Article On UK 50 Pence Pieces

For Brits., it may be worthwhile 'phoning The Royal Mint and and finding out their issue policy for these coins. With that information, it may be easier to determine your collecting strategy for proofs, mint sets, or circulation coins.

Royal Mint is normally rather mute on how or when coins are released. Part of it is due to demand.

We have been told all 29 of the Olympic 50 pence coins are out there. I have 20 different ones so far, some I have traded for.

We are just now only seeing some of the 2010 coins for the first time in circulation.

Ken

How are people doing with getting these Olympic coins? I have 24 of the designs now and many duplicates, largely thanks to staff in my local coffee shop who keep an eye out. I thought that each coin had an issue limit of 3 million but the last stats from the RM suggest lower numbers. I guess they may be holding some back for release later?

I have 25 out of 29 olympic coins. I regularly ask for them in change in shops, and have devised a tactic for trawling for them from banks. When I draw out cash, I often ask for £100 on 50p pieces. I go through this lot taking out the odd few that interest me and then adding in a few to make up the number. I then pay it all back into another bank nearby.

I have noticed that the number of olympic coins per £100 has dropped a lot, down to about 3 or 4, which causes me to think that people are hoarding them.

As far as I recall there are the following UK 50p coins in existence ( excluding proofs etc):


Large size business strikes ( Britannia reverse ):

1969-1981 Machin portrait on obverse, "new pence legend",
1982-1984: Machin portrait obverse, "fifty pence legend"
1985-1997: Maklouf portrait, "fifty pence" legend

Small size business strikes

1997: Maklouf portrait, Britannia reverse
1998-2008: Rank-Broadley portrait, Britannia reverse
(The 2008 with Britannia does not appear that common ).
2008-now Rank-Broadley portrait, part shield reverse

There may be some gap years in the business strikes, and some may only have been released as proofs and/or uncirculated sets. - cannot recall, am at work and no access to my references

Large size commemoratives:

1973: Machin portrait, 1st EEC design, 9 clasped hands on reverse
1992: Maklouf portrait, 2nd EEC design, table/stars on reverse
1994: Maklouf portrait, 50th anniversary D-Day, ships/planes on reverse

Small size commemoratives (all Rank-Broadley portrait):

12 in total -
1998 50th anniv NHS,
1998 3rd EEC,
2000 libraries,
2003 suffragettes,
2004 4-minute mile,
2005 250th anniversary Dr Johnson's dictionary,
2006 150th anniversary VC,
2006 soldier carrying comrade (VC),
2007 100th anniversary scouts,
2009 Kew gardens,
2010 100th anniversary guides,
2011 World Wildlife Fund
the Kew Gardens one is rare. Most books I have say only 10,000 minted, but I have one reference which says more.

Then 29 Olympic 50p pieces also.

( I dont sell on ebay, so it's not me making them scarce!!)

Re the Kew gardens mintage, I wonder if some leading personage wrote a typo of 10,000 when they should have written 210,000? If others slavishly copied this, it would explain why other books have an error.

Of the hundreds of 50p pieces I have handled using my bank tactic above, I don't recall seeing any of the more recent years with the shield reverse. I do have the shield 50p from 2010 and 2011 in uncirculated sets, so at least some have been made.

The Royal Mint mintage page is up to date as at a certain point in time (Not sure exactly when as I've never asked) - there is nothing to stop them minting more at a later date - this is probably what's happened with the Kew gardens 50p. Many of the olympic 50p mintages were revised at the same time - It's more than possible they will be revised upwards again next year - we may even see yet more Kew 50p minted (even though we are now well into 2012)

There were people buying Olympic 50ps, circulated, for more than they could buy them for direct from the mint. So some people simply set themselves up for a fall.