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 Replies: 19 / Views: 3,861 |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1751 Posts |
The past 36 years has seen 2 high spikes in the silver spot prices. During this time the average person, who owned any silver, more than likely sold their coins. During this time there were many We Buy Gold & Silver places.
Has this impacted the mintages of pre 1967 coins. Did a lot of coins get melted. Do you think only culls were melt, or coins of better grades were effected too. I keep wondering about this. Has it impacted prices at all. Is silver spot price having more impact on current pricing.
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Pillar of the Community
 Canada
5394 Posts |
At the first spike in late 1979 early 1980 bucket loads of better stuff was going into the melt. You could run through a bag of dollars and there were 1938 and 1946 circs in there as well as BU 1939 , 1950 through 1952 and hi grade 1935 and 1936. This is just a small sample.
Silver was so high you just did not take chances and hang on to much except the better key date coins.
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Pillar of the Community
 Canada
1751 Posts |
Pacific, I value your experience and input. So what you are saying is a ton of stuff was melted and mintages are actually lower than stated. I thought it is illegal to melt Canada or US coins. I wonder how the mint gets around this too. I always enjoying adding to my knowledge. Did you see the same kind of activity, this past 2011-2012. I image bullion coins faired the same fate. We hear so much about mintage, I wonder how much is reliable, with all the melting going on for any coin. How will it affect the market place down the rd. |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2495 Posts |
True, a ton of good material has been melted in the past.
You would think future coin prices would be rosy because of this.
However a dwindling supply of good material has been offset with a dwindling demand from a perhaps decreasing collector base, so the future prospects of the coin market is anyone's call.
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2845 Posts |
Pocket Change, to your comments..... By definition "illegal" indicates the government has passed is a law against melting bullion/silver. That law is in place making it illegal for others unless approved to do so, but it is primarily "the mint" -- the Royal Canadian Mint ( RCM) who's the arm of the Cdn government that has legislated authority to melt coin. A book has been mentioned various times on this forum, it's an excellent read that you might find interesting because it deals with the same topic. "Striking Impressions: The Royal Canadian Mint and Canadian Coinage: James A Haxby" Something to remember regarding silver prices - regardless of spot price, the average holder of silver coins will never be paid that same amount. Buyers of silver do so based on high volume pricing and also deduct production costs required to melt and purify the items. In the past I know people who were delighted to get 75% of spot price. Anyone believing that saving hard silver is a good longterm investment strategy would be far better buying raw silver bars or wafers than buying silver coins. That silver prices were higher in the past really has little or no bearing on the current value of individual silver coinage other than melt values determine base pricing. However unless one only collects "filler" coins, the value of a specific coin - the year, variety and condition - is determined by how great or weak the collector demand. Otherwise for example, the value of a MS-63 1949 would be the same as a MS-63 1948 SD. Editing to add: Anyone interested in the aspect of gold or silver as an diversified investment strategy, there is a multitude of other options far beyond that of collector coins but that's also a topic totally outside of the intent of this Coin Collecting Forum. Edited by wildflowerAB
01/12/2016 11:33 am
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
5324 Posts |
Yes the RCM has that covered with their bullion ETF as an example, but during the last silver boom and to a lesser degree a few dealer still buy pre 67 coins for silver value only and during the peak most dealers were just dropping mainly common date silver dollars into 5 gallon pails strait to a refiner. One would think eventually even common dates will be hard to find but most dealers still gets a continuous supply even in today's prices. As in the ms 63 examples there is little or no demand for a 49 dollar but a 48 ms63 is always in demand at a certain price, you just don't see too many being offered. |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
514 Posts |
Quote:I thought it is illegal to melt Canada or US coins. As it was explained to me, it is illegal to deface Canadian coins in Canada, and it is illegal to deface American coins in the United States; The get around is melting coins on the opposite side of the 49th than where they were originally minted. |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2845 Posts |
Quote:
As it was explained to me, it is illegal to deface Canadian coins in Canada, and it is illegal to deface American coins in the United States;
The get around is melting coins on the opposite side of the 49th than where they were originally minted.
