1 oz Dove of Peace Gold Round

The Only Bullion Series Struck in Israel

The 1 oz Dove of Peace gold round contains one troy ounce of .9999 fine gold from the Holy Land Mint, the international brand of Israel Coins and Medals Corp. Its core distinction is provenance: the Dove of Peace is the only bullion series produced in Israel, and its imagery, a dove carrying an olive branch over the walls of Jerusalem's Old City, gives it a cultural and religious resonance that nothing else in mainstream bullion offers. The dove-and-olive-branch motif references the biblical story of Noah in Genesis 8:11, and the design has remained consistent since the series launched.

Buyers should be clear about what this is. The Dove of Peace is a private mint bullion round, not a legal tender coin: it carries no face value and is not issued by a central bank. As a category, gold rounds typically price between bars and sovereign coins, with the lower cost coming from the absence of a legal tender markup and sovereign mint branding. The trade-off is recognition: rounds lack the universal dealer familiarity of an Eagle or Maple Leaf, and the Holy Land Mint's dealer network is narrower than Swiss or North American producers, with distribution mainly through US dealers and directly from the mint.

The product compensates with serious packaging. Each piece ships in tamper-proof sealed protective packaging with security film, a unique serial number on the assay card, and Certieye optical authentication technology. For buyers who want gold with a connection to the Holy Land, or simply a distinctive design at a non-sovereign price, this round occupies a niche of one.

1 oz Dove of Peace Gold Round Specifications

The obverse shows the dove in flight with an olive branch in its beak, soaring over an outline of the Old City walls of Jerusalem with famous buildings within, including the silhouette of the Dome of the Rock. The reverse carries Holy Land Mint branding with the weight and purity specifications. No individual designer is publicly credited. The date changes annually, with occasional anniversary privy marks such as the 10th anniversary mark in 2024.

The 1 oz round anchors a wider .9999 gold range that includes 1/10 oz and 1/25 oz rounds plus bars from 1 g to 1 oz, alongside .999 silver rounds and bars. These are not LBMA Good Delivery products, which applies only to large wholesale bars from accredited refiners; the retail pieces carry the mint's own assay certification instead, which is why keeping the sealed packaging intact matters for resale. The .9999 purity exceeds the IRS minimum of .9995 for gold held in precious metals IRAs.

Dove of Peace Gold Round Tax Treatment

As a .9999 fine gold round with no legal tender status, the piece is taxed as investment gold on purchase nearly everywhere, with the usual round-versus-coin gaps appearing on disposal and retirement accounts.

• United States: the primary export market. The round is IRA-eligible, since its .9999 purity exceeds the .9995 IRS minimum for gold, giving tax-deferred gains within a custodian-held IRA. Outside an IRA, gains are taxed as collectibles at up to 28% federally. Most states exempt bullion from sales tax.
• United Kingdom: VAT-exempt as investment gold at 995+ fineness. Not UK legal tender, so subject to CGT on gains, unlike a Britannia or Sovereign.
• EU: gold at 995+ fineness is VAT-exempt under Directive 98/80/EC.
• Canada: gold at 99.5%+ purity is GST/HST exempt. However, as a private round without government issue or face value, it does not meet the standard requirements for RRSP eligibility, which calls for coins issued by a government mint; Canadian retirement-account buyers need sovereign coins instead.
• Australia: gold at 99.5%+ purity in investment form is GST-free.
• New Zealand: gold at 99.5%+ purity is GST-exempt, with no formal capital gains tax.
• Singapore and Hong Kong: no capital gains tax in either; Hong Kong has no sales tax at all, and qualifying investment gold is GST-exempt in Singapore.
• Israel: the home market, where the products carry national significance and sell directly through the mint.

From Ben-Gurion's Mandate to Investment Bullion

Israel Coins and Medals Corp. was established in 1958 by Israel's first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, with a mandate to commemorate Israeli national events through coins and medals, not to produce bullion. The company remained fully government-owned for half a century until its privatisation in 2008, when it was acquired by the G.R.A.S. Group. Despite the Mint branding, ICMC is not Israel's monetary authority; circulating currency is the business of the Bank of Israel, while ICMC produces medals, art bars, and bullion.

The pivot to investment bullion came in 2014, when the company launched its international Holy Land Mint brand alongside the first Dove of Peace bullion in silver. The move was a commercial diversification far from the original commemorative mandate, but it gave the series its distinctive identity: Jerusalem iconography on investment-grade metal. Gold rounds and bars joined the line in 2019, extending the dove design to .9999 fine 24k gold.

The series has marked its milestones along the way. The 2023 release coincided with the 75th anniversary of Israel's founding and a period of heightened geopolitical attention on the country, which potentially boosted collector interest. In 2024 the series celebrated its own 10th anniversary with a special privy-mark gold round. Through all of it the core design has stayed the same dove, olive branch, and Old City skyline that launched in 2014, with only the year-date changing, a consistency more typical of sovereign bullion programmes than private mint products.

Dove of Peace vs Sovereign Coins and Swiss Bars

Against government coins such as the 1 oz Gold Britannia, Maple Leaf, or American Gold Eagle, the Dove of Peace gives up legal tender status, face value, and the near-universal dealer recognition that lets sovereign coins trade with the tightest spreads. What it offers in exchange is the general round advantage, typically lower premiums than sovereign coins, plus a design no government mint produces. For UK buyers the gap is wider still: the Britannia is CGT-exempt as UK legal tender, while gains on the Dove of Peace are taxable.

The closer structural comparison is with privately minted, assay-carded products from PAMP Suisse and Valcambi. The concept is the same, a private producer guaranteeing weight and purity through sealed serialised packaging, but the Swiss refiners have far broader dealer recognition and tighter bid-ask spreads, backed by LBMA accreditation on their wholesale output. The Holy Land Mint is a much smaller operation whose appeal is cultural rather than institutional. Its Certieye optical authentication and security-film packaging are competitive features, but resale will usually mean a US dealer that knows the brand rather than any counter worldwide.

Within the gold round category, the Dove of Peace is unusual in having a sustained, dated series identity at all; most gold rounds are generic designs from private mints sold purely on price, and gold rounds as a whole are a small niche compared with gold bars and coins. A buyer choosing this round over a cheaper generic is paying for the only Israeli-struck bullion series on the market, and that is a deliberate, identity-driven purchase rather than a premium calculation.