Olympic gold medals are worth more than ever this year because of the rise in cost of the raw materials used in making them. The price of gold, as reported by Business Standard, soared to a record in mid-July due to “central-bank buying, retail interest in China and expectations of easing US monetary policy.”
Despite gold prices soaring, Olympic gold medals may not be worth as much because gold medals aren’t made entirely of gold.
As Money.com explained recently, “The gold medals being awarded at the Summer Olympics in Paris weigh 529 grams, or a little under 19 ounces. If it consisted of pure gold, each medal would currently be worth more than $45,000 strictly based on the precious metal it’s made of selling for about $2,400 an ounce.”
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In fact, silver makes up a large percentage of the weight of gold medals. Over the years, the International Olympic Committee has asked that gold medals be at least 92.5 percent silver. Generally, only 6 grams of gold are used in Olympic gold medals, with the medals traditionally only plated in gold.
That said, how much a gold medal is worth at auction depends on various factors including the athlete’s profile, the sport and the uniqueness of the achievement, the physical condition of the medal and the medal’s historical significance, executive vice president at Boston-based RR Auction Bobby Livingston told Money.com.
He estimates that a gold medal won by a low-profile athlete at the just-ended Paris Olympics would sell between $15,000 and $30,000.
Interestingly, the medals this year contain a small piece of the Eiffel Tower but Olympians work hard for these medals and are largely not to sell them despite how much they are worth.
The gifts that accompany their accomplishments are sometimes even more lucrative than the medals. For instance, the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee’s Operation Gold program pays $37,500 to each Team USA athlete for winning an Olympic gold medal, $22,500 for a silver and $15,000 for a bronze. USA Wrestling’s Living the Dream Medal Fund also pays $250,000 to U.S. gold medal-winning wrestlers.
For winning his country’s first Olympic gold in the men’s 200m at the Paris Olympic Games, reports say that sprinter Letsile Tebogo has been promised a four-bedroom apartment by the Botswanan government as well as a $75,000 cash prize.
