Coin Community Forum Hot Topics

How many obsolete coins are left?

Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:01:14 -0500

I would love to know whether there is any information on approximately how many, say Indian cents and Buffalo nickels, are still around. I think more than 3 billion Indian cents were minted, but of this, you'd have to think some are lost forever, some were mutilated and removed by the US Mint (how often does that occur, as I see mutilated modern coins all the time in circulation still). There is also a lot of discussion about silver coins being melted in the 1980s. Very, very few of these obsolete coins are still in circulated coinage- probably 1 Buffalo nickel per every several $100 in nickels. Maybe 1 Indian cent per every $1000 in Lincoln cents. Almost never see a Mercury dime in circulation. So I would think "still in circulation" would account for a very small fraction of the surviving obsolete coins

Are there any data on what % of the total obsolete coins survive to this day? The obsolete coins are in the hands of dealers and private collectors.

I'm just thinking about this issue and wondering whether such information if it is available could be helpful in understanding where there might be some coin types that are actually much rarer than appreciated.

Experts and Beginners

Wed, 14 Jan 2009 18:16:07 -0500

Hi,
I'd like to share a story regarding internet "expertise" in the context of how it might possibly apply to coin beginners vs. coin experts.

As the story goes, this collector has another hobby, and that hobby is quite a bit more technical than coin collecting (save perhaps counterfeit detection).

Eager to learn more about his new interest, he chanced across a site filled to the brim with experts who could help him. The "seed" of this problem started here when hapless collector could not tell who was an expert—and who was not.

Having learned a little knowledge and with some related diagnostic gear, he posts a few well-done analyses (he assumes) with questions. Despite his reasonable statements, a few "experts" remind him of a past mistake and seemingly dismiss those conclusions.

It must have been sheer folly, because the beginner then defended his conclusions based on clear, documented evidence collected by him. He also questioned why a past mistake should possibly apply here, and unwittingly questioned the conclusion of the "expert".

What followed was like a kick to a raging bee hive, followed by "stings" of innuendo, verbal abuse, and browbeating--public and private. Alas, this poor guy didn't see it coming! This sheep was properly shorn.

Btw, that hypothetical person was me. And perhaps I deserved some of it.
Now I'm not looking for sympathy here; I wrote this to make a point, because I know this place is a healthy community of rational people—beginners and experts alike. It bears saying.

I offer this in defense and empathy of beginners everywhere.

If you're an expert, newbies won't immediately know that and fail to give you the credit for your time and expertise. Consequently, respect of your position and expertise takes time outside those who know you. I'm sure as an expert, you know the importance of good leadership towards earning respect and consequently gaining influence. Without respect, there is little influence, is there?

Sometimes newbie collectors are very excited about their new hobby
It's important not to mistake their energy and resultant errors as something malicious towards you.

That's about it—did I miss anything? If I'm the butt all those people think I am, tell me please.

Can't pay with cents

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:10:19 -0500

On Yahoo news a man in New Jersey tried to pay a ticket with rolled cent's. He finally convinced the court house that the coins were "cash", which they accept as payment, but he had to write his drivers license number on each roll. He also now has a warrant out on him.

Cool Lincoln Roll Finds (from bank rolls) - Post Yours!

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:08:52 -0500

Show me your nice Lincoln roll finds! I'd like to keep the thread to rolls that cost 50 CENTS, i.e. you just got the roll directly from the bank.

Outstanding luster, this coin glowed when I emptied the roll:

A sound and tested method for looking through lots of coins.

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:07:26 -0500

This was going to be a reply in another thread, but thought it should get its own thread because I am sure plenty of people have this same question.

