Fake Trade Dollars?

The 1880 is almost certainly fake, I have serious doubts that it is one of the 1,987 proofs minted in a year with no business(circulation) strikes. The 1878 is also very suspect, see if you can see a mintmark above the D in DOLLAR. An 1878 without a mintmark is also a rare proof-only issue. Since two out of the five are probably counterfeit, that makes the rest of them questionable as well.

Tolerance for a Trade dollar is 420 grains +/-1.5 grains(27.22 grams) so only a 0.36% variation in weight was allowed. Obviously, a worn coin will weigh a little less but anything more than 1 gram underweight should be considered suspect. Without clearer pics, it would be impossible to look for diagnostics that would confirm a genuine example.

if they are fake and the price is right id be interested in the 1880 it looks good enough to teach with.

One must immediately assume that any raw Trade dollar is counterfeit, and then look for evidence that you're wrong. Unlike most coin issues, Trade dollars have had an inherent motivation to produce counterfeits since the day they were issued, having been minted by one country with the intent that they circulate in other countries. This created a fertile atmosphere for counterfeiting, since they circulated in places where people wouldn't necessary know what they were supposed to look like.

That's the reason for "chopmarks" on Trade dollars, a certification by merchants that they were, in fact, genuine. Chopmarks were contemporary, and if they were necessary you can assume that the fakes started appearing immediately.

With that said, there's also a market for contemporary counterfeits - people collect them, too.

I have to agree. They are most likely all fake. As far as their metal content goes, how do they sound in the ring test? Nothing rings quite like silver. If your lucky they will at least be fakes made of silver...

Contemporary counterfeits don't have to be marked. The HPA requirement for marking applies to pieces made in 1973 and later.



If they are a lower fineness of silver the simple way to get the weight right is make the planchets very slightly thicker. For example if they use 500 fine silver instead of 900 fine to be the same weight the planchet would have to be 2.44 mm thick instead of 2.31 mm or about 5 thousandths of an inch thicker.