If You Found A History-Making Hoard

Going back to Saddle Ridge... what was the impact to the non-hoard coins? I know that more than a few stole the title of "finest known" from heartbroken collectors across the nation. That's what made me wonder what the best course of action would be from a business perspective. The lesser of the coins would hurt the top specimens, but the size would help secure a buyer for coins that would otherwise be hard to move.

I think a good example would be the Sac dollar. Two major varieties exist--the Cheerios dollar at 5.5k mintage, and the Goodacre dollar at 5k mintage. All Goodacre dollars are slabbed and accounted for, and about 60% are on the market; certified specimens trade hands for $200-500. Only <100 Cheerios dollars are known, and they sell for $4,500-34,500. It's reasonable to suppose that if you were to find a solid box of Cheerios dollars, that revelation would bring your $35k coin crashing down to a measly $300 as soon as word got out. That's why I'm thinking that except for a few scenarios, the best bet is to seed them into the market slowly and quietly, taking a slight loss on each subsequent transaction rather than bringing the market crashing down all at once.

Finn, are you talking about a hoard of a previously-unknown issue or a hoard of just rare and expensive coins. I got the gist that I was the first one, but my answer would be different if it was the seecond one.

I hadn't thought about the "protecting others' value" angle. Sure makes it easier to be greedy when you can hang an altruistic reason on it.

@The Silver searcher

The IRS does not tax the sale of anything. The IRS taxes income and profit.

Since the hoard was found, not purchased it falls under a special provision like 'Windfall' ( I cannot remember what the provision is called at the monmoent) So it gets taxed higher than normal income. As the couple had no investment in the hoard the IRS can claim all proceeds as profit.

The hoard was said to be worth in the neighborhood of ten million so something around 40% would be the tax bill due in the year it was found.

If you are enhancing or reducing a collection you are given some room to wiggle tax wise. So if you do not run to the press screaming "Look what I found!" you do not get hit with a giant tax bill all at once.

When you are assesed with the "found treasure" you owe the tax that year if you sell it or not.

So if I had found it on my land while walking my dog you would all be saying 'What are you on about? I never heard of a Saddle Ridge hoarde."

I'd be curious how far you would be able to get with claiming a hoard of US coins at face value. Technically, any government-issued coin since 1793 (or 1787?) is legal tender and always will be. Technically, the Saddle Ridge Hoard could have been deposited at a bank at their $27,980 face value, and the owners would not have been able to sue said bank for theft of the $9,972,020 difference between "real" and face value.

Clearly, I would expect to get hit out the wazoo for taxes when I sold the coins, but I would much rather pay the taxes for keeping $28k worth of coins than $10M.

In the light of Sap's comments,
it may well seem that the finder could have to run the gauntlet of spurious and dishonest claims for decades, all to the increase of legal fees.

It depends on how much continuous stress you may wish to call upon yourself.

There are themes here that also came up on the Saddle Ridge thread. How is the "few at a time" thing really going to work? Here the hypothetical is a mint bag - 1000 coins, right? So, the "few at a time every few years" option is going to take you a hundred years at a rate of 10 a year. At what rate can anybody realistically dribble them out into the market before somebody starts suspecting a hoard was found? One a year means you and your descendants will be at this for a thousand years.

I also have problems with commenters essentially advocating tax evasion. This forum is frequented by young people. There are ethical dilemmas surrounding the marketplace, previous owners, etc, but there should be no ethical dilemma on the tax issue. My feeling is that we should be clear in this regard with our postings. "Don't let the government find out" is not an option. Tax evasion isn't just morally wrong, it gets you prison time and/or hefty fines. You're never going to keep this kind of thing secret forever, so why advocate it?

As such, the only right answer to me is the way the Saddle Ridge hoard was handled.

I would do what Buck would do...I like his theory.