Johnson Matthey

Know the business

The useful overview.

Johnson Matthey’s bullion history begins with an assaying business, not with the modern retail bar. The company traces its origins to Percival Norton Johnson in London in 1817. Its present heritage account places precious metals at the center of a much broader scientific and industrial business. That continuity matters: the survival of the corporation is different from the continuation of a particular silver-bar production line. A legacy hallmark should therefore be researched as a product history as well as a company name.[1]

The firm’s bicentenary account identifies George Matthey as a partner from 1851. Entering the business and becoming a partner are distinct milestones; this profile does not assign an exact apprenticeship date. Bank of England archival information records the 1852 appointment as official assayers, melters and refiners, and incorporation of Johnson Matthey & Co. on April 11, 1891. Those events should not be substituted for the earlier origins of the business.[2][3]

For silver collectors, the manufacturing timeline is less simple than a single uninterrupted run. The Silver Institute’s April 2012 newsletter reported the return of a one-ounce .999 silver bar after a thirteen-year hiatus, in partnership with Sunshine Minting. The described format deliberately resembled late-1990s bars. This contemporaneous report is a reason to avoid assuming that an older-looking design must be an older production. It also makes an unsupported claim that all Johnson Matthey bar production ended in the 1980s untenable.[7]

On December 15, 2014, Johnson Matthey announced an agreement to sell its gold and silver refining business to Asahi Holdings for £118 million in cash, subject to closing adjustments. The announcement identified refining sites in Salt Lake City and Brampton and investment casting at St Catharines. This was a defined business disposal, not the sale of the entire Johnson Matthey group. The distinction keeps the story of vintage bullion separate from the company’s continuing industrial activities.[4]

Johnson Matthey confirmed completion on March 5, 2015. Asahi’s release, dated March 6, also identifies March 5 as the completed transaction and explains that the two refineries would operate as Asahi Refining. It names Niagara Investment Castings as the successor to the casting operation. A successor refinery and a surviving legacy bar are related through history, but they are not the same product identity. An Asahi-branded bar should not be cataloged as vintage Johnson Matthey merely because a facility changed hands.[5][6]

The specialist All Engelhard references provide practical ways into the surviving bars, including one-ounce and ten-ounce categories. Their specimen descriptions encourage attention to the arrangement of lettering, weight statements, serials, surface and regional attribution. Use those comparisons to formulate questions about an offered object, not to copy an entire classification system into a new database. Collector references can contain estimates or disputed dates; commercial descriptions that repeat them are not necessarily independent confirmation.[8][9]

A useful collection record separates what you can observe from what you have been told. Photograph the faces and edges, preserve the original invoice, and record actual measurements alongside the claimed weight and fineness. Ask who performed any testing and what was tested. The name, crossed-hammers emblem, a wrapper or a serial number cannot by itself authenticate a bar. If the purchase depends on a special variety or provenance, agree the seller’s written description and remedies before paying the additional premium. No current manufacturer warranty for secondhand legacy bars was established in this research.

Names & chapters

How the story developed.

1. 1817

   London origins

   Percival Norton Johnson established the assaying business.[1]

2. 1851

   Matthey becomes a partner

   The company’s bicentenary history dates the partnership to 1851.[2]

3. 1891-04-11

   Incorporation

   The Bank of England archive records incorporation of Johnson Matthey & Co.[3]

4. 2012-04

   Relaunch reported

   Silver News reported a one-ounce silver-bar return with Sunshine Minting.[7]

5. 2014-12-15

   Sale agreement announced

   The refining-business disposal was agreed with Asahi Holdings.[4]

6. 2015-03-05

   Sale completed

   Johnson Matthey confirmed completion of the previously announced transaction.[5]

Follow an interest

What to explore.

• Historical silver bars and ingots
• Precious-metals assaying
• Gold and silver refining history

Check the details

Before you buy.

Read the current item and checkout terms. These notes summarize dated company policies, not a promise about your order. Applicable consumer rights still matter.

Open the references

Research this name.

1. Institutional archival authority

   Bank of England archival record

   Check institutional and legal milestones.[3]

   An archival authority is not an individual-bar authentication.

2. Independent collector reference

   Ten-ounce specimen reference

   Explore regional and physical comparisons.[9]

   Dates and populations require scrutiny; no database copying.

3. Primary corporate source

   Asahi completion release

   Identify the transferred operations.[6]

   The historical transaction is not a present product warranty.

4. Market standards reference

   LBMA historical silver list

   Investigate refinery history through the market authority.[11]

   Refinery accreditation does not authenticate a retail bar; list entries were not fully exposed in the retrieved page.