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 Replies: 15 / Views: 1,539 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
606 Posts |
Not exactly sure how to phrase my question so here goes! LOL
In most modern series think I would consider less than 1 million strikes to be semi key and less thank 100k to be key dates.
In perusing the "coin facts" section of this site, I noticed that in some series (most grades) the semi-key costs several hundred dollars, and other series semi-key cost noticeably less.
If you were to find a series where the "good dates" are significantly cheaper would you want to load up on them? Either as an investment or just the cool factor.
Maybe I need to adjust my notions of "key" and "semi-key"?
Without delving into ultra rare stuff. LOL
I feel like I am missing a big and basic piece of market knowledge. LOL
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1747 Posts |
I think you need to give some references, however it always lies with supply and demand, if there is little or no demand, then the price is low. however the demand could always go up, and then yes you would have been wise to invest in buying a few of them.
also numbers wise I am not sure if you are talking about Spanish coins or some other coinage.
In Canada a key date coin would be somewhere from 450,000 to 2 million in the USA it is much higher
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Rest in Peace
United States
17900 Posts |
As Ace FTW mentioned, the NUMBER of collectors of a particular series has a great deal to do with the value of tougher coins. Many folks don't even consider a set of Standing Liberty quarters, for example, because the 1916 is so expensive, even though lots of people consider that design to be one of the most beautiful series there is. Likewise, even very low mintage numbers won't make the price zoom on some series, simply because so few people collect them as series. The Half Cents of all types would be good examples. Many of them have TINY mintage in comparison to other series, but their prices remain relatively small simply because of the small number of collectors who are trying to complete that set. If you take the really super popular coins - Lincoln Cents, Buffalo nickels, Indian Head cents, Walking Liberty halves, Morgan and Peace dollars, and so on, then you will notice pretty significant jumps on those that are key or semi-key. If you are concerned more about the potential value of the coins you buy (which is usually not a good way to approach collecting), then yes - staying with the key and semi-key coins might be your best chance of profit IF - and it's a BIG IF - you also buy top end grades (both technical and market). What is your goal? Once you know that and let us in on that secret, it's a lot easier for us to give you some more specific opinion. |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
606 Posts |
No specific series. I am really just trying to learn this aspect. For instance, I was looking at 1877 and 1909-S Indian Head cents. There were massive amounts of IHC produced and these are the only two with mintage's less than 1 million. These coins start at $310.00 and $391.50 with details. A 1931-S LWC starts off at about 118 in AU. It is one of only two LWC to have a mintage of less than 1 million and costs a fraction of what a 1909-S VDB costs. Granted the 1931-S has about double the original mintage of the S VDB. Does that make sense or am I talking crazy? ROFL Edited by Half
07/10/2015 1:29 pm
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1118 Posts |
A lot of Canadian coin dealers joke that once the NFLD series gets some traction we can all retire. I have some municipal Trade dollars that have mintages in the double digits. The Coin Show Podcast was joking about how some bloke told one of the hosts that the 3 cent piece was a sleeper, that was 20 odd years ago. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4085 Posts |
Some of this will also depend on the availability of coins for a particular date. Take the Lincoln series:
The 09-SVDB was saved quite a bit as it was a first year of issue coin. When the VDB was pulled, that was an even bigger incentive to save them. So they are pretty readily available. But, given the low mintage, they are still in demand and so command a relatively high price.
Contrast that with the 14-D. Few anticipated the low mintage of this coin and so a lot of them made it into circulation. A circulated coin can be had for a pretty reasonable price, but try to find one in uncirculated condition. No one saved them, so they are actually more expensive than an uncirculated S-VDB in that grade.
For the 31-S, the word got out that the mintage would be low and so this coin was widely hoarded. So, very few hit circulation and you can get an uncirculated one for just a little more than a circulated coin. I paid about as much for my 31-S in MS63RB as I did for my 14-D in VG-8.
Edited by KenKat
07/10/2015 1:44 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1839 Posts |
It may have already been said in one of the posts above but unfortunately mintages are not a very good way to gauge the value of a coin. This is over simplifying but the number of surviving coins (not the mintage) is important, and it can be frequently very hard to know that number. And demand, how many people are there that collect that year/series. This too is sometimes hard to quantify. Those two factors which are frequently hard to nail down probably affect the price of a coin more than anything else. Well of course the grade of the coin too.
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
94367 Posts |
 And think about it - if the supply is TOO low, there may in fact be very little demand! |
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Rest in Peace
United States
17900 Posts |
It might also give you a little help to look at what PCGS and NGC have graded for the different series. Keep in mind that some of the numbers are pretty skewed because we don't know how many coins have been pulled from encapsulation and regraded, or how many have been pulled from encapsulation because the collector likes them raw better (as in putting them in a 7070 set). But even with that skew, it does help to see what has been recorded thus far from the two major TPG players. BUT - if you go JUST by those numbers, all you are going to be buying is Classic Commemoratives. Which actually isn't a bad idea. If you are young enough to hold on to a batch of "cliff grade" commems pre-1954, someday you stand a chance of seeing a pretty marked increase. All you need to have is ONE of the "big boys" decide to start buying them up for promotional purposes. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
597 Posts |
Grade Grade Grade! I have a few sets of Lincolns my average set was so so much easier to get than my all ms 60 or higher set, one would think that an all ms60 or higher set would have the hardest coins being 14-d 09-svdb etc but I paid more for 21-s 24-s and 15-s because they are so rare in great condition due to the fact that everyone kept there keys in great condition for all those years and there are more keys in mint state than some normal dates.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1839 Posts |
As you can probably tell by now there's no "slam dunk" answer. It's also one of things that makes the hobby so interesting. As a collector it can pay to focus in on something specific and learn as much as you possibly can about how all of these things being discussed effect that niche area. The more you learn about a niche the more you'll be ahead of the curve of other collectors. moxking gave a great example of one of those niche areas someone might choose to focus their learning attention. The great thing is that there are an unlimited number of other niche areas one can choose to educate themselves on.
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
20753 Posts |
So called key dates if associated with low mintages, just don't work. For example look at the Mercury dimes. A 31D has the fourth lowest mintage in the series and yet no big thing for a price. Same with the 31S Lincoln Cent. And then there is the so called key date Jefferson nickel of the 1950D date. Very low mintage and yet no real big thing for value. Some key dates may be excessively valuable depending on popularity. Some so called key dates may be practically very low in value. So called key dates are basically just a lot of talk. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4212 Posts |
I had a piece w/a mintage of 115. It was from Trinidad & Tobago.
Ended up as a doorprize on another forum.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
606 Posts |
Thank you all!
I think you showed me the missing piece. I feel much better now.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
606 Posts |
I just got to the part in Whitmans guide book of Lincoln Cents that talks about this topic. LOL
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Rest in Peace
United States
17900 Posts |
I hope you enjoy the adventure, Half!
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Replies: 15 / Views: 1,539 |
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Posted 07/10/2015 1:25 pm
