Britannia 1 oz or Panda 30 g: which is the better buy today?
Britannia 1 oz holds 31.10 g of fine gold and Panda 30 g 30.00 g — close enough to be the same purchase in metal, and far enough apart in everything else not to be the same coin to own.
| coin | Britannia 1 oz | Panda 30 g |
|---|---|---|
| fine gold | 31.10 g | 30.00 g |
| gross weight | 31.10 g | 30.00 g |
| purity | 999.9 ‰ · 24 kt | 999 ‰ · 24 kt |
| diameter | 32.69 mm | 32 mm |
| thickness | 2.79 mm | 2.00 mm |
| face value | 100 pounds | 500 yuan |
| struck | United Kingdom · since 1987 | China · since 2016 |
The prices come from the feed, and the feed has not answered yet.
Britannia 1 oz — Struck in 999.9 gold since 2013 — earlier ones are 22 carat. Legal tender in the United Kingdom, which is what exempts it from capital gains tax there.
Panda 30 g — Metric rather than imperial — 30 g, not an ounce — and the only one of these whose design changes every year.
Panda 30 g is 999 ‰ · 24 kt, so it weighs 30.00 g for its 30.00 g of gold; Britannia 1 oz is 999.9 ‰ · 24 kt, 31.10 g on the scale. Neither holds more gold for the difference: the alloy is hardness, which is why Panda 30 g can be handled and Britannia 1 oz travels in a capsule.
Both are modern bullion coins, struck for investors — Britannia 1 oz since 1987, Panda 30 g since 2016 — and priced on their metal and the margins above it.
So the comparison is the premium. Whichever of the two a dealer asks less for above its metal is the cheaper gold that day — and that changes shop by shop and day by day, which is what the numbers above are for.