Hi Richard; I'll take a stab at answering your questions the best I can.

1. Nope.... token manufacturers consider this to be proprietary information.
2. Nothing... as tokens are removed from the casinno property by collectors and souvenier hunters, casinos order more made to replace diminishing inventory.
3. There is more than one, but Anchor Gaming is the prime distributor.
4. Simple. Have you been paying attention to the "RARE" discussion on this board? Supply and demand. If an overwhelmingly number of silver strike collectors don't have a particular silver strike in their collection, and it is no longer available at the casino that issued them, and silver strike dealers don't have any in inventory.... the masses of SS collectors who don't have it and can't live without one, drive up the prices on available pieces when they occassionally come up for sale.... either privately, or via public auctions such as ebay. When the demand is satisfied, the price goes down. However, when the number of available pieces do not satisfy demand, prices remain high. Some well-respected collectors have a different viewpoint on "rarity". They think it has to fall in a certain number produced range. It's not; but that's just my viewpoint. No one can tell anyone else with any certainty if there are 127 of an item known in collections; or is it 82, or 29? There is no such thing as population census records kept in chip and token collecting circles. It's all guesstimates. Your guess is as good as the next collector's guess. May I ask what are your friend's thoughts on why some items are more expensive than others?