So how do I look through cents for die varieties and errors?? Here's how I do it, and if I had the time I could go through 100 rolls a day this way:

1. Sort all the coins in a batch by date if the batch is more than a couple of rolls. I recommend sorting them a bag at a time (5,000 coins). One of the reasons for doing this is so that the more 'expected' dates can be gone through first, and the lesser 'expected' dates can be set aside for a rainier day. Another reason for doing it this way is purely logical and makes perfect sense - if you have 250 examples of 1985 cents to look through, you will get a better sense of how thick the design is and what some of the smaller details look like, and don't have to rethink your knowledge through every time you go from one coin to another. Additionally, you can get out a list of all the known dies for that given year and have them handy while you search, without having to flip back and forth through a LOT of stuff with each coin you look at. If your group is mixed, you might see a 1985 cent, then not see another one for another 60 coins and won't have the visual memory of what the other one looked like. This is more or less a waste of time.

2. Sit in a comfortable environment. If you're using a loupe, sit with a window or other light source behind you. This allows you to sit up in the chair and look at the coin in a comfortable position. Those who try using a desk lamp sitting in front of them have to bend over in different positions to light up the coin, which is a killer on the back after an hour or so of looking. If you are looking through a microscope make sure you set the lighting, magnification, and focus to a comfortable range and LEAVE IT THERE. Constantly changing the settings can play games with your eyes and cause you to miss stuff that's there, and see stuff that's not there.

3. Don't try to look through too many coins at once. Find your limit and don't exceed it. If your eyes start to blur and lose focus after three rolls, call that your daily limit and don't exceed it. I found that my limit is about 20 rolls a day, and I don't go over that. If you get tired of looking, you'll get lazy and stop looking. Your eyes will be catching most of the details, but your brain won't process them, and I promise you'll be missing stuff and wasting your time.

4. Know what you're looking for. Don't just go by what's been listed. Pay attention to all the details and pick out any differences and hold them aside. Keep looking, and if that difference appears over and over, you probably have nothing...but if you see something different on one out of 500 coins of the same date, you might have something worth further investigation.

5. Keep examples of the "nots" as well as the good coins. If you keep the things that aren't collectible, you'll be able to look back on them when you find something else in question and probably answer many of your own questions.

My method:

I have a stereo-zoom microscope with good lighting that did not come with the microscope. More so than not I find that microscope lighting that comes with the scope is not the proper type or intensity of light to use for searching through coins.

I have a stick I made out of ash 1x2 boards that has a flute cut into it that's the right size for cents to fit onto it. I line up half a roll at a time on the stick, obverse facing up and look through them sliding the stick through under the scope. I then have an identical stick I use to flip the coins over so I can look through the reverses. I can often accomplish a half roll in under 3 minutes, or my entire 20 roll daily quota in about an hour, including holdering and marking everything I find.

steel cent question

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 12:06:40 -0500

I have a 1943 steel cent that i think look faboulous.. think it is worth being graded and how can i go about doing as i have never sent anything off.. How much does it run?

Inherited a LOT of old coins

Thu, 4 Dec 2008 17:48:19 -0500

Never collected coins before, always a baseball card collector. However, my Grandfather passed away in Jan (RIP) & left me his coin collection. I really have so much, I don't know where to start. For example, I opened a couple of half dollar rolls last night (thinking they would be JFKs) & ended up being enough to build several Franklin complete sets. Almost everything is silver & there are several books filled with everything from Flying Eagle cents to Morgan dollars. I've been doing some research online but am a complete novice. How do you decide what to grade, whether or not to complete sets (just a 1916 D from a complete Mercury set or 12 LOL), etc.? Any advice would be appreciated

Thanks

Coin World - 1795 Reeded Edge Large Cent Found.

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:37:16 -0500

A collector in Oregon purchased a 1795 Reeded Edge Large Cent for $1000. This coin has been examined by numerous dealers raw. These various dealers felt the coin to be an alteration so did not take the coin seriously after examination. While they are deciding weather or not this coin is genuine and finally determined it was not, this collector buys it, submits it to PCGS and it comes back Good4. Now I ask you, why didn't these dealers pay $30 to see what PCGS thought? No brainer to me. This collector is expected to get $200,000-$300,000 for the coin.

