Why No Predecimal Coins In Circulation?

You have indeed answered your own question :)

They do show up very rarely but as you have noticed, due to the silver content of Australian pre-decimals, they are more likely to have been removed from circulation due to their bullion value exceeding face value.

Thanks for the replies!

I used to drive a fiat. It wasn't very good.

The answer to all three of your questions is, "yes".

Australian predecimal "silver" coins actually were made of silver, unlike in Britain. This hastened their disappearance thanks to the combination of both official withdrawal from circulation (and remelting for profit) and unofficial hoarding (and remelting for profit).

And yes, though not demonetized, predecimal coins were no longer legal tender here. In Australia, the pound was replaced with a completely new currency system. In Britain, the pound was never replaced and the old coins never declared no longer legal tender. Rather, they were allocated new values under the decimal system. Only the coins that didn't fit easily into the decimal system (denominations of sixpence and below) were formally withdrawn.

Silver coins from the pre-decimal era are rarely encountered nowadays, as others have mentioned.




Yep, NZ coins are frequently encountered. Actually it is a rare event to get a stack of coins from the bank to noodle, and find no kiwi coins somewhere in there....3x NZ 20c just last night in $100 worth of 20's....
Over the years, I've found a couple of sixpences - and a British one dated 1896, one florin and a NZ 1934 shilling in change.
With the new coin sorting machines being introduced to suburban banks, I reckon the old silver coins will get even harder to find, as the machines would presumably reject them. When tellers manually count coins they tend not to notice an older coin, just as long as the general shape looks right...