Homepage / Popular Bullion Refiners: Johnson Matthey
Updated 01/02/24
Johnson Matthey
Bullion
Johnson Matthey's logo of a Geologist's Pick & Hammer is recognized worldwide among bullion investors as a sign of quality.
Johnson Matthey Public Limited Company is a multinational Chemical and Platinum Group Metals (PGMs) technology company headquartered in London, England.
The company is one of the largest international full-service refiners of platinum group metals; it has a market capitalization of over 6 billion dollars with 12,000 employees, operating in more than 30 countries.
The History of
Johnson Matthey
The Johnson Matthey Company has a long history of refining platinum group metals (PGMs).
The company dates back to the grandfather of Percival Norton Johnson, whose name is unknown.
Percival Johnson was the founder of Johnson Matthey company and a founding member of the Royal Society of Chemistry. (the oldest national chemical society in the world).
Percival's grandfather was an assayer of ores and metals in London during the late 1700's.
After his grandfather's death, Percival's father, John Johnson (1765–1831), took over his father's business and got involved in the platinum trade.
At the age of 15, Percival Johnson (1792-1866) became an apprentice in his father's firm.
During his apprenticeship, he published the following paper titled: Experiments which prove platina, when combined with gold and silver, to be soluble in nitric acid.
In the paper, Percival Johnson showed that small quantities of platinum mixed with gold and silver in nitric acid cause a facilitated separation of pure gold from the solution.
Through his work, Percival proved to his father that he was a skilled assayer and mineralogist.
In 1817, at twenty-five years of age, Percival separated from his father’s established assaying firm and set up his own “Assayer and Practical Mineralogist” business.
1817 is the same year often referred to as the year the Johnson Matthey Company was established; however, it would be another 35 years until George Matthey would become a full partner in Percival Johnson company.
Johnson's knowledge of the assaying of precious metals allowed him to find the value and purity of a gold bar by applying chemical tests to the physical metal.
The firm became the first London assayer to offer a guarantee on the quality of a gold bar; the business grew when Johnson began to offer buy-backs on the bars of gold he assayed.
Percival built a small gold refinery for the gold bars coming into his growing business.
He proved to his customers to be proficient at the extraction of Platinum Group Metals and other ores from gold bars, which established his firm in the London Bullion Market for its technical abilities.
He specialized in assaying and refining precious metals, particularly gold imported from Brazil: he perfected a method of extracting palladium from gold, improving its color.
Over the next several years, Johnson added a few partners in his company.
In 1832, he added George Stokes to the firm, creating the partnership of Johnson & Stokes.
Stokes died in 1835; a few years later, in 1837, William John Cook (1813–1892), a skilled assayer, joined the firm, creating the partnership of Johnson & Cook.
In 1838, George Matthey (1825–1913) joined the firm as an apprentice to Percival Johnson and William Cook at just thirteen years of age.
George Matthey was an excellent assayer and chemist; he studied at the Royal College of Chemistry, proving to Johnson that he was a fast learner while excelling in platinum refining.
Matthey developed a "head for business" and wanted to build Johnson's firm into a great company.
In 1851, Johnson made George Matthey a full partner in the firm, creating the Johnson Matthey Company.
George Matthey encouraged Johnson to expand the company's capabilities, and their new partnership transformed the business into the International Conglomerate it is today.
Johnson Matthey
Notable Achievements
- 1852 - Appointed as the official assayers to the Bank of England.
- 1861 - Approved as refiners to Bank of England
- 1875 - supplies platinum leads for the first electric lamps
- 1928 - Johnson Matthey patents the only workable process for extraction and refining platinum group metals from Rustenburg ores (see the Merensky Reef).
- 1946 - wins exclusive contracts for refining British demonetized silver coinage
- 1974 - develops the world’s first catalysts to control vehicle
pollution, in May of 1974 - 2000 - receives the second MacRobert Award for the Continuously Regenerating Trap (CRT®) system to control emissions from heavy-duty diesel vehicles
- 2001 - Work starts on the dedicated fuel cell membrane electrode assembly manufacturing facility
- 2004 - Johnson Matthey celebrates 30 years in the development of auto catalysts.
- 2012 - Formed following the earlier acquisition of Axeon, Johnson Matthey Battery Systems designs, develops, and manufactures integrated battery systems.
The company is changing new technologies, including fuel cells, medical devices, and emission control catalysts.
Johnson Matthey
Bullion
Johnson Matthey & P.R. Mallory
Founded in 1916, the P.R. Mallory Company began doing business as a tungsten wire manufacturer.
