The Perth Mint website states, "To celebrate Diwali, the annual ‘festival of lights’, this (Gold) coin features a representation of a dancing Ganesha. Diwali is celebrated by millions of Hindus, Sikhs, Jains and some Buddhists around the world. At the heart of the jubilant five-day festivities is the triumph of light over darkness and knowledge over ignorance."
The silver coin has a similar description and the mint has also released a Ganesha stamp which can be used as a coin cover.
The Perth Mint’s Group Manager, Minted Products, Neil Vance, told SBS Hindi,
"Coins come in one-ounce silver or one-gram gold and feature Ganesha as the image on the coin. It's actually the second year we have done this, we did Laxmi last year and this year we wanted to change it up so we put Ganesha on the coin."
Neil Vance also told SBS Hindi the reasons behind launching the 'Diwali' edition.
"The first reason is that we have actually done a Chinese Lunar Calendar series going back to 1995 which has proven very successful for us. Here at the mint we actually have a shopping exhibition and we get about 70,000 people through the year and every October around Diwali we get an enormous number of Indians coming in and buying gold for Diwali and basically we thought, we should try and tap into that Indian market."
India is one of the biggest consumers of gold and also has the biggest private holding of gold in the world. Mr Vance says that was a factor.
The Perth Mint 'Diwali' edition 2018 Gold coin Source: The Perth Mint
"We know from our business that we sell a lot of gold in bar format into India. It’s the largest consumer of gold, particularly in the jewellery format. We know that Indians love to give gold as gifts. So that was certainly one of the reasons we wanted to pursue this project."
Over 90% of gold refined at The Perth Mint is Australian gold.
"Certainly all the gold coming through to Perth Mint is mainly from Australia, we do take some from South East Asia and from mines in Papua New Guinea and New Zealand," says Mr Vance.
"They have an intrinsic part of the coin as in silver and gold but we don’t recommend them for investment so to speak because they are priced as collector coins," he says.
"You have two grades of coins I guess, bullion and collector, and this would be more in the collector area."
