Reasons to collect world coins.

The problem is that people often use the terms "scarce" and "rare" based on market value rather than actual availability.

 

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Or simply use it as a marketing comeon.

The funny thing is there ARE scarce and rare US coins, but since they aren't promotable enough, never get much attention. Try finding business strike half dollars from the 1880's, or better yet look at things like gold mintages. I have toyed with the idea of collecting eagles by date/mm, (skipping over things like the 1933 for obvious reasons), and I see mintages of less than 1000 coins fairly regularly. But, how many people collect eagles by date/mm? Even SL halves commonly are not collected that way, so people do not talk about how scarce they really are for some dates.

 

Don't think that "absolute" figures make much sense when we try to determine what a rare object is. Just one example - modern (21c) collector coins from Romania usually have a mintage of 500, sometimes 250 only, no matter whether it's a gold, silver or tombac/brass piece. So if for some reason the Romanian mint makes 1,000 pieces, that would be a high mintage. In that context, 500 is certainly not rare ...

Christian

 

I understand, but of the issues I noted above, if they made 5,000 circulation issues 130 years ago, there might be a few hundred around today. Even weirder is how some issues like a 27d double eagle might have over a million struck but have maybe 5 surviving today.

I guess I was just trying to show there ARE rare US coins, but they are not the ones collectors commonly talk about like 1916d dimes of 1909sVDB cents. Those two coins, in world coin terms, are downright common coins. I was just trying to say we DO have rare coins, its just that most US collectors do not know about them.

 

Rare is less than 10 examples known. I have a couple of Scots coins that only 3-4 are known. My rarest USA coin has less then two dozen known examples, a pattern from 1868.

 

I can say though that sort of annoys me because there are some coins I would really like to get my paws on because I collect that theme, ie the Aurel Vlaicu commemoratives, but even my collector friends in Romania can't usually get them.

 

U S coins are generally sold for a small amount over here in the UK and for one i have never been a fan of most issues from across the pond but give me british (including islands, scotland and ireland) or french and i always pay top dollar to get the best example possible.

 

They minted over 484,000 1909-S VDB cents. They are worth a minimum of $600 In problem free condition. I have a coin that has a mintage of 32,000. It was a circulating coin, too. It's worth $10. Go figure.

 

In the end it is all about demand - I have CC mintmarked $20s that are under 20k mintage that are more affordable than the 09-S VDB.

 

In my opinion, rarity is independent of how much it cost for an example. The '09-S VDB cent is not rare at all, regardless of how much an example costs. ANY coin show will have multiple examples for sale and, likely, an example or two in decently high MS grade. The fact that it will cost you a few thousand dollars to purchase in MS grade doesn't mean it's rare, it simply means it is expensive.

Conversely, truly rare coins are not necessarily expensive. I define rarity based on how easy or difficult it is to find an example at a "usual" coin show or something of the sorts. I have dozens of non-USA coins with mintages less than or around 1,000 pieces. These are coins that, until recently with the ability to find them online, I would have never seen at coin shows. But, their scarceness alone doesn't make them expensive.

People too often equate the concepts of rarity and price. RARITY is the supply-side of a coin (how many coins there are to go around). POPULARITY (or number of collectors seeking an example) is the demand-side of a coin. Price is a combination of both ingredients: if supply is low, and demand is high, then the price will be commensurately high.

Remember, price is a combination of BOTH issues, not equal to RARITY. In the case of the '09-S VDB, the popularity is disproportionately high pushing up the price, but if you have the $$$ you can easily find a coin. By contrast, for a truly rare coin, all examples may be tucked away in collections and off the market, and no amount of money will make the mintage increase.

 

If by it you mean price. The rarity has nothing to do with the demand.

 

To some extent rarity and demand are correlated. Personally if I pick up an example of a particular series I go for the key date rather than a common one, and this is true for many other collectors as well. In that sense rarity does contribute to heightened demand.

 

Correlation and Causation are not the same. While a higher price can be related to a lower-mintage ("key") coin, price alone doesn't make a coin rare. The '16-D Mercury dime or the '09-S VDB Lincoln cent are the classic examples. At every show you can find an example if you have the money. They are expensive, yes. But, not hard to find or rare at all.

If you want the grand-daddy of all USA coins that is the intersection of both rarity and popularity, then the 1913 Liberty would be a good example. The coin is massively rare, and highly popular -- and the price is accordingly astronomical.

 

Well, the VDB probably has around 40mm people in the US alone rummaging through change for that coin, due to the publicity it's garnered through the years. Demand is further increased by those individuals who are trying to complete Lincoln Cent collections, since the S VDB is an actual issued coin.

Now, add to this the requirement of the coin being "problem free" (meaning a TPG won't body bag the coin, for this intent and purpose), and your population of coins falls drastically. Also, as of 2008, 200 BILLION pennies were in circulation around the world. Even if we assumed all of the S VDB coins were problem free, you'd have a less than 1:400,000 chance of randomly pulling one from a circulation bag. That also assumes that none of them have been removed from circulation. 7570 have been graded by PCGS in AG3-AU58 states. Assuming a ratio of 1:24 (graded:raw) coins in collections, 189,000 of available non-UNC coins have been removed from circulation. That leaves us with 300,000 or so coins in circulation.

Assuming that over the past 100 years 80% of the coins are either damaged or non-identifiable, you're left with 60,000 1909-S VDB coins in circulation among a population of 200B coins. The perceived rarity stems from publicity and source of the coins. By contrast, your coin with the 32,000 mintage, circulating or not, is probably:

A) from a smaller economy.
B) a larger denomination coin.
C) a non-proof edition coin that is technically a business strike but never released into circuation.
D) a non-descript small denomination coin made from an industrial metal.

It could be any combination of these, but I think it's safe to say that at least one of the criteria applies.

Another thing... I think the initial premise of this thread is inaccurate and very Americentric. While there aren't as many collectors of world coins (excluding crown collectors, I suppose) as US circulation coins in the US, I'm sure that coin collectors in the respective countries collect their own coins more often than they do US coins. A large part of this has to do with availability. It's a similar reason behind the low price of minerals until there is a consistent enough supply to use the stones in jewelry. If demand is perceived to be so low that marketability would also remain low, the price will be low. Demand will pick up when marketability of the item increases. US coins are far more marketable to US coin collectors than foreign coins, so the prices in the US are higher.

 

So funny... I do it vice versa as I live in Europe but collect US coins. Some people may not be aware that there are really scarce and expensive coins in other countries than the US... e.g. old German/French/British silver & gold coins - and we do have collectors too ;-)

 

I have found a Philly mint VDB cent from 1909 from circulation - in nice collectable condition also - but usually when you get those 100+ year old coins from roll searches etc they are pretty worse for the wear. Prolly never find an S mint as they were likely pulled well before my time.