1880-o versus 1904-o morgan

The 1904-o has a much smaller mintage quantity. But the 1880-o is worth bigger prices. Why is this?

 

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There are lots of quandary's like this in the hobby. Look at the 1927 Peace Dollar, only 848,000 minted, yet it priced like a common. As far as the 1880-O and 1904-O Morgan Dollar go, one must look at how many are available for collector's now. There may have been (say several thousand) of the 1880-O melted to mint the 1904-O, or any other number of things.

Take Care
Ben

 

it used to be considered a rare morgan til bags were released from treasury storage in 1962-1964. maybe over a million were released. it was not the same case with the 1880-O, though both are considered common. til about oct 1962 the 04-O was considered a rarity. david bowers estimate in buyers guide places the mint state estimate as nearly 10x more plentiful for the 1904-O vs 1880-O. hope this helps some...steve

 

did the treasury release the morgans in the sixties at face value? and a million what? A million coins? or a million bags? how many per bag?

 

bags

I believe the bags had 1000 coins per bag (so about 1 million coins sold of the 04-o) and were handed out at face value. I think the only coins sold at a premium were the Carson City morgans sold in the early 70,s by the GSA.

 

sorry. 1000 coins per bag , so possibly a million or more mint state pieces were released by the treasury as you could still get dollars for face at the bank. this was in 62-64 era. many collectors would buy bags at face then scrounge thru them for good dates.

 

so srkjkd, the 62-64 Morgan release was mixed dates, then? ...is the treasury hoarding any more Morgans?

 

It may be that many 1880-O Morgans that were uncirculated and sitting in bank vaults were melted under the Pittman Act in 1918. Lower grade ones that were in circulation or private hands may have avoided being melted. This would explain why lower grade 1880-O Morgans are common, but uncirculated examples carry a hefty premium.

The 1904-O Morgans that sat in bank vaults until the 1960s explain their abundance in uncirculated grades.

 

i'm trying to do ths from memory, but others will correct my errors as there are many excellent coin minds here. no, i don't believe any more are hidden away. in 62-64 obviously, silver was still standard coinage. youwould see half dollars circulating around commonly then. dollars were still available at face if you asked for them at a bank and if the bank had them. demand was increasing in late 60's and we were also getting ready to go to clad coinage by 65. as the banks responded to customer demand, they got deeper in the vaults. dates like the 04-O and also 03-O began to surface. these had been rare til then but the reason being is that stuff that hadn't been melted in prior years were just stored away. these were some of the dates and they were tucked away in bags of 1000. prices for both dropped after that as these came to light. by 1965 i don't think you could get them any more (silver dollars from bank). the gov't still had some bags hidden away or forgotten about til early 70's. most all of these were carson city mints and the gov't released these at auction, i believe in 74 (?). think the bidding started around $60. once again, i'm doing this from memory but believe its correct. as far as mintage vs. prices...sometimes coins were hoarded like 50D nickels, 1883 no cent nickels which left many availble in mint state. if i recall, i think the 31d and 31s lincoln cents fall into this category as one had low mintage and everyone held onto it due to that, while the other got spent and circulated, hence a higher mintage more expensive in mint state than a lower mintage of same year. interesting...i hope this helps some and others with more knowledge will chime in.

 

bags

My understanding was most of the bags were solid date bags, but I'm sure some might have been mixed. I'm not sure about the stricktly bu bags, but solid dates make more sense.

 

One dealer on ebay is putting the NGC population report in his Morgan Auctions. Looks like a so-called "sleeper" coin, aka UNDERVALUED, might be the 1900-o. 12,500,000 minted, BUT: ....graded MS-63 by NGC, only 12,000!!!! Whereas the 1904-o: approximately 3,500,000 minted, much lower mintage, but over 40,000 graded MS63 by NGC. And only 4,000 of the 1900-o graded by ngc in MS65. . Im one of the many who hasnt paid for an NGC or PCGS membership yet. the Population reports from the grading companies are generally for their members only. If the population reports can gain wider distribution, the hobby could be theoretically be in for some major changes, as far as waking people up to whats rare today. I bought a 1904-o for $45 bucks. A nice coin. But Im going to target some 1900-o morgans.

