Another Thing That Drives Me Crazy... Differences In Purity Marks

here is one of the "1000" purity Chinese "doughnut taels... normally there is a "9999" or ".9999 there.

contrary to what some think when they see the "1000", it is not the monetary value of the coin but the purity. google "Chinese doughnut gold taels" to see more.

so are we saying that the Chinese are fudging just a tad? I agree, just exposing this thing to air would problably knock the purity down...

mike

then again, we get these... while the doughnut itself says "1000", most often the more honest sellers will still advertise or state that it is as being ".999" pure, despite the 1000 purity designation.

taels are roughly 1.2 oz (troy) or 37.5 grams

sorry, but what about the original question... should there be a worldwide standard on these 24k doughnuts, rounds, bars or whatever, should they all stamped as a standardized 9999, 99.99, 999.9 or 9.999 or .9999 ?

or do I just have too much time on my hands to think about such silly things....?

They could just stamp it with 24K and be done with it. There is no 100% pure gold, to my knowledge. I once read that the reason Chinese or Asian coins had holes was so that they could wear their money on a necklace.

You are right Libertad, they can be used as pendants for necklaces, the dealers use the holes to string them together as well as stacking them on a stick.

so the "1000" mark is not accurate then and the Chinaman is fudging a just a tiny tad bit on the purity stamp is what I gather from this discussion.

thanks for the inputs... mike

There's no such thing as 100% purity in gold. If it was, it certainly wasn't clear as glass. It'd be just as shiny as as .999 gold: it is in fact possible to make gold sheets so thin that they become transparent. In that case, the sheet will transmit green-blue light, as gold reflects yellow and red (hence the color you see: this characteristic of the chemical element will not change at 100% purity). Also, even though gold is largely non-reactive with oxygen and 'regular' air, a bit of reaction with the environment cannot be excluded, as gold actually does react at some degree with some elements under certain conditions, hence the .999 and not the 1.000. However, compared to most other natural elements on this earth, the amount of elements it reacts with and the extent of the reaction are so little, that gold is seen as one of the least reactive elements in the periodic table.

You don't need to be a professor in chemistry to know this, just basic knowledge will do.

Also, I'm not sure about those marks in your nuggets. Knowing that 1000 doesn't exist, seeing that these chopmarks look like post-nugget-damage, and knowing how much fake gold leaves China, I'd consider having them tested if I were you.

thanks for the inputs

the pictured examples above is from the internet, the doughnut taels I have are 9999 and were bought from the USA, however, that is not to say that the person I bought them from did not get them from China. but this whole Chinese and in general fake thing from anywhere wants me to take everything I do not have in a slab and have it tested.

I do keep records of where I bought my stuff. seems to me that a smart thing to do would be to make it a requirement for sellers to mandated by law have their gold and other metal coins tested and certified prior to offering them for sale. I am in not in favor of a lot of laws, or especially adding to them, but this whole counterfeiting thing seems to have gotton way out of hand, especially from ebay sellers. but what good would it do... the Chinese would then just fake the certifications haha.

I wonder if this this would even be possible... the "gold and coin purity and authentic act of 2017". personally I would not have a problem with it, but it would problably be impractical...

thanks again for the replies...

problably not much. It just seems that, like many laws already on the books, are either not enforced or simply ignored (at least from China or overseas). It just seems that counterfeiting and other sleazy dealings are on the rise, despite any laws that may be on the books. ebay does not seem to have an effective method of responding except for pulling the listing and possibly banning the seller, who sometimes just re-registers in a different account.

my "law" would require local and overseas (read: China mostly) sellers to have their coin certified by a US-based agency that the buyer could contact toll-free prior to buying the coin.

And any VERIFIED/SLAM-DUNK GUILTY fraudulent ebay sellers would be AUTOMATICALLY referred by ebay to this SPECIFIC agency formed solely and for dealing with counterfeit coins only, and that this agency would have the full cooperation of all nations, especially Chinese and other governments. (figure the odds on that, unless we gave China millions of dollars to cooperate).

We could get the U.N. to pass a worthless and useless act or "resolution". everybody knows that the U.N. scares the pants off of every nation, right?

or, only give them money on the criminal transactions that they do move on, a case-by-case system. (I am sure the US taxpayer would love this, but we already give away billions each year on totally worthless and ineffective causes). Government waste is at an all-time high, so why not add to it, with the exception being that this would not be a wasteful cause... at least not to us.

There would be raids and arrests by the hundreds and maybe people would get the idea that conning people on coins is no longer a game where arrests are few and convictions even fewer, especially if a few convictions are widely made public with heavy fines and lengthy jail sentences.

So how practical would it be for Chinese sellers to mail their coins to the US for the certification prior to their sale? not much.

How practical would it be for you to have to mail in or run down to an agency that may not even be in your town for a certification for a coin you want to sell? not much.

so maybe that is not practical. I do not know which particular law you are referring to, but regardless it just seems that bad sellers seems to be a semi-regular event, despite what is already on the books.

Exceptions or exemptions could be made for NGC coins that are verified through their tracking site, as they already have. Require the other major graders to do the same.

As a precaution, I run NGC holder serial numbers through their description page, which provides a description and most (but not all) of the time some photos of your coin. but even they can and do make mistakes, I have had to have corrected several of them by NGC.

I am not saying I have all the answers, but it just seems to me that more COULD be done. I am not saying that I am right about this though... I am just suggesting that a PREVENTATIVE measure might be something good if it could be made practical. I am not saying I am right or being realistic though...

but, I agree, it is best or most effective for the buyer to be educated and not allow themselves to beome victims in the first place. but is this possible in every case until it is too late?