Specifications For Sierra Leone $20 2018, Image Of Saint John Paul II?

To participate in the forum you must log in or register.

Author	Replies: 5 / Views: 1,115
oriole Pillar of the Community Canada 5239 Posts	Posted 03/16/2021 7:54 pm The diameter is 50 millimeters. I don't have the weight unfortunately as I could not take it out of the capsule. I have been unable to find this coin in any catalogue or on the internet. I am wondering if the catalogues are simply not up to date. The possibility of a fantasy crossed my mind. The quality is excellent though which suggests a government issue. Does anyone know the composition/ catalogue # / mint of issue? Report this Post to the Staff

That Coin Dude Pillar of the Community United States 1427 Posts	Posted 03/16/2021 8:05 pm Just by looking at the coin I know its not genuine, The obverse (coat of arms) looks to be a genuine coin, however the reverse is of noticably poor quality. My best guess is someone modeled a cast off of a genuine 2018 coin, but created their own reverse. I am not sure if this coin is silver or not, but it is definitely not real, as the only $20 coin minted in 2018 was a mere 38 mm in diameter. Report this Post to the Staff
Greasy Fingers Pillar of the Community United States 7010 Posts	Posted 03/17/2021 10:27 pm Is that the Pope that gave up his position? Report this Post to the Staff
tdziemia Pillar of the Community United States 7936 Posts	Posted 03/18/2021 08:57 am Quote: Is that the Pope that gave up his position? Nah. This is the charismatic Polish pope who led the church from 1978 to 2005, and is credited with contributing to the collapse of Communism in Poland. He was canonized a saint of the Catholic Church in 2014. The pope who resigned was Benedict XVI who followed him, and resigned in 2013, the first pope in 600 years to do so. Clearly the design of this coin is based on the earlier $1 coin which is an official commemorative issue (Pobjoy mint); only the legend around the bust and the date have been changed. I'll let others compare the quality (@tcd's comment). Posted coin has the same PM mark (presumably for Pobjoy mint). https://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces43442.html I agree that it's strange that Numista has more recent $20 coins, but not this one. Maybe your guess is right that the catalogs have not caught up. Edited by tdziemia 03/18/2021 09:25 am Report this Post to the Staff
Sap Moderator Australia 16810 Posts	Posted 03/18/2021 9:49 pm The most recent Sierra Leone coin in the Krause catalogues and on the NGC database is dated 2012. I suspect they simply don't have any on-the-ground knowledge about more recent coins. In 2012, Sierra Leone was at peace, with no civil war and an internationally recognized government. This is in contrast to the decade-long civil war of the 1990s which only ended after intervention from British special forces. Countries at civil war make excellent flags of convenience for bogus and/or semi-legitimate mints issuing "coins", because there's no clear chain of authority that a third party can use to check whether a coin is actually "legal tender" or not. A less-than-ethical mint can get rubber-stamp approval from some rebel government or government-in-exile, and run with that; an outright fraudulent mint can just issue coins with no effort at seeking government authority whatsoever, knowing no-one can verify their legality. This is why there are so many "coins" issued in recent decades in the name of Liberia and Somalia. Sierra Leone has been at peace since 2018, and indeed since 2005, but the economy would still be classified as "post-war basket-case", so I suspect in this case, one of those shadowy mints might have put this coin out, to see if anyone notices. The key indicator that this coin is fake/fantasy is the currency used. Sierra Leone does not use, and has never used, "dollars", or any other currency using the "$" symbol. They use leones, symbol "Le". With a post-civil-war exchange rate of about 10,000 leones to the US dollar, any actual commemorative coins issued by Sierra Leone in 2018 would probably be denominated in tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of leones. Yes, this does mean that those $10 2012 Olympics coins listed in Krause/NGC are fake/fantasy, too. And any other dollar-denominated coin listed in Krause or on Numista. Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis Report this Post to the Staff
tdziemia Pillar of the Community United States 7936 Posts	Posted 03/19/2021 09:03 am Excellent clarification (exposing my bad assumption that if Numista lists dollars as a currency for Sierra Leone that this is an "official" currency). Edited by tdziemia 03/19/2021 09:15 am Report this Post to the Staff
	Replies: 5 / Views: 1,115

To participate in the forum you must log in or register.

All Forums Category: World Coins and Currency Forums Forum: World Coins and Commemoratives

Silver Gold Bull US is the United States leading bullion dealer. We deliver gold coins, gold bars, silver coins, silver bars and precious metals to your door. Order today!

The First Dollar, your premier source for bullion and rare coins. See our bullion list on the site and the coin inventory on ebay.

View Last 100 New Topics

View Last 100 Active Topics

Disclaimer: While a tremendous amount of effort goes into ensuring the accuracy of the information contained in this site, Coin Community assumes no liability for errors. Copyright 2005 - 2026 Coin Community Family- all rights reserved worldwide. Use of any images or content on this website without prior written permission of Coin Community or the original lender is strictly prohibited.
Contact Us | Advertise Here | Privacy Policy / Terms of Use

Coin Community Forum

It took 0.28 seconds to rattle this change.