Here's a scary thought.

With the price of silver currently at $19.55, a Morgan dollar would contain $15.12 worth of silver in it. We already know that the mints in China are able to make first-rate copies even to the extent of aging them, artificially, to appear circulated.

But, what is most disconcerting to me is what would happen if the price of silver remained at this level or possibly drop even further? What would prevent these counterfeiters from using real silver in the coins? If they can turn out a nice MS64 or MS65 coin for a cost that low and sell it for a tad under the going rate for authentic coins of that grade, they would still be making a huge profit.

Who says that they have to produce fakes of the key dates? The markers for most of these coins are too well known, but how many of us (me included!) are well-versed on the myriad die pairs that were used for most of the common-date coins like the '21 PDS?

Chris

 

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...and you just posted this idea on an open internet forum?

If I start seeing these I know who to blame!

 

I second that!!

 

They are probably way ahead of us. Who knows what they're planning to counterfeit next.

 

For the record, in the Coin World interview about 6 years ago, Jinghuashei mentioned this as a viable possibility if the price of silver dropped.

Chris

 

No reason for the Chinese to pay a premium price for silver dollars (to melt) when there's a zillion bags of "junk silver" around.

 

They have already been making "first rate" copies of common date, mint state Morgans and also Mexican cap and ray type 8 reales from correct purity silver. Which they then sell for $30-$40 and higher on eBay. Had several dozen pulled a couple of months ago, and several dozen were sold without being pulled.

Here are a few examples.

Morgans:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1886-Morgan-Dollar-unc-/161265583363?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item258c2d8503&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1904-O-Morgan-Dollar-unc-/161272332228?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item258c947fc4&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1885-UNITED-STATES-MORGAN-DOIIAR-/221412155538?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item338d316092&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

8 reales:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1884-Mexico-8-Reales-/161254270169?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item258b80e4d9&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1885-Mexico-8-Reales-/161265551017?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item258c2d06a9&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1886-Mexico-8-Reales-/161265552700?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item258c2d0d3c&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1876-MEXICO-MO-8R-/221412142028?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item338d312bcc&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1874-MEXICO-MO-8R-/221395942386?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item338c39fbf2&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1887-MEXICO-MO-8R-/221401214079?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item338c8a6c7f&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

Misc:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/British-India-Queen-Victoria-One-Rupee-1862-/221401291995?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item338c8b9cdb&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Scarce-Italy-Kingdom-of-Napoleon-silver-5-lire-1813-/221401298507?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item338c8bb64b&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

http://www.ebay.com/itm/GREAT-BRITAIN-QUEEN-VICTORIA-1847-GOTHIC-CROWN-/271478836530?pt=US_World_Coins&hash=item3f35664d32&nma=true&si=diboWnZdqYTmcdsv478uE9JZpHk%3D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

There are three seller id's here, which are run by the same folks. They had about another 7 or 8 id's that were banned after being reported.

I've also seen them do this with gold coins, but not nearly as frequently.

 

I've seen junk 90% on everyone's favorite knock-off wholesale website.

 

The scariest to me would be pretty good fakes in really good fake slabs. A coin in a slab is much harder to prove its a fake, so it only has to be pretty good if the fake slab is high quality. If they could make high quality slabs, and use real slab serial numbers, they would be very dangerous. The sad truth is many people who buy slabs never bother to learn to grade or authentic a coin themselves, this is why I am saying this would be more dangerous than fake raw coins.

 

If there's a smartphone app that "reads" credit cards, I wonder if it's feasible to make a smartphone app to "read" slabs, and identify them against a central database maintained by the TPG. Combine that with GPS, so that if you're in Minneapolis holding "13318415" in your hand, but the app says that coin is in Tampa, Florida, then you're positive you have a fake. Coded physical location (only to the nearest city) is one of the few variables that the Chinese probably can't fake.

 

Interesting idea, but I see a couple of problems. How would it know where the physical coin is unless there is a tracking mechanism? I for one would NEVER EVER want my coins to be able to be physically tracked. Short of that, this code would only be of the original owner. What if the guy in Tampa sold it to me, and I am trying to sell it? THat would explain why that slab is now in Minneapolis, but originally in Tampa.

 

One of the reasons you should only buy from a dealer you can trust.

 

LOL, I am not a "details" guy. Just the big picture here.

 

The only problem with that is, your idea is basically impossible without violation of privacy to the coin collectors. It sounds like a decent idea to be honest, but you can't do it.

 

Especially to a residence or even a small town.

 

OK, let's go back to the Tampa-Minneapolis scenario. Here is a partial solution to privacy. The prospective Buyer pings the slab number, and the reply takes the form of a distance, i.e., the slab is now 1,350 miles from its original delivery point. This is a great circle that includes, for instance: Portland, Maine; Montreal; Minneapolis; Roswell, New Mexico; a number of Caribbean Islands, and the west coast of Mexico. You can therefore get a false negative, but