In 1924, Phillip Rogers Mallory, the founder of the company, moved his company to Indianapolis, Indiana.
P.R. Mallory later formed the Mallory Metallurgical Company. The company engineered electrical alloys and composites from silver, copper, and tungsten.
The P.R. Mallory worked with Henry Ford to create the first applications for Electrical Resistance Welding.
In addition, during World War II, P.R. Mallory teamed up with Samuel Ruben and created the first mercury cell battery; millions of these batteries were manufactured for the war effort.
The P.R. Mallory Company later revolutionized the battery industry, creating the alkaline manganese battery, and in 1964, the company registered "Duracell" as its trademark.
In 1947, Johnson Matthey created a limited partnership with P.R. Mallory, creating Johnson Matthey & Mallory Limited, headquartered in Toronto, Canada.
The company began as an industrial metals refinery.
It is unknown when they started to produce investment-grade bullion, but it made gold and silver bullion bars and rounds until the end of the partnership in 1977.
The Johnson Matthey & Mallory partnership produced poured and minted gold and silver bars, and they had the identification marks found in this section.
CMW Inc., a welding company, was started by P.R. Mallory.
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Johnson Matthey
Bullion Rounds
Johnson Matthey is commonly known in the bullion market for their precious metals rounds and bars.
During the 1970s & '80s, two refining giants produced a great deal of the world's investment-grade bullion; one was Johnson Matthey, the other was Engelhard, and they were regularly competing for market share.
Johnson Matthey produced bullion rounds of Gold, Silver, Platinum, and Palladium.
Freedom Rounds
After Engelhard came out with "The American Prospector" round, Johnson Matthey created the "Freedom" Series rounds and other decorative silver rounds.
There are ten 1oz silver Freedom rounds in all, with each of the ten rounds inscribed with a Freedom that Americans hold dearly.
The Set of 10 Freedom
Rounds included:
- The Right to Vote
- Freedom of Speech
- The Right to Privacy
- The Right to Bear Arms
- Freedom of the Press
- Freedom of Slavery
- Freedom of Religion
- The Right to Counsel
- The Right to Trial by Jury
- Freedom of Assembly
The Freedom rounds were only produced in silver.
The American Way
Freedom round
There was another Johnson Matthey Freedom round, but it was not part of the series of Freedom's rounds; this round had a different design on its obverse, and the reverse portrayed patriots standing over the continental United States.
Liberty Trade Silver Rounds
Johnson Matthey and Engelhard produced "Liberty Trade Silver" rounds; these rounds are harder to find than Johnson Matthey's "Freedom" rounds or Engelhard's "American Prospector" rounds.
The Liberty Trade Rounds have the Lady Liberty on the obverse side and her torch on the reverse.
Johnson Matthey produced a proof and non-proof (bullion) version of the round.
To know who produced the "Liberty Round," look for the Johnson Matthey or Engelhard logo/trademark on the bottom of the reverse side to authenticate these rounds.
Where it says "logo" in the photo above, look for the "E" trademark for Engelhard or a "JM with pick & hammer" trademark for Johnson Matthey.
The "year of issue" is on both sides of the round; on the reverse, a copyright "©" symbol with a 1980s year will be directly across from the logo, on the other side of the torch.
These rounds range from 1/2 oz to 5oz in size; all have limited mintages.
Johnson Matthey and Engelhard also produced Liberty Trade Silver bars in the same sizes as the rounds.
Note: Engelhard produced Liberty Platinum Rounds in 1986.
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Decorative & Commercial
Rounds
Johnson Matthey often produced gold and other silver rounds for many
private companies and organizations.
These rounds had detailed artistic designs inscribed on them from the company or organization that commissioned Johnson Matthey to mint the bullion round.
These customers included Xerox, Scotia Bank, the Lions Club, The
Royal Bank, The National Bank of New York, TD Bank, King Fook (a Hong Kong-based jewelry company), and the Walt Disney Company, and many others.
Stillwater Palladium Rounds
In the mid-2000s, the Stillwater Mining Company released rounds and bars of Palladium refined by Johnson Matthey.
Stillwater Mining Company, based in Billings, Montana, primarily mines palladium and platinum; it's the only miner of platinum group metals in the United States.
The palladium rounds and bars were named after Lewis & Clark, commemorating the 200th anniversary of the pioneer's expedition across America, commissioned by President Thomas Jefferson.
Each Stillwater Mining round and bar is inside an assayers card, with a six-digit serial number on the card.
