That's definitely one of their drawbacks. People seem to dismiss that criticism and say it doesn't reflect the spot price because its the value of usable gold, but I dunno about that one, seems like a stretch. 

The thing I like about them is, so far anyways, its probably hard to counterfeit them. If you hand me a silver coin or a goldback, I'm much more confident in my ability to look at the goldback and know its real. That's probably due to my inexperience with silver coins for what its worth. 

 You can hear a silver dime fall to the floor from across the room and know what it is!