Do you look like a coin collector?

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:34:20 -0500

This might be an unusual thing to ask, but have you ever had the feeling when you were at a show or a shop that many numismatists just sort of have a "coin collector look" to them?

This is just an odd thought that I've had every so often.

Enhancing Coins

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:32:03 -0500

Poll Question:

What does everything think about private mints "enhancing" coins especially the silver eagle.

Which one is your favorite?

Personally i like the gold enhancement, but not the coloring.

Another Nic-a-date find. 1914-D found!

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:29:43 -0500

1914-S

Time travel to get GREAT coins

Thu, 27 Nov 2008 10:28:59 -0500

Someone recently started a discussion thread about what coins you would buy with $500,000.00. How about this: If you could take $100 with you and travel back into time for 1 day and try to exchange that $100 (no time-related inflation problems - it STAYS as $100!) for coins in circulation or as rolls of coins from a bank, what date and what location would you travel to?

Problem At The coin shop

Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:45:33 -0400

How many people have gone into a coin shop and known they were getting ripped off. It's ridiculous what some of these guys can get away with. I was in a shop this morning. I showed him 2 coins I had purchased a number of years ago on ebay when I was stupid anyway. They were 2 morgan dollars that were grade in the MS66 and MS65 by an off name grading service. I and Everyone who would looked at the coin would agree that They were really some where around AU-50 But this guy offered me 25$ for the both. I'm No idiot the silver in the stupid things is worth almost that much. Needless to say i didn't sell but buyer be where with some of these guys. I looked when I got home the value of them was about 35$ a peice. Its unbelievable some of these guys.The sadest thing is they are taking advantage of people who really need the money

Sleeper Coins~

Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:44:27 -0400

This topic may or may not have been covered here before so bear with me as I'm still fairly new to the forum.

Sleeper Coins. What do you feel is under rated, what have you done well with? Opinions? Comments?

Here are some of mine.

Under Rated:

1914-S Barber quarter. Same mintage as 16-D Mercury dime at a SMALL fraction of the cost.
Actually I feel that there are several post 1900 sleepers in this series including:
1911 D and S
1912S
1913
1915-S.

1912-S Liberty Nickel. It has shown some substantial movement but I think there's room for more.
The 1912-D has shown a bit of movement as well.

Three Cent Nickels: Not horribly popular but lots of low mintages. If the series heats up watch prices skyrocket.

I could go on but would like some input from others.

As for coins I've done well with. First would be the 1927-S Standing Liberty quarter. I used to pick these up at $6-8 in G-VG. Bid on G4 is now $30.
1872 Two Cent Piece. I may never buy another one. Picked up an XF for $400 and a nice AU at $500. Now I see dealers list them at over retail frequently $850 and $960 respectively.

Semi key Lincolns: Not even a Lincoln collector per se but always jumped on 10S, 11S, 12S, 13S, 14S, 22D and 24D when I saw them cheap. Seems to have been a good move.
Also stockpiled VDB and 31D.

As I stated looking for your opinions.

clembo

mikescoins1, Hard Times

Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:43:28 -0400

I signed up for his newsletter for kicks and grins but was wondering if any one else received this email;

Dear Our Valued Customers,

We normally use this email list to advertise our specials on Ebay as well as our website. We wanted to take the opportunity to explain a situation that has affected us and may have caused some of you concern, and we think you will be very interested in what happened.
Some of you may have received an email from Ebay stating that our listings on our Ebay User ID Mikescoins1 were cancelled. You would only receive this email if you had bought from an active listing, however, since some of our listings are Ebay store listings you may have received an email from orders as old as six months ago. Because of this we felt it was neccessary to let everyone on this list know about the situation as soon as possible as the amount of time it would take to determine who actually received this email from Ebay might take days. As you can imagine, we have received some emails from customers worried that they will lose their money or otherwise not get their coins.