 

remember that pop reports will always raise. note that a low pop report on 1882-s morgans and similar dates. its not that the coin is rare. its that its common in the grades and not going to get them a 66 or 67 grade so no point in paying to get it slabbed. look at auction listings and dealer listings especially over the years to see how many times that coin is available in that given grade.. heritage is a great resource when it comes to that. been able to track prices and appearances from their auctions for frequency and price. also coin vs coin comparison. same w/ teletrade and other auction houses. then i go to dealer lists to see how many are available in dealer stock and prices. get a copy of david bowers buyers guide as it is worth the money. i am putting together morgans as a collection. since money is a premium, i chose to go the ms63/64 route for more bang for the buck and less competition. for the scarce and keys i go for fine or better. the real keys are beyond me at this point. when buying, i go for what i deem to be the prettiest coin for the money. i first look at pics for the certain characteristics i want in my collection...color..peripheral toning...steel gray to slightly darker for my circulated coins. strictly what i find eye appealing to me. then comes pricing and its coin vs coin. the first basis tho is it must catch my eye. also keep in mind that there are lots of morgans out there for the most part so pick and choose. there is no shortage of people wanting to trade you coins for money so make sure you get the best coin for your buck even if you have to wait. another will always appear at some point. especially common or semi scarce dates.

 

What do I call rare? Then let me clarify myself. Im talking about SEMI-rare dates. Specifically, my point within the context of this thread is I call 1900-o Morgans semi-rare in MS63. As I said, based upon NGC population reports. Sure as more coins get graded, population reports will rise. That doesnt matter too much. The 1904-o is already far more common than the 1900-o in MS63 thru MS65 by a ratio of four to one, or greater, based on NGC population reports. Any PCGS members reading this: I ask a favor if you can look at the PCGS pop. reports for the two coins and report back in this thread. Asa many of you have often said, a lot of stuff got melted down. The population reports from the grading companies are a good measure of whats left.

 

Among other things, numerous crackouts and upgrades are not taken into account in population reports. IMO a more accurate gauge of scarcity is the frequency of auction appearances. Quickly looking over TT, Heritage, and eBay for 1904-O Morgans I currently see 140 coins for sale or auction. For 1900-O Morgans, I count around 115 individual coins for sale or auction. This doesn't even begin to touch the number of coins available from dealers.

Only my $0.02.

 

Theres not a morgan dollar in every household. if theres 5000 graded by ngc in ms63 of a coin, for our purposes, thats rare. Lets not nitpick the definition of rare. What terminology would you rather use? If theres less than ten of something, then we would not be able to afford it, would we? There would not be a discussion forum for something of less than ten existing.

 

In the case of 1900-O and 1904-O Morgans in 63 - the prices don't justify the cost of submitting to a TPG for grading and ensapsulation. Honestly, the term I would use to describe 1904-O and 1900-O Morgans is dirt common.

In the Morgan series, prices are a fairly accurate indicator of rarity. Prices are a reflection of supply and demand. When there is enough supply to meet demand, prices tend to be low. Notice the prices of 1904-O and 1900-O's are just about the lowest in the series. This is because there is more than enough supply.

My definition of a rarity is anything with an existing population under 100. For example, a 1913 Liberty nickel is rare - 5 known. There is huge demand for this coin (Hey, everyone wants to own one, right?), but extremely limited supply. That is why these coins sell for 1 million + when they appear at auction.

The Morgan $ is one of the most popular and collected U.S. coins, and there is huge demand. But - the 1900-O is inexpensive, because there is more than enough supply to meet demand.

NGC has slabbed 22987 1900-O's, and PCGS has probably slabbed a similar amount. Right there you have around 35,000, without even taking into consideration hundreds of thousands of raw coins.

 

a good reference to get aside from john highfill's book and vam book would be david bower's buyers guide and redbook for more morgan info. he even breaks down estimated pop of given dates/mints per grade as well as other useful info. the great thing about morgans is that there are so many avaiable in mint state due to treasury releases, ect. rare and scarce are relative terms in relationship within a series. even on the listed coins like 80-O and 00-O ect. there are lots and lots available for purchase. finding a 93-S is a little more difficult, but i still see them listed fairly often. this is still a great series for collectors. example for 1900-O est ms 60-62 750,000-1,250,000..ms63 est 120,000-200,000...ms64 est100,000-200,000 ms65 or better.20,000-40,000. source david bowers buyers guide to silver dollars, as you can see, this series has enough coins for almost everyone in any grade. lots just haven't been certified due to cost of cert compared to price of coin.

 

I was in the bookstore today. I still say 1900-o and 1904-o should be considered semi-key dates. But that argument aside, I did learn two key dates to take notice of, are 1887-S and 1900-S. Im going to try to add one of those to my collection.)