Your source is unreliable. If that were so, ask them WHO do they suppose has the higher authority beyond respective governments to make melting of silver in Canada and the US illegal that would require this devious cross-border strategy in order to circumvent? Read some of the tabs on RCM's own website pertaining to either their bullion segment or their Alloy Recovery Program (ARP). |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2845 Posts |
It's also not true that it's illegal to deface coins. Section 7(2) - Defaced coins not current http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/...-1.html#s-8.What that means is defaced coins can be deemed worthless and surely anyone who chooses to do so would realize that? |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2845 Posts |
Quote:. Yes the RCM has that covered with their bullion ETF as an example, but during the last silver boom and to a lesser degree a few dealer still buy pre 67 coins for silver value only and during the peak most dealers were just dropping mainly common date silver dollars into 5 gallon pails strait to a refiner. One would think eventually even common dates will be hard to find but most dealers still gets a continuous supply even in today's prices. I strongly suspect - Infact I'd bet a whole bucket of old silver if there was a way of proving it but there's not - but I strongly suspect a lot of the best old coin that was sold for melt never saw the melting pot. It was culled and resold back into the collector market. The rare and best examples have always been worth more than melt and the operations of any refinery would have to be awfully stupid to not cull to further increase profits. The other reason I think so is that a staggering amount of people that I've talked to even at present are still under the false impression that the only value to silver coin above face is it's silver content. Notice the kijiji ads offering to pay a flat silver value per denomination? If that belief remains today, it certainly was more commonplace years ago as people were hauling off stashes of grandpa's collection, saved from circulated coin in his day, smiling because suddenly they discovered that each old but shiney coin was suddenly worth dollars because they noticed a full page ad in the paper or got a mailbox drop about some outfit setting up shop for the weekend, literally begging them to sell that silver! Edited by wildflowerAB
01/12/2016 1:07 pm
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1751 Posts |
Wow glad I posted the question. Common sense was telling me that as the supply shrinks, demand should go up. however, I am reading that demand has been static, very interesting. On the bullion forums I read so many people who are buying junk coins, hoping to make money when silver rises. Boy do they have it wrong according to this. The more I read the more questions I have.
Striking Impressions is an excellent book. I bought a copy a couple years ago for $5. It was a riveting read. I will need to reread it again, as I forgot half of it. The mint and employees sure faced some hard challenges. Plus to think early pre Canada used all sorts of foreign currency. The stuff on early silver and crossing borders was very interesting. Is there another book on mint history that picks up were Striking Impressions leaves off. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of Canadian money.
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
3733 Posts |
the gold/silver dealer that I know is personally responsible for 100's of thousand of face dollars going to the melt pot, they ship it to the canada mint, who refine it and he gets a gold/ silver credit on his pool account.. yes I would surmise that of the 1960's dimes, quarters,halfs, and dollars. more has been melted than is still out there..but remember there were millions on top of millions of all these coins minted..
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
1984 Posts |
While there are obviously a whole lot of small cents still lying around, I wonder how many have been melted over the last few years since minting ceased. With copper at $2 those hoarding them for copper value may decide it is not worth the hassle and investment.
I am personally doing a major cull and have a very large bag ready to go to the TD counting machine (and on to the ARP I assume). Some may disagree, but I think I am doing the hobby a favour by withdrawing bulk common coins from the market. All I am saving are George VI cents and some red Elizabeths and varieties. That being said, given the billions of cents that are out there, I suspect it will take a while for the supply to be meaningfully reduced.
It would be nice to know what has been melted in the ARP. Anyone else been culling their cents?
Edited by Smallcentguy
01/13/2016 9:55 pm
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
5394 Posts |
Even with all the melting and destruction of our past coinage , I am sure that there will always be a ready supply of most everything in the Charlton catalogue, for future generations to collect including the rarities.
It is still a surprise to see what is out there and where it comes from. Sure most of the stuff offered is quite common and was collected out of pocket change back in the day. However doing a buy you still get surprised.
For example look at the recent post on the BU roll of 1943 BU cents featured on our forum, or the Landon hoard that was the talk of the coin community last year. As a personal experience over the last two years, I have purchased two major hoards of
Original rolls and quantities of most dates and denominations of George VI and EIIR from 1937 to 1964. These came from different long time holdings and it is a treat to have the opportunity to examine quantities of original material.
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
2845 Posts |
Quote:
I am personally doing a major cull and have a very large bag ready to go to the TD counting machine (and on to the ARP I assume). Some may disagree, but I think I am doing the hobby a favour by withdrawing bulk common coins from the market. All I am saving are George VI cents and some red Elizabeths and varieties.
I recently did the same. The bank where I deal gave me plastic bags to fill loose, up to the line is deemed $25 worth. However I couldn't help myself and asked "sooooo.....what happens with these pennies" and this is now the second time, second branch pertaining to junk non-silver coin in the recent past where the response has been "there's a guy who collects coins, we call him up.....". I don't really want to know that as, sadly, I suspect my noble contribution to ARP may have been unsuccessful. Edited by wildflowerAB
01/14/2016 8:53 pm
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
11951 Posts |
I have really enjoyed reading all your opinions on this
topic.
I hope it is OK to add a couple points.
I live in Florida, and work for a family that has two local
coin shops. The shops buy a good amount of foreign silver,
pre 1967 Canadian silver coins being the dominate amount
of coins thrown into the foreign silver bucket.
When the bucket gets enough value, the coins are taken
to be melted. My guess would be every month or so.
There will be coins of every denomination going back to
Queen Victoria. From low grade coins to cut up mint sets.
I feel this happens in most coin shop all over the
United States. At some point it could have a impact on
availability of common silver coins, but maybe not in my
lifetime.
Also, it is legal in the United State, to melt old U.S.
silver coins. But it is not legal to melt nickels and
cents.
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Replies: 19 / Views: 3,861 |
Posted 01/12/2016 02:59 am
