SALES of American Eagle Gold Coins by the US Mint totaled 80,500 ounces in February, a rise of 283.3% from the same month last year, while sales of the same line of silver coins more than doubled from a year earlier to nearly 3.4 million ounces.

February's sales figures represented a month-on-month decline from January, although January is traditionally a stronger-than-average month.

Excluding figures for January, February 2013 saw the second-highest monthly gold coins sales by the US Mint since September 2011, the month that saw gold set an all-time high above $1900 an ounce. Since then, only November last year has seen more American Eagle gold coins sold by the US Mint, when 136,500 ounces were sold.

The US Mint sells American Eagle gold and silver coins to coin dealers rather than the general public.

In contrast with gold US Mint coin sales, gold exchange traded funds saw their biggest combined monthly bullion outflow on record, according to data tracked by Bloomberg going back to 2003.

ETF gold holdings dropped by 109.5 tonnes in February, falling to a five-month low at 2502.7 tonnes.

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