American Gold Eagle Coins

American Gold Eagle Reverse

American Gold Eagle Obverse

American Gold Eagle Coins are official gold bullion coins of the United States and have been minted since 1986. There're four denominations of American Gold Eagle coins and they are: 1 oz, 1/2 oz, 1/4 oz, and 1/10 oz. The gold composition of all coins is 0.9167 or 22 Karat, which is the crown gold English standard for gold coins. The coins are minted both in brilliant uncirculated finish for investors and in proof finish for gold collectors. The proof versions are mostly produced at the West Point Mint.

The obverse of the American Gold Eagle coins is a slightly modified version of the famous St. Gaudens Double Eagle, a $20 gold coin minted for circulation in the United States until 1933. The design of the original St Gaudens Double Eagle gold coins was considered to be one of the most beautiful among US coins and hence adapted for the US gold bullion coins. The reverse of the coins is designed by Miley Busiek, an American sculptor, and features a male eagle holding an olive branch and landing into a nest with a female eagle and her hatchlings.

You can see specifications of all denominations of American Gold Eagle coins in the table below:

Denomination	Content	Composition	Weight	Diameter	Thickness
$5	1/10 oz	0.9167	3.393 g	16.5 mm	1.19 mm
$10	1/4 oz	0.9167	8.483 g	22.0 mm	1.83 mm
$25	1/2 oz	0.9167	16.965 g	27.0 mm	2.24 mm
$50	1 oz	0.9167	33.930 g	32.7 mm	2.87 mm

An interesting fact about American Gold Eagle coins is that by law, the gold used in the coins must come from the sources in America, making it eventually a true American Gold Eagle. Another fact is that American Gold Eagle coin minted from 1986 to 1991 used Roman numerals for dates as the original St Gaudens Double Eagle coins minted in 1907 and 1908. Later issues were minted using more common Arabic numerals.

As with all bullion coins, American Gold Eagles of smaller denominations are usually not proportionally valued in relation to higher denomination. The premium for smaller denominations can be up to 20% of the gold value, which is extremely high comparing to higher denominations.

You can see individual pages for each denomination of the American Gold Eagle coins here:

You can see some current listings for American Gold Eagle coins below:

2009 Gold American Eagle, $5 (1 10 oz.), NGC MS-70