The palladium in these rounds and bars is from Stillwater Mining Company, refined by Johnson Matthey, and minted by the Northwest Territorial Mint.
The 99.95% fine palladium rounds were minted in the following sizes:
- 1/10 oz.
- 1/4 oz.
- 1/2 oz.
- 1 oz.
The Stillwater Mining bars are only known to have been minted in one troy-ounce Palladium bars.
Asahi Refining
Acquires Johnson Matthey's
Gold & Silver refining businesses
On March 6th, 2015, Asahi Refining, a Japanese company, acquired Johnson Matthey's gold and silver refining businesses. (Press Release)
From the press release, the CEO of Asahi Holdings stated the following about the acquisition:
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“We are proud and humbled to acquire a business with such a rich history and tradition of quality, precision, and expertise. I am convinced that combining these new facilities with our existing assets will foster global growth and technological innovation well into the future. We also look forward to developing our relationships with our global partners. ” - Mitsuharu Terayama |
Asahi Holdings is a precious metals recycling company founded in 1952.
Asahi Holdings has grown to become a London Good Delivery refiner; it now operates through its subsidiaries processing gold, silver, and platinum group metals.
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Johnson Matthey
Bullion Bars
The company was the largest manufacturer of minted bullion bars in North America for nearly 30 years (1971-2000).
In 2000, Johnson Matthey stopped producing all smaller-sized gold and silver bullion bars.
However, the company continued to produce Gold & Silver LBMA "Good Delivery" bullion bars used in the wholesale and professional investment markets.
Johnson Matthey started to produce gold 400oz "Good Delivery" bars in 1961.
In May 2012, Johnson Matthey licensed their name to the Sunshine Mint; this allowed the Sunshine Mint to mint bars labeled with Johnson Matthey's name.
Shortly thereafter, the Sunshine Mint started the mass production of 1oz Silver bullion bars with the Johnson Matthey name and Trademark through key wholesalers like Dillon Gage Metals. See the article here.
Unfortunately, due to falling precious metals prices and a refocusing of the company's business, Johnson Matthey announced in late 2014 that they were exiting the Gold and Silver Refining business.
As of March 2015, Johnson Matthey no longer refines gold and silver bullion; this article from Bullion Vault explains why they made this decision: Johnson Matthey Exits Gold & Silver Refining After 160 Years.
Johnson Matthey is still a Member of the LBMA, as seen here.
However, Johnson Matthey is no longer an accredited LBMA provider of "Good Delivery" bullion bars, as seen here.
Types of Bullion Bars
Produced by Johnson Matthey
Johnson Matthey's refinery produced two types of bullion bars: Cast or Poured and Minted Bars.
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Cast Bullion Bars - are produced by pouring molten precious metal directly into a mold. Markings are usually stamped on the bar using a hammer or a press. In addition, company markings on cast bars will look depressed or "sunken," into the bar. |
Minted Bullion Bars - are cut from a cast bar that has been rolled to a uniform thickness. The cutting is done with a die to create blanks that have a specified dimension and weight. All the surfaces are smooth and even. Markings are usually stamped on the bar using a minting press. Company markings on minted bars will be "raised" due to this process. (Minted bullion photo provided courtesy of Heraeus) |
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Johnson Matthey
Serial Numbers
In General, refiners put serial numbers on bars that are Not LBMA "Good Delivery" bars on the bar or assay card as a service to the individual investor to help them keep track of the bullion they own.
Serial numbers sequences on Johnson Matthey Bars and Assay Cards are known as follows: (Includes: Gold, Silver, Platinum & Palladium)
- 1 Letter followed by 3 digit serial number
- 1 Letter followed by 5 digit serial number
- 1 Letter followed by 6 digit serial number
- 2 Letters followed by 5 digit serial number
- 4 digit: serial number
- 5 digit: serial number
- 6 digit: serial number
There is little uniformity among these numbers, except that bars produced in the same batch share the same series of serial numbers.
There is a list of Johnson Matthey silver bullion bars and serial numbers on All Engelhard's Johnson Matthey page here.
The following is how Johnson Matthey applied serial numbers to their Gold 400oz. LBMA "Good Delivery" Bars:
- 5 Numbers plus year & date: 1983 - 2005
- 6 Numbers plus year & date: 2005 - 2015
Johnson Matthey
Bar Sizes
Silver
Johnson Matthey produced Silver bullion bars as small as 1 gram up to
1000 oz. LBMA "Good Delivery: size.
