Description
The Royal Mint is Britain's oldest company and the official maker of UK coins.
Operating under the legal name The Royal Mint Limited, it is a limited company that is wholly owned by His Majesty's Treasury and is under an exclusive contract to supply all the nation's coinage. As well as minting circulating coins for the UK and international markets, The Royal Mint is a leading provider of precious metal products.
Formed over 1,100 years ago, The Royal Mint was historically part of a series of mints that became centralised to produce coins for the Kingdom of England, all of Great Britain, and nations across the Commonwealth.
The Royal Mint was founded under Alfred the Great, c. 886 AD. It operated within the Tower of London for several hundred years before moving to what is now called Royal Mint Court, where it remained until the 1960s. As Britain followed the rest of the world in decimalising its currency, the Mint moved from London to a new 38-acre (15 ha) plant in Llantrisant, Glamorgan, Wales, where it has remained since.
Since 2018 The Royal Mint has been evolving its business to help offset declining cash use. It has expanded into precious metals investment, historic coins, and luxury collectibles - which saw it deliver an operating profit of 12.7 million in 2020–2021.
In 2022 The Royal Mint announced that it was building a new plant in South Wales to recover precious metals from electronic waste. The first of this sustainably sourced gold is already being used in a new jewellery division – 886 by The Royal Mint – named in celebration of its symbolic founding date.
