers and they aren’t registered on exchanges like APMEX, COMEX or LBMA.
Are you looking to acquire these silver bars for your self-directed precious metals IRA? You should immediately contact the administrator of your individual retirement account. If you don’t have a self directed IRA, talk to the folks over at Augusta Precious Metals Corp. Tell them about the purchase you want to make and have them make it on your behalf, because it’s their job to handle these transactions for you.