Silver 5-ounce coins coming alive?

Is the current price of silver the sweet spot for buyers of 2013 5-ounce America the Beautiful silver bullion coins?

It just might be.

While investors with their memories of near $50 an ounce in April 2011 might be disappointed in the present price of silver, coin buyers might just be finding the price point for these bullion coins to their liking.

With prices fluctuating at somewhere around $150, they no longer seem unreasonably high.

Hefting one of these coins in your hand induces that “gotta have it” response. At least it did when I held one.

These coins are big. These coins are beautiful.

They are the logical extension of the trend that has occurred over the last generation where collectors have been increasingly drawn to large silver coins rather than the ones smaller than a silver dollar.

The jury is still out as to whether the 5-ounce ATB coins will find a permanent niche as bullion coins, but there is no question that the huge fall from the 2011 mintage totals of 126,700 for the Gettysburg and Glacier pieces to the 20,000 for last year’s Hawaii and Denali coins might just be as far as that downtrend will go.

Last week’s figures published on the “Mint Statistics” page of Numismatic News showed the White Mountain bullion coin at 35,000, Perry at 25,000, Great Basin at 25,000 and Fort McHenry at 25,000, the last number doubled in just a week.

It could be end-of-the quarter inventory adjustments, or perhaps we are beginning a new chapter in the lives of these large silver coins.

Buzz blogger Dave Harper is winner of the 2013 Numismatic Literary Guild Award for Best Blog and is editor of the weekly newspaper "Numismatic News."