Can A Coin Ever Be Worth Less Than Face Value?

This might be the most stupid question ever asked...but....
I am not really a coin "collector"....except of Ireland.
But having visited USA for first time in 2013 (aged 60) and handling cents, dimes, nickels andquarters for the first time....having seen them in movies and TV for over fifty years....I do kinda have an interest.
They seem easily available in flea markets etc.
But I noticed an odd thing on Friday at a market stall.
Coins costing 15 pence. Or 10 for £1 ....The box included quarters and I must say that I like quarters...a nice size and typical of USA.
So I end up with ten quarters of different dates 1960s thru 1990s and I have bought them for £1.
So I presume all these quarters still have a minimum face value of 25 cents (they dont go out of circulation?).
So thats a good "exchange rate".....$2.50 for £1
Now I am not suggesting I fill my suitcase with Quarters and then on my next visit to USA exchange them for dollars in a Wells Fargo branch...for a start it would take me a long time to gather 400 quarters.
But is this ....even possible?

 

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Theres a few factors. The silver content if any. Also, if you paid 1 euro for 2.50 american, it was a good deal on your part. If im not mistaken its 1 euro for like 1.30 american? Been a couple days since i looked up the conversion rate.


Anyways, to answer your question, no. Unless the US goes away.

 

I guess your seller thought it was easier to sell them this way than to gather them all, count them all, and find a place to exchange them. That takes time, and for some people, that time is worth more than the extra pound it might earn them.

 

If the currency ever gets demonetized, then it would loose it's face value but it could go up in collector value.

 

It's pretty common for coins from other nations that are not easily redeemable for their value in the currency of that nation to be purchased or sold for a percentage below their face value.
That being said, $2.50 for £1 is a great deal.

 

I never fully understood it myself, but a few of my US dealer friends have a bucket of foreign coins that they sell for pennies apiece. The only time they pay attention to them is to check a random one here or there for silver content. At coin shows, a few kids will pass through and spend 45mins-1hr digging through them picking out a small handful with their allowance money ($2-$10). Then, I made friends with a gentleman from England, who had a bucket of "foreign" change that he brought with him when he recently moved to the US. At one of the shows around here, I was sitting talking to him for a few hours. I happened to catch a barber dime on top. I asked how much he charged for coins in that bucket. "5 for a dollar" was his reply. I asked if he had gone through it before, and his reply was "not in this decade". So I grabbed a few handfuls, and started pulling out 90% US coins that to this former man of the crown, were foreign coins. I pulled out around $2.50 face in 2 mins. It was about 10 coins (+/-2). I handed him $3. One was a Barber half in XF-AU. Not going to retire me, but it was funny that "foreign" to a foreigner is home grown to me.

 

If that's how you treat your friends, I'd hate to see what you do to your enemies.

 

Thanks for these answers guys.

 

I bought like 8 pound coins for 25 cents a coin.

 

I'm thinking that quite a lot of pound coins have been demonetized.

On an unrelated note, I wonder if you'd consider de-animating your profile image? It's kind of distracting, especially when you're showing up a lot in the Recent Topics list...

 

OK, I will. Sorry if it is distracting.

Back to the good old Mercury Dime avatar.

 

Thank you, on behalf of my poor spasming eyes. I liked that Merc best anyway.

 

When my wife returned to the US from a trip to London, she had a few pounds left over. The 5 and 10 note could be exchanged at the bank but their $15 fee for the service made small amounts not worth doing so we ended up giving them to a friend planning a trip. The 3-4 pounds worth of one pound and smaller coins would not be touched by the local bank even if we had a thousand of them. How much effort is it worth to find someone to make a tiny exchange? I suspect it is similar in the other direction. I went to a coin show where a dealer had a pickout pot for foreign coins and was allowing kids to take one coin free just for being there. I saw several kids take coins but last I saw the 2 Euro coin was still in there. I could have bought it for a quarter but I don't plan on going to Europe and don't know what I'd do with it.

I understand there is a problem with fake pound coins circulating in the UK. Perhaps some of these coins really are not worth a quarter???

 

Foreign coins...you bet. U.S. coins....not yet. But coins, currency and bonds of the Confederate States of America are "obsolete." The coins are pretty rare, and are worth a lot more than face....as a function of supply and demand. not true for CSA bills and bonds.

 

There certainly are fake £1 coins around but I'm not sure it is that big a problem.

Going by ebay, lots of folk here collect US coins. I think we all collect the unusual. We went through decimalisation so our old coins are no longer legal tender so little chance of getting a silver coin in your change.

 

Actually, Jeff, all pounds are still legal tender, as far as I am aware. There aren't too many currencies out there that have remained consistently legal tender and haven't radically changed in value, but the British Pound is one of them.

 

Absolutely right. Not demonetised but decimalised. We lost the predecimal coins and gained some new ones but a £ is still a £. The £1 coins are modern and replaced the £1 notes. The £1 notes are no longer currency.

 

No problem, if I ever change my avatar again I will try one that does not give people headaches.


Also, The pound coins are 1983 if I remember correctly. I think they are still legal tender according to the last time I looked them up. I guess that dealer has the lowest exchange rate ever.

 

All British Bank of England and Treasury notes are redeemable for face value,since about the mid 18th C, although anything before the mid 20th C is likely to have a collector's premium, even if lightly circulated.

There is a regular trade in other countries coinage at about 50% of face value. The stuff needs to be accumulated, and transported, which means the higher denominations are preferred, and then someone spends maybe $150 to transport 1000 Euros in coin to Eire, where they bank them for that 1000 Euro face value.
You will find the rates by looking at ebay sales of job lots of Euro coins or whatever.

Some 'legacy' pre Euro European coins are still exchangeable in the relevant European banks, search 'legacy currencies' for a list.

Banks won't handle foreign coin exchange, to much weight and fuss for too little value. If the only people who want these coins will pay no more than half of face value, then certainly, to answer the OP, coins can be worth less than face value.

The Euro has pretty well ruined the 'Face value' trade in the UK, I used to be able to accumulate Marks and Francs from people's mixed foreign junk boxes for a fraction of face and sell then to long distance lorry drivers for a rather larger fraction of face, they would then spend them in Europe at face value. No more. Most people above the breadline go to somewhere in Europe annually, and they take and spend their own odd coins.

 

As an afterthought Britain issued some cupro-nickel crown (dollar) sized £5 coins that are legal tender for £5 and have just about zero collector value, but finding someone who will accept a £5 coin is pretty hard, so in effect there are worth less than the face value even in their own country.

I have also bought a lot of about 800 Churchill crowns,(ugly coins like your Ike dollars) nominally 25p. each legal tender value, for about half face at an auction, presumably because no one else there bothered to work out the face value. Or knew that the Post Office, not the banks, were legally obliged to take them at face value. Most were in the original Royal Mint £50 bags.

I love it when you have an unwilling official over a barrel. The post office manager really, really did not want to take them, moaning about how they'd have to arrange a special van to take them away, and pay someone to count them, etc. I had to refer her about 2 or 3 steps up the managerial food chain before we found someone who'd admit I was in the legal right and she had to take them and pay be full face value, free of any charges.

Not a huge profit, but such fun dealing politely and patiently with people with petty power when the rules that give them that power say you are right and they are wrong.