1 oz Scottsdale Mint Archangel Michael Silver Bar

The 1 oz Archangel Michael Silver Bar

The Archangel Michael bar is a minted 1 oz bar of .999 fine silver from Scottsdale Mint of Scottsdale, Arizona, depicting the archangel as a winged warrior with sword and shield standing over a defeated serpent. It belongs to a small series that also includes a 10 oz silver version and a 1 oz .9999 gold bar. These are private mint products, not legal tender, and they compete in the faith-based bullion niche, a segment with a dedicated collector base where most rivals produce rounds or coins rather than bars.

The religious subject is deliberately broad in appeal. The Archangel Michael is venerated across Christianity, where he is the leader of God's armies in the Book of Revelation and a patron of warriors, police, and the sick; Judaism, as protector of Israel; and Islam, as Mikail, the angel of mercy and sustenance. The iconography of the bar, a muscular winged figure triumphant over the serpent, draws on centuries of Catholic and Orthodox art and Renaissance sculpture translated into a modern minted format.

Scottsdale Mint backs the bar with a 100% guarantee of purity, weight, and content, and operates under ISO 9001:2015 certification with ASTM purity standards. Each bar ships in a sealed capsule, with multiples available in sealed boards of 5 or boxes of 125. Within the wider market for 1 oz silver bars, it is a design-led purchase: buyers pay the standard small-bar premium for a bar that doubles as devotional or gift bullion rather than anonymous stack weight.

Archangel Michael Bar Specifications

The obverse carries the Archangel Michael design; the reverse features the Scottsdale Mint lion hallmark, a crowned male lion that has become a recognised brand mark in the bullion world, along with the mint name and the bar's weight and purity markings. The series also includes a 10 oz silver bar, an uncommon weight for minted bars with this level of design detail, and a 1 oz gold version in .9999 fineness.

Security is modest by modern standards: there are no serial numbers, assay cards, or embedded anti-counterfeiting technology. The lion hallmark serves as the brand identifier and the individually sealed capsule provides tamper evidence. Authentication therefore rests on weight, dimensions, and strike quality, all straightforward to check on a 29 x 50 mm minted bar, supported by Scottsdale's ISO 9001:2015 certification and ASTM-standard production.

Archangel Michael Silver Bar Tax Treatment

As a private mint bar with no legal tender status, the product is taxed purely as .999 fine silver, which meets the 99.9% threshold used by several jurisdictions.

• USA: The primary market. Most states exempt bullion bars of .999+ purity from sales tax, though some do not and a few apply transaction thresholds. The bar generally meets IRA purity requirements for silver (99.9%+), with eligibility ultimately depending on the custodian. Long-term capital gains are taxed at the 28% collectibles rate.
• UK: Silver attracts 20% VAT on new purchases (margin scheme rates may apply on pre-owned stock from VAT-registered dealers), and there is no CGT exemption since the bar is not legal tender. Note the contrast within the same series: the gold version qualifies as VAT-free investment gold in the UK, while the silver bars do not.
• Canada: GST/HST exempt; the federal exemption covers silver refined to at least 99.9% purity in bar form.
• Australia: GST-free as investment-grade silver at 99.9% purity or higher. The bar is less commonly stocked by Australian dealers.
• New Zealand: GST-exempt at the 99.9% silver threshold; no formal capital gains tax.
• Singapore and Hong Kong: Singapore exempts qualifying investment precious metals from GST and levies no capital gains tax; Hong Kong has no sales tax or duties of any kind.
• EU: Full local VAT on silver, between 17% and 27% by member state.

Archangel Michael Bar vs Coin and Round Alternatives

The most famous Archangel Michael bullion product is not this bar but Ukraine's 1 oz silver Archangel Michael coin, issued since 2011. The Ukrainian piece is government-minted legal tender with stronger numismatic appeal, but its availability has been disrupted since 2022 due to the conflict. The two serve different markets at different premiums: the coin for collectors who want sovereign backing and the classic issue, the Scottsdale bar for buyers who want the subject at private-mint pricing with reliable supply.

Among private mints, various producers strike generic Archangel Michael rounds, but Scottsdale's bar is distinguished by higher production quality and the mint's ISO 9001:2015 certification. PAMP Suisse covers the religious-bullion niche from another angle with bars such as the Cross, Romanesque Cross, and Ka'Bah designs, though none feature the Archangel Michael, so the Scottsdale bar has the subject largely to itself in bar form. The bar format is itself the differentiator: most faith-based bullion comes as rounds or coins.

Against ordinary stacking silver, the usual 1 oz trade-offs apply. Small bars carry the highest percentage premiums on the bar size ladder, and a design-led branded bar sits above generic 1 oz bars on price while reselling better than unbranded pieces thanks to the recognised lion hallmark. Buyers optimising purely for ounces per dollar do better with a 10 oz silver bar, including the Archangel Michael's own 10 oz sibling; buyers in this niche are usually paying for the design, the gift presentation, or the devotional subject.