Copper Hoarding - What's The Realistic Run Up?

Why hoard at all? Sell that $300, put the profits into rare coins and the face back into the "business".

How long do you think it will take for someone with money and bulk coin contacts to buy about 20 sorters ($10,000), capable of sorting 5 coins a second and run them 24/7? That's 7+ million cents a day, $500,000 worth a week, 2.5 billion a year. Wouldn't take many such operators to sort cents faster than the mint makes them!

A freind of mine has been hoarding copper cents for a while but I have never paid much attention to them.

I guess that's because I buy a lot of copper in flat sheets for my work and usually there is a fair amount of 'drop'.

A few years back I would buy $10000.00 worth of copper sheets for about 60.00 a sheet.....$2.00lbs......a sheet of 16oz. is 30 lbs.

For the last few months 16oz copper sheets were at about $180.00 a sheet...that's $6.00 a lbs. Three days ago I called for a quote and the sheets were 280.00 a sheet.......9.33 a lbs.
Scrap for melt is about $3.00 a lbs. now.

Copper goes up and down some, but I doubt if we'll ever see $2.00lbs for new copper.Scrap may hit $4.00 soon.

Save those pennies folks, they will never be made of copper again.IMO

I dont see any harm in it... if people are willing to buy right now... then I can sell right now and go buy a few more boxes of pennies to search through...

Wow, those 5 gallon bucket handles probably wouldn't even hold that then.

As to the question of hoarding copper pennies for a possible melt value at some point in the future...

My thought is that there are two legitimate ways to get ahead in the world... work hard or work smart. Messing with tons of copper pennies to eke out a little profit looks a lot like hard work to me. Better (and easier!) to work with pounds of silver or ounces of gold to realize the approximate same profit, IMHO.

Indeed so. We just had a more recent episode of the heavy hand of government falling upon Bernard von NotHaus, a fellow who was minting what the government called "his own silver dollars". Truth to tell, though, those coins did not look a lot like a silver dollar to me. Of course, I am one of those people who has actually SEEN a REAL silver dollar and knows the difference.

A fascinating part of this case was that the government never charged Mr. von Nothaus with fraud. I believe that this charge is always added to those caught counterfeiting money, yet in this case they did not do so. Could it be that his coins were legitimate in terms of metal type, weight, and purity? If so, then that would constitute proof that no fraud was intended.

Another fascinating aspect of the case was the shrillness of the government's case. They accused this man of being a terrorist, of all things. From what I have seen in the media, von Nothaus was about as far from being a terrorist as anyone can be. There is zero proof that he actually terrorized anyone... other than the government types who insist on perpetuating the lie that US currency is actually worth something more than the paper upon which it is printed, that is.

new here but been reading a lot it has changed my way of thinking . example I just sold our gas guzzling 83 dodge for 3 * melt

MY motivation for saving 95% Cu cents is that they have actual intrinsic value. If we become the Weimar Republic II, and hyper-inflation occurs (or some other catastrophic event), copper coins may be worth more than a wheelbarrow full of worthless Federal Reserve notes. Gold coins and silver bullion are excellent for major wealth preservation, but what if you need a loaf of bread, potable water or medicine? Some liquor or tobacco? A shirt? If the feces hits the fan, you may be trading that $20 Double Eagle for a tank full of gas and six cans of beanie-weenies. Copper cents will have actual value, and may be a nice augmentation for smaller purchases and barter.
That being said, (and no, I don't wear aluminum foil hats) I also like to search rolls for these reasons:

1.It's fun! I do $25-50 in cents /week. Treasure hunting @ home.
2.I have several cent folders that I upgrade with every box of cents.
3.I search for errors, varieties
4.I save AU/UNC cents and roll by date and type.
5.The Lincoln Memorial series is already obsolete; the general public will figure this out soon enough and they will disappear quickly.
6.Who knows, copper value may skyrocket in the future

So, to answer the original question of this thread, I don't think hoarding Cu cents will reap windfall profits, but I look at them as a nice hedge in uncertain times.