One of the world's most famous coins
Since the Krugerrand was first minted in 1967, it has become the world's most widely used and best-known gold coin for investors. In German-speaking countries, the gold coin is called "Krügerrand", slightly modified. The name of the gold coin is a combination of the depicted former President Kruger and the South African currency, the "Rand".
The Krugerrand has a fineness of 916.67 (91.67% gold), which corresponds to 22 carats. This degree of fineness was adopted from the so-called Rand gold coins and the former sovereigns. These were used in payment transactions at the time. However, pure gold would have been unsuitable as a means of payment, as it is not scratch-resistant or abrasion-proof. In order to harden the precious metal, copper was added to the gold as an alloying metal. Incidentally, this is also responsible for the intense reddish color of the Krugerrand. The (non-)precious metal mixture of gold and copper made the Krugerrand harder. This meant that the gold coins could once again be used as a means of payment.
In the center of one side of the coin, a springbok is depicted on a grassy landscape. The year of minting is shown divided on both sides of the gazelle-like animal. The Krugerrand is the only bullion coin to feature this depiction. The words "Krugerrand" appear above the springbok, with the details of the metal type and the fineness stamped below.
The second side of the coin features the portrait of Paul Kruger, a president of the former Boer republic of Transvaal. The Kruger National Park in South Africa is named after this enthusiastic animal lover. The country of minting "South Africa" is written on both sides of the portrait in both Afrikaans and English.
As the Krugerrand is considered official currency under the South African constitution, the face value is based on the London fixing price, which varies daily. For this reason, there is no indication of the face value on the coin.
While the mintage was initially limited to 40,000 coins per year after the first issue, the mintage figures "exploded" in the following years, culminating in a record mintage of more than 6 million coins in 1978. A total of around 60 million coins have been minted to date.
In addition to the original one-ounce coin, the Rand Refinery also launched half, quarter and tenth denominations on the market from 1980.
As a protest against South Africa's apartheid policy, both the USA and the EU banned imports of the Krugerrand in 1986, which led to a massive slump in trade and production of the coins.
When the import ban was finally lifted again in 1999 - after the end of apartheid - the Krugerrand had long since been largely displaced from the market by other bullion coins, such as the American Gold Eagle or the Kangaroo.
The mintage of the Krugerrand has been recovering since 2000, but remains far below previous mintages. Nevertheless, the Krugerrand is still one of the best-known and most common bullion coins today, although 90% of the Krugerrand gold coins traded today are from earlier years. This also explains why the Krugerrand is one of the cheapest bullion coins.
You are welcome to visit one of our branches in Vienna and let our experts give you detailed advice on the Krugerrand, gold investments and other precious metals.
You can also buy the coin right here in our online store. The current price is fixed for you with just one click.
You can find our current Krugerrand prices in euros for buying and selling here:
Preise zuletzt aktualisiert am 01. May 2025, 04:47 Uhr
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