Yeah I bought some Platinum xD

Oh yeah Romans are fun!

However they definitely aren’t something you’d want to get into to try to make a profit unless you really know what you’re doing.

I’ll be happy if I get 60% of what I paid for my ancient coins.

But if you enjoy learning about ancient history I definitely recommend collecting them .

They’re pretty awesome!

 

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Those are really cool

So what are most made out of ? they seem to have a very unique grading
system as well, any made out of GOLD ? or are they mostly bronze or
other alloys ?

 

Most of them are made of copper or silver. All the ones I posted are pretty high purity silver.

On the NGC slab:
AV = Gold (from the Latin “aurum”)
EL = Electrum
AR = Silver (from the Latin “argentum”)
BI = Billion (heavily debased silver)

& there are a couple others they used.

So like mine says “AR Denarius” it means it’s silver.

They do make gold coins like the aureus but they are like REALLY expensive.

For comparison coincidentally the ancient Roman gold aureus contains the same amount of gold as the American $5 gold Half Eagles that we used during our Gold Standard days.



1 gold aureus = 25 silver denarius
1 silver denarius = 16 bronze asses


The aureus was also always struck of a very high purity (98% or more) gold even when the denarius was being debased into oblivion.

When the Aureus was debased it usually had its weight reduced but the gold always stayed at a very high purity.

 

Oh and yeah they do have a different grading system.

It’s because in ancient times every single die was engraved by hand.

Obviously with engravers of different skill levels this resulted in some coins being struck with higher quality designs so these coins are given the “Fine Style” designation.


Here is a good example of my Fine Style Victoriatus:


Compared to a normal non-Fine Style Victoriatus of equal condition grade but struck from dies engraved of a lower artistic quality:


You can really see the difference between the skill levels of the die engravers.

My Fine Style coin has a portrait that appears much more realistic whereas the non-FS one looks more cartoonish.

 

Thanks for sharing, so are all roman coins that small ? so about the size os a 1/10 AGE ?

 

No they’re bigger than a 1/10th oz AGE. They’re the size of a 1/4 oz AGE or a
pre-1933 $5 gold piece.

They did make rare larger pieces like the 40 gram 8 aureii medallion but those are 5 figures minimum and extremely rare.

This example has a $10,000 starting bid with a $20,000-30,000 estimate.

It’s even bigger than a 1 oz AGE or Buffalo.

 

jus to pick your brain a little more...LOL, why are allot of them off center or
cracked ? I think you mentioned in a earlier post that the skill level of the
engravers varied but putting things on center doesn't seem to be that hard.

 

Depends on the size of the coin whether they are centered or not.

Remember these coins were struck by hand and thousands were struck per day and it’s pretty easy for the coins to move out of place and be struck off center.

As for the cracks those are pressure cracks that all hammered coinage has.

 

Yeah, was just wondering on that
thanks for the info.

 

Ouch! PMs are being battered today!

Thank goodness for stocks. Lol!

 

Gold down almost 1%, silver down 1.75%, BTC down 1.4%, S&P down 1.1%, NASDAQ down 0.6%. Makes me wish I'd dumped everything into Apple, it's down only 0.1%. Not the first time I've wished that.

Edit: palladium down 1%, platinum down 4%?! I give up, nothing makes sense any more.

 

I prefer Microsoft xD. They pay a better dividend and are just as solid.

 

No argument here. I formed my Apple-vs-MS preference decades ago, when they were very different companies. It's no longer a rational preference.

 

P.S. The reason *everything* is down is because the markets are expecting the Fed to raise interest rates thus leading to a stronger dollar and a cool down on the inflation and rising prices of everything.

When the dollar itself gets stronger every market goes down.

Gold is worth less of the more valuable dollars.

Stocks are worth less of the more valuable dollars than the easy money dollars of a near 0% interest rate.

Everything is worth less. One extreme example is when the dollar was uber strong during the days of the Gold Standard. Everything in those days cost less because the dollar back then was much more valuable than a dollar today. Of course back then a dollar was defined as 1.5 grams of pure gold.

But even though it’s a pretty extreme example it gets the point across of how markets work when the dollar gets stronger rather than weaker.

 

With everything happening today, inflation is everywhere you seem to get less and pay more, a pick example that I noticed yesterday, went to Panda Express they not
have only increased there prices from $6.65 to $7.15 but the bowls now substantially smaller so you get less product, instead of being a normal size
bowl it is now concaved at the bottom so less product is being served, one of
many examples.

Then we got the war in Ukraine by the little man Putin, not sure what the end game
is there but I am avoiding stocks entirely now and still am on standby there so
focusing on BTC to fund a couple onces of GOLD each month.

 

Yeah for sure it’s a pretty common tactic for companies. I remember reading an article about Snickers candy bars being smaller than they were in the 1990s.

You might want to keep some US Dollars on hand too. If interest rates go up to 4% as analysts are expecting it could lead to price decreases as money becomes more expensive to borrow.

For years banks have been able to borrow at 0% or 0.25% interest so money has flowed loose and free.

At 4% that just won’t happen. That’s what the banks pay and then the rate is even higher for the customer.

Im keeping some US Dollars handy .

 

I am always for keeping some cash on hand as I think thats very important
but also believe in diversification, cant say that 100% because I am on standby
when it comes to stocks, but am in to everything else..LOL

 

buy the dips .....same strategy as always

 

timing can be an issue, use my AMEX for all my bullion purchase, no interest
and a ton of points to boot, comes do on the 6th so rain or shine...LOL

 

I remember I applied for a Venture card right before a big bullion purchase because it said if I spent $4,000 in 3 months I would get 60,000 points which is like $600.

It worked well!