I can get this Denarius for $19. Should I?

It has been cut in antiquity, but I think it is a denarius of Nero. Correct me if I am wrong.

The dealer has it priced at $19. Should I have pounced on it, or was I wise in letting it go?

 

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I would not have bought it. I don't think it's un-collectable just something I wouldn't want.

 

Personally, I would put that 19.00 towards a better coin.

 

Nero - and I would pass on it.

 

I agree with @Orfew, put the $19 towards a better coin. This coin has too many problems

 

It depends on your coin budget. If you're the kind of guy who doesn't spend more than fifty bucks on a single coin and you really want the type, you might not have many opportunities to come in under budget like this.

 

I agree with hoth2 and jwt. It depends on a person's coin budget and appetite for acquiring new coins. Yes, this coin is a bit of a dog but still... it's an ancient coin, it's Nero, therefore it is at least somewhat cool

 

@TypeCoin971793 Your coin is a silver Denarius of Nero. The reverse shown Jupiter seated holding a thunderbolt and scepter. It was struck at the Rome Mint in AD 67-68, during Nero's last and most unpopular days as Emperor.

References:
SR-1943
RIC I 69

I do not like to put myself in the position of being in disagreement with the people above who have provided an opinion and I certainly do agree that the coin suffers from a host of problems. But that being said, I think $19 for a genuine Denarius of Nero is a great deal almost regardless of what the coin looks like.

 

If you go on in the hobby and still have interest i twenty years, you will not be happy to have this coin. If you lose interest and try to sell this coin, you will not find a lot of interested buyers. I would buy a coin for $19 that was intact but I am hard on broken coins unless they are rare enough that I am unlikely to ever find another. That said, I have bought worse.

 

No.

 

As someone who has bought broaken coins, I agree with the above. If you only want a budget example, I dont think $19 is a bad deal for this but you can find bronze coins starting at $20 and if you want silver, Egyptian provincial of Nero are pretty cheap and very cool.

 

How much would that coin be worth in that condition without the chip?

Maybe that would help define the choice better.

 

$60 -$100

 

I did not buy it. Instead, I bought a US coin for $60 that I will try to make 10x my money on.

 

This coin was clipped, not broken. The cut was plainly obvious in hand. I don't know if that makes a difference.

 

I have trouble with the concept of buying a coin only to make money on it. If you are a dealer, that is fine. That is the name of the game. As a collector, any coin I buy that someone would pay me more for than I paid is probably one I don't want to sell. I'd be happy to sell you a coin worth $1000 that I paid $1250 for but I rarely want to get rid of a coin costing $1000 that is worth $1250. Who wants to make my mistakes into their mistakes?

My definitions:
Chipped (a real fault):

Broken (a real fault):

Cut/broken (for change - not a fault but a fact):

 

I would define clipped as part deliberately cut off for its precious metal value with the intention of passing on the rest of the coin at full face value.

That could be the case with the op coin? I have no idea how often denarii were clipped in this fashion. Some issues suffered routinely from clipping to the point the mints created designs that made clipping obvious.

 

I'm going to nominate this succinct piece of advice as the one of the best processes for evaluating whether or not to collect (not buy for resale) an ancient coin.

Paraphrasing,

(1) Will I still be happy with this coin in (1, 2, 5, 20) years?
(2) If I'm not happy and want to sell it, will anyone else be interested in collecting it?

If the answer to both of the above questions is NO, your decision is obvious.

 

I wasn't going to buy the denarius to flip. Some ancients I do sell because I need them to pay for the ancients that I most want to keep. I can't afford to keep them all. I bought the US coin to sell because it was not in my collecting area, and it would be an easy profit when it sells.

 

Could not agree more.