The High Price Of Silver Good Or Bad For Collectors?

Devil's advocate position: It would be preferable to melt common 1992-up Silver Proof coins (as opposed to pre-1965 silver) because the modern Proofs have a far higher percentage of their mintage surviving.

This high survival rate is what keeps the values of common Silver Proof Sets tied to their bullion value.
Large-scale melting of these Sets could boost the value of the surviving Sets.

From a collector's viewpoint, it would be more important to preserve circulated pre-1965 Silver coins as pieces of numismatic history.
(especially given their much lower survival rate, due to several periods of large-scale melting that have already occurred)

Modern Silver Proof coins lack such historical import.

If I ever do sell my Proof "bullion", it will most likely be at a coin show table, not to a melter.
But once they're out of my hands...

How is it bad

1) to allow collectors and dealers to clear out their borderline collectable coins and put the money into stuff that's truly scarce?

2) to encourage non-collectors to turn in coins, including potentially valuable stuff that might otherwise stay in a box for another 20 years?

Yes, but from my standpoint, no coin should ever be melted. I would be afraid that they would not stop melting modern proofs before they are all gone.

But they are still coins! Where's the love?



They just raised them for 2011. I am not sure if they would raise them mid-year, but I am pretty sure they will not lower them. That being said, order them now.

From the dealer's point of view, it is probably good that lots of 'borderline collectible' silver is being washed out. Because that forces the serious hobbyist into the retail marketplace. From the hobbyist's perspective, this can be a minefield of overpriced, often overgraded coins that have migrated to the showcases of the profit hungry.
I am not saying that all dealers are unethical and/or greedy, but they all need to maximize their margins in order to stay afloat.
There is simply no going back to the magical days of circulating silver. This, to me, is very sad. Because it has destroyed much of the pure hobby aspects of coin collecting. Today's collector of silver has three options: local B&M dealers, if there are any; public coin auctions and shows, or internet buying. Each has its limitations. The argument that sacrificing common silver is a good thing from the hobby viewpoint because it allows for trade-ups at better margins, still does not address the needs of the beginner to be able to start with affordable items somewhere other than at the dealers' tables. With continuing high spot prices nudged up and up by world turmoil and economic uncertainty, eventually there will be no more inexpensive silver. The casual hobbyist who is not eager to hop on this wagon will fall by the wayside or seek other more rewarding pursuits.
I apologize for sounding so negative. I suppose I have been spoiled by being born too soon. I feel sorry for those who will never know the familiar ring of a silver coin dropped casually on a diner countertop as payment for a cup of coffee. And I will not consign my small stash of common circulated silver dimes and quarters to the melt pot. I resisted thirty years ago, and I feel the same today. When the next thirty year silver cycle rolls around, someone else will have the honor. Perhaps by then the numismatic value will have exceeded the metal value, because there will be so few of these coins remaining.

I never said my fear was rational. If it were, I would no longer have it.

Silver Proofs aren't just coins, they're shiny, silver coins. I love any and all shiny, silver coins.
Enough to have kept every single one of them and continuing my resistance to the temptation to "cash them in" for their high bullion value.

Didn't mean to scare you with the "once they're out of my hands" remark,
but it's the truth. Once you sell the coins, the buyer can do what they please with them.
At a recent flea market, I saw a Nebraska Silver Proof Quarter that was set into a sterling silver necklace
(yes, it was white in my tissue test!).
Point being, there are other horrors performed on coins besides melting.
I could buy dozens of "ex-jewelry-set" pre-1933 gold coins in just one shopping trip around town.

Silver is so high now that common silver will get melt--that's inevitable given quick turnaround. While dealers will probably spot most US silver of numismatic value, they might send scarcer world coins to the melter.

For example, consider the badly worn coin pictured below. Most US dealers wouldn't give second thought to sending a well-worn .925 coin to the smelter. But, any collector familiar with Aussie rarities would spot this 1922/1 immediately, which sold on Heritage for $3000. That's the real tragegy--many scarcer coins will be forever lost during this metals panic.

The likelihood of there being a $3000 coin out there to accidentally get refined is pretty slim to nonexistent, or it wouldn't be a $3000 coin. It's not like there are hundreds floating around in circulation that will all get turned in for scrap. Knowing how rare it is to find a 90% silver coin, I can't imagine many sterling coins that aren't already in collectors' hands.