Bank Of Nauru $10 Coin For $10 From Macquarie Mint

milky. Thats a nice looking coin. Looks too good to be true though. Does it say what size it is? I guess if it's the size of a quarter or smaller it would be under melt.

Silver melt value on a quarter is about $7.20 I think. So at $10 it is slightly under melt value if it's solid silver. Silver melt is also called "spot" for future reference.
So if the coin is at $10 USD and is 90% silver the price is not bad.

From the first link:



It's 5g of silver according to the site, for $10 Australian.

If it's in fact a legal tender $10 face value coin, then I don't see a downside. However if no one will accept it for a debit of $10 then IDK.

Remember, the true value of a coin is what someone is willing to give you in return for it.

I'd tend to agree with the post above by markn, seems to be all about getting you on a mailing list.

I clicked through to checkout and they have a special free postage offer. But I find it suspect that at no point do they tell you size or silver content of coin.

I tried, but can someone with better computer skills blow the coin up where it states silver content. In my attempt I blew it up to see squiggly line x 3. Possibly the coin is quite large with a low as can go silver content!

http://www.downies.com/australia/st....asp?id=6066
2011 $10 We Will Remember Them Silver BU

2011 Bank Of Nauru 10 Dollar Proof Coin
50% Silver
Diameter: 26mm
Mintage: 50000
Weight: 10 grams

RRP: $22.00 In box with certificate.

But Macquarie Mint only sells the coins, so they are only worth face value anyway.

http://eurocollections.com/store/pr....asp?id=6444
http://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces23749.html

Some things to note.

First, buying anything from Macquarie Mint will put you on their mailing list. Unless you specifically request otherwise, they will keep sending you coins and deducting the price from your credit card, expecting you to pay to return them if you don't want them. See this thread for discussions on this company.

Second, despite the blatant attempt to extract sympathy from Australian buyers with a clearly Australian theme, I agree that this is not technically an Australian coin. I will be moving this thread to World Coins as soon as I'm done posting this.

Third, and despite what I said in point two, this coin's face value is indeed for ten Australian dollars, since the Nauruan dollar is on par with the Australian one. Of course, whether anyone actually in Nauru would ever be persuaded to change your coin for a 10 dollar note is another question. I doubt if anyone in the country apart from the Finance Minister knows of the existence of these coins.

Finally, Nauru needs all the foreign cash it can get. If you're interested in helping to support an economic basket-case country with a truly tragic "hard-luck story", then by all means buy the coins; hopefully, Macquarie Mint will pass along enough profits from them to Nauru to make a difference. If, however, you see yourself as more of a Fiscal Darwinist, then buying these coins is not for you.

I thought I'd bump this thread, rather than start a new one, to give a bit of an update.

In my role as Secretary of the Queensland Numismatic Society, the local ABC Radio station here in Brisbane contacted me about doing a short on-air interview; the early morning show host had seen the ads in the newspaper and had questions about what the deal with these coins really was and wanted a coin collector's perspective about these coins. I went in and did the interview this morning, Brisbane time; ABC page for the interview. I told them pretty much what was being said in this thread, and elsewhere, and even though (as per ABC policy) the company was not named, I don't think Macquarie Mint fared well.

A few hours later, I received an e-mail from the Secretary for Justice and Border Control for the Republic of Nauru.

It turns out that the Nauruan government has previously noticed and been concerned about these advertisements. He'd either heard or found out about the interview and wished to confirm that these coins are not, repeat not, issued and authorised by the Government of Nauru, nor by the Bank of Nauru which (as lordty pointed out above) has been in liquidation since 2009. As I had suspected, but could not confirm in my researches, Nauru actually has no legal basis in its Constitution or Law that allows it to issue its own coinage.

So, either Macquarie Mint is pulling a fast one and outright lying in their ads, or they've been swindled by a conman pretending to be "the official Treasury Authority of Nauru" who gave them fake authority for these coins. Either way, the people of Nauru aren't getting a cent of profit out of the sale of them.

I listened to your interview!
So cool
It's great that we have this forum; people can ask questions and find out about stuff that the average Joe wouldn't be able to get information on.
Ha, how awesome is it that the Secretary for Justice and Border Control for the Republic of Nauru emailed you about this.

Thankyou for sharing, now we all know that this is a scam, or poor investment.
But it does beg the question why Downies/Macquarie mint a major coin dealer and business get fooled by a scam, they are supposed to be very knowledgeable and know better and have research into this. I think Downies should have an email sent off to them asking for some sort of explanation.