Johnson Matthey silver bullion bars under one troy ounce are usually rare. You should expect the value of these bars to be higher than the intrinsic value of the bullion due to their size and limited mintage.
Furthermore, Johnson Matthey made several different-sized silver bullion bars, cast and poured in the following sizes:
- 1 gram
- 5 gram
- 10 gram
- 1/2 oz.
- 1 oz.
- 2 oz.
- 3 oz.
- 4 oz.
- 5 oz.
- 7 oz.
- 10 oz.
- 20 oz.
- 25 oz.
- 1/2 kilo.
- 1 kilo.
- 50 oz.
- 100 oz.
- 1000 oz. LBMA "Good Delivery" silver bar
Johnson Matthey
Identification Marks
Silver
Johnson Matthey Silver bullion bar production took place in the following countries:
- Australia
- Belgium
- Canada
- United Kingdom
- United States
Below are the Identification Marks (ID marks) for the Johnson Matthey refineries in these countries.
Note: Most of the ID Marks are re-creations of the original photos.
United States - Silver Identification Marks
SLC - is the ID Mark for the Salt Lake City refinery.
The "JM" Diamond ID Mark on the left is usually on the same bar as the oval ID Mark on the right.
The "JM" Diamond ID Mark used by Johnson Matthey on their silver bullion bars was commonplace.
United Kingdom - Silver Identification Marks
Belgium - Silver Identification Marks
Canada - Silver Identification Marks
The maple leaf (above) is usually on the same bar with one of the other Johnson Matthey identification marks.
Australia - Silver Identification Marks
There are no examples of Australian silver bullion bar ID Marks.
The following information is known to be inside the oval of a Johnson Matthey silver bullion bar refined in Australia.
- AGR MATTHEY with three stacked bars inside oval
- JOHNSON MATTHEY, AUSTRALIA SYDNEY inside oval
Other Johnson Matthey ID Marks
Johnson Matthey Identification Marks on silver bullion bars; however, none specify the refinery's country of origin.
Johnson Matthey
Bar Sizes
Gold
Johnson Matthey Gold bars are easier to find than Engelhard gold bars; Engelhard produced fewer gold bullion bars than Johnson Matthey.
The sizes of the gold Johnson Matthey bars:
- 1 gram
- 5 gram
- 10 gram
- 1/2 oz.
- 1 oz.
- 10 oz.
- 1 kilo.
- 100 oz
- 400 oz. LBMA "Good Delivery" gold bar
Johnson Matthey
Identification Marks
Gold
Johnson Matthey Gold bullion bar production took place in the following countries:
- Australia
- Belgium
- Canada
- United Kingdom / Hong Kong
- Untied States
Below are the Identification Marks (ID marks) for the Johnson Matthey refineries in these countries.
Note: Most of the ID Marks are re-creations of the original photos.
United States - Gold Identification Marks
United Kingdom - Gold Identification Marks
Gold Bullion refined at Johnson Matthey's Hong Kong facility had the following words inside the oval;
- JOHNSON MATTHEY - HONG KONG (ID Mark not available)
Australia - Gold Identification Marks
Canada - Gold Identification Marks
Belgium - Gold Identification Marks
Other Gold ID Marks
Johnson Matthey Identification Marks on gold bullion bars; however, none specify the refinery's country of origin.
Notice: If you have a Johnson Matthey Gold or Silver bar with an Identification Mark that is not on this page, contact us if you would like to share it with others on this guide for reference purposes. Thank You.
Johnson Matthey
Platinum & Palladium Bar Sizes
Johnson Matthey made platinum and palladium bullion bars in the following sizes:
- 1 gram
- 5 gram
- 10 gram
- 1/2 oz.
- 1 oz.
- 5 oz.
- 10 oz.
- 10 oz.
- 1 kilo.
- 100 oz.
The "JM with pick and hammer" ID Mark is the most common on these bullion bars.
Furthermore, even though Johnson Matthey has gotten out of the investment bullion market, the company continues to refine Palladium and Platinum investment-grade bullion blanks for the Perth Mint, the Royal Canadian Mint, and the United States Mint.
Sources:
Johnson Matthey - Refining homepage
Johnson, Matthey and the Chemical Society - 200yrs of precious metals expertise
Johnson Matthey Plc. - Encyclopedia.com
GoldBarsWorldWide.com - pdf. Johnson Matthey
George Matthey and the Building of the Platinum Industry
The Johnson Matthey Connection - St. Peter's Church Stoke Fleming
(other sources have links throughout this webpage)
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