Possible real 1943 copper penny!?

MezRHD - You have everything you need to make your decision. It's pretty simple from this end of the computer. You've been told that with NO doubt your coin is fake. NO grading service will put it in a holder, so don't bother wasting your time or money. Find a nice holder to put it in, print a copy of this thread for your records, and forget about it. That way whomever ends up with it next will already have their research done for them.

That last picture is a counterfeit? I am FAR from an expert but I would have been dancing around like I had won the lottery if I found that in my pocket change!

well I never had it checked but im pretty sure its fake

Based on the odds alone, 909records's coin is probably a fake, but it sure looks better than any of the plated ones I've seen. The plated ones never quite seem to look the right color/texture for a 60 year old wheat cent. And it looks better than the other struck counterfeits I've seen, like the original one from this post, or cast counterfeits I've seen. It also looks better than ones I've seen with modified dates.

If I had one that looked like that, I don't know how I could let it sit without checking it out. Please at least do a magnet test!

I remember seeing my first in-hand fake Morgan at a local coin dealer. I forget the date on the coin, but it was a completely common one, and it was in circulated condition. It didn't look "right", but I couldn't put my finger on what was wrong with it. It didn't feel like a real coin in hand (wrong weight and texture, it had the slippery feel of cast metal). Probably it would be obviously cast under any kind of magnification. It was pretty scary though because I know it would easily fool somebody who didn't know coins, and I knew there were really sophisticated counterfeits out there that I wouldn't be able to detect.

Wow, that was a great read! Hopefully the OP will do the right thing and keep it. 909, I usually have a very keen nose to sniff out a counterfeit, but that copper 43 of yours would practically stop my heart if I found it searching a bag of wheats. To me, THAT one is worth checking out, not necessarily sending it off to a TPG to have the possibility of the government ending up with it, but taking it to a nearby large show and having some experts look at it in hand. A few dozen of these exist; to me the existence of another would not be an impossibility.

I wonder if SGS would certify it as genuine, there is the potential for some serious fraud to occur with the third tier TGP's (which is why I would never bid on such a thing in a third tier slab).

*yawn*

If you don't believe the best in the country ..you'll certainly never believe an unknown employee of a TPG anyway.