A five gallon pail holds $316 pennies minus $16 which is zinc which equals $300 net the $300 net weighs 165 pounds which means you pay $1.92 per pound for the copper, zinc is just junk not figured in, then 165 pounds on spot copper market is $2.92 per pound this leaves you with $1.00 profit or $181 for a five gallon pail easy money!
Is that after you, yourself process the pure copper out of all the pennies? Or before you pay someone else to process pure copper from all the pennies?
You are planning to sell the cents? The Scrapyard will not take them. I have asked 3 different locations. I believe it's also illegal with fines if caught. https://iscrapapp.com/blog/can-i-scrap-copper-pennies-no/
Reclamation companies would only pay you about 25% of the price for Grade A copper. So, if Grade A copper is selling for $2.92/lb. you would only get about $120 for 165 lbs. of pennies. (NOTE: I haven't deducted anything from the weight for the zinc & tin.) Therefore, you would be losing $196 for every 5-gallon bucket of pennies. Chris
How much for 3 55 gallon drums. That is 50 - $50 bags that equals $2500.00 and 35 lbs per copper cents that equals 1750 pounds in each drum. Total for the 3 drums is 5200 pounds and $7,500.00. Based on you $2.92 per pound I have a value of $15,184.00. Which would be $7,684.00 profit if we could melt cents. But, why not? We melt silver coins. P.S. I started the fourth drum.
If you live in the US, the US Gov't made it illegal. Otherwise when copper prices spike, ppl will want to melt their coinage. Which would drain the money supply.
Silver coins aren't considered circulation coins anymore and can be melted. One and 5 cent coins are illegal to melt because the mint wouldn't be able to keep up with the demand as they are removed. People still hoard them hoping in the future the coins are discontinued and the ban will be lifted. What people don't realize is if that ever happens the metal prices will drop so fast there will be no profit to be made!
This is true. Lots of people would immediately try and sell for a profit, and the price would bottom from the supply glut. Cents nowadays are pot metal, and have been for decades. Removing the old ones would not burden the mint. Heck, if they allowed it, half the country would try to sell, prices would drop and save the mint millions. Also, they might be silver colored, and called nickels, they are 75% copper. Have been for a long time. No squinting at dates or weighng. The mint loses even more money on nickels.