We think you will be interested to learn the reasons behind this, and we encourage you to read the rest of this email, but first and foremost -- rest assured that absolutely everyone who has an active paid order will promptly receive their order. The majority of people who received the email have already received their order. Please do not panic and put chargebacks through your credit card or Paypal complaints as there is nothing to be concerned about.

Now, let us explain what happened. If you are an Ebay seller as well, or if you use Paypal you might be especially interested.

Back in April, we had an international transaction with a company in New Zealand for $6,000 in silver coins through our website where the buyer paid by Paypal. We shipped the order according to Paypal's seller protection standards and also insured the package through our private insurance company. The package took about two weeks to arrive, which is normal for an international transaction. The US Postal Service and New Zealand Post both confirmed delivery, however, New Zealand Post did not get the requested signature confirmation that should have been obtained by the delivering postal employee working at New Zealand Post.

The day after we confirmed receipt, the buyer put a Paypal dispute in claiming non-receipt. As you may know, Paypal finds sellers guilty until proven innocent in these cases and the money was instantly removed from our account. In the comments section, the buyer stated that "the tracking number you provided does not confirm delivery". This was especially interesting considering this was before we were providing tracking numbers to international customers, so unless the buyer had the package right in front of them they would have had no way of knowing what the tracking number was.

We submitted to Paypal a screenshot of the USPS website showing that the package was delivered, a screenshot of the New Zealand Post website showing that the package was delivered, a letter from the USPS Inspection Service showing that after an investigation they determined the package was delivered to the addressee, and a letter from the New Zealand Post equivalent to the Inspection Service stating the same thing. Despite receiving all of this information, Paypal failed to render a decision in either my favor or the buyer's favor for three weeks on this case.

The buyer then instigated a chargeback with their credit card company since he failed to get a refund. The buyer also put a chargeback through on another earlier transaction claiming non-receipt that the buyer confirmed to me he received before putting in the $6,000 transaction. It is unclear if Paypal submitted the information to the credit card company to fight the chargeback on my behalf, or they failed to do so, as they have given me conflicting information, but nevertheless we lost the chargeback and we are permanently out $6,000. Our insurance company also would not cover the claim as they believe it was a case of buyer fraud and we can't really blame them for their conclusion.

Now -- to add insult to injury, Paypal froze our account with no explanation during the first week of July. Some of you may have been inconvienenced by this as you were unable to send payments. It took intervention by an Ebay executive that we met at Ebay Live to unfreeze the account. During this whole week, we had no concrete reasons from Paypal to determine the cause of this, except vague information from my Ebay/Paypal account manager Adam (who is the only Ebay/Paypal employee that has gone out of his way to try to help us through these issues) that it was due to a high Paypal complaint rate.

We thought the problems were over as the account was fully restored, but while we were on vacation out of the country in late July, the same thing happened, again with no explanation. When we returned, we eventually conferenced with a Paypal "risk specialist" who informed us that the reason behind these restrictions was a high chargeback rate. We explained the situation about the fraudulent New Zealand buyer and while the account was partially restored, a 5% / 120 day reserve was put on our account which wouldn't be so bad, except that the 5% was placed on ALL activity, including refunds, (which makes absolutely no sense) so if we issued a refund to a buyer, an additional 5% was placed into an reserve, resulting in 100% getting returned to the buyer and 5% put in reserve for a total loss of 105% of our money.

Now -- to the reason for the listing cancellations by Ebay. Ebay has now, effective Monday, instituted Paypal performance as a part to help determine Ebay seller performance. This is patently unfair as sellers that don't accept Paypal are not affected by this change, but those who do can only be negatively affected by this change. While we have had some negative feedbacks that added this "seller non-perfomance" rate, what caused the listings to cancel apparently was a poor Paypal chargeback rate, most of which was due to this $6,000 chargeback. Mind you, this is a company that we have paid over $200,000 in fees to just in the past two years have done over $2,000,000 in business with and we never experienced a problem like this before.

Aside from our horrible experience, in general Ebay and Paypal as many of you know have gone through a period of dramatic and tumultuous change with numerous rapid management and policy changes since the beginning of this year. Needless to say, it appears that Ebay is no longer a reliable venue for our sales and regardless of what eventually happens with this situation, our Ebay auctions will become a smaller part of our business, if they have any part at all, by the end of this year.

We do have two other Ebay User IDs that we have used as backups and have many of the same listings we normally have on our Mikescoins1. Both of these user IDs have "raised" search standing due to excellent customer service and we were already planning to list more on them before this issue occurred. To see these listings, please click on the links below:

Walruscoins Ebay Store
Mikescoins2 Ebay Store

Please also take a look at our website, www.mikescoins.com. We will be expanding our website listings and lowering prices soon as well. If there is anything that is listed that is a silver item, we can probably give you a better price on the coins as the prices on the site do not reflect the recent drop in silver. Please email us with any questions.

And, if you have any other questions or want to comment on what happened, we invite you email us directly at support@mikescoins.com. We thank you for reading this and appreciate your support during this disruption.

Sincerely,

Mike's Coins

Large Cents

Sun, 24 Aug 2008 22:37:54 -0400

Just found this collection of large cents was wondering if anyone could tell me what its worth/how good it is.
Its a lot of pictures sorry.

http://s462.photobucket.com/albums/...8/TeukCoins/

Let me know what you think.

Something to do for the crowd...

Mon, 4 Aug 2008 20:36:42 -0400

I was born on August 01, 1968.

In light of today being my birthday, and not only that...it's my 40th birthday...I would like to do something for the crowd here. I don't know what that would be, so I am open to suggestions.

Anybody have a clue what I could do for the folks here to celebrate my birthday in style?

Tough Times..............

Mon, 4 Aug 2008 20:35:45 -0400

I know that we are all starting to feel the pinch of the rapidly rising cost of living. For example, a LARGE portion of my coin purchasing budget now goes into my gas tank. Therefore, I was wondering if any other CCF members were thinking about ( or having no other choice ) to sell coins from their collection just to make ends meet? ( coin collecting is expensive during good times and now it can really be hard to fill that dansco 7070 ) I truly hope that this is not the case for us die hard collectors, but we all have that mortgage (rent), food, gas etc... to deal with and as the saying goes " you gotta do what you gotta do" to keep your head above water. not knowing where it will end or how bad it could get I have started to consider what in my collection I would give up first. Fortunately I have not been pressed to make any sacrifices yet............... and I will hold out till the bitter end. (unless my wife decides she has to eat ) I feel that the American will to survive will prevail, so I will hold on to my gold and silver ( what else will be left ) until they knock on my door. These are the times that can again make us strong, we just need to stand together. So...........how do you stand ?

Which is your least favorite coin design

Mon, 4 Aug 2008 20:34:35 -0400

Is it just me, or do the new coins in circulation appear to be of a lesser quality than previous designs? For example (in my opinion), the new portrait of Thomas Jefferson looks more like the "Mummy" than Thomas Jefferson. Also, many state quarter reverses look like they have been created on an etch-a-sketch. What ever happened to the classic designs?

Which is your least favorite coin design?

How often do you find Canadian coins in circulation?

Mon, 4 Aug 2008 20:33:42 -0400

Obviously, this question is not directed at fellow residents of Canada. I have an idea in mind, just trying to get some info on how often other countries are able to find coins of decent grades in their circulated money?

Norwegian coin of 1655

Mon, 4 Aug 2008 20:32:03 -0400

Hey everyone, I bought this coin a while back, but I am not certain of the denomination of the coin or any other info other than the date and that it was minted in Denmark for circulation in Norway (since Norway and Denmark were politically fused at this time. Any info on this coin would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

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