Panda 30 g or Kangaroo 1 oz: which is the better buy today?
Panda 30 g holds 30.00 g of fine gold and Kangaroo 1 oz 31.10 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 | Panda 30 g | Kangaroo 1 oz |
|---|---|---|
| fine gold | 30.00 g | 31.10 g |
| gross weight | 30.00 g | 31.10 g |
| purity | 999 ‰ · 24 kt | 999.9 ‰ · 24 kt |
| diameter | 32 mm | 32.1 mm |
| thickness | 2.00 mm | 2.60 mm |
| face value | 500 yuan | 100 dollars |
| struck | China · since 2016 | Australia · since 1986 |
The prices come from the feed, and the feed has not answered yet.
Panda 30 g — Metric rather than imperial — 30 g, not an ounce — and the only one of these whose design changes every year.
Kangaroo 1 oz — Perth’s one-ounce coin, struck in pure gold since 1986 and redesigned every year — the reverse is a different kangaroo each time.
Panda 30 g is 999 ‰ · 24 kt, so it weighs 30.00 g for its 30.00 g of gold; Kangaroo 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 Kangaroo 1 oz travels in a capsule.
Both are modern bullion coins, struck for investors — Panda 30 g since 2016, Kangaroo 1 oz since 1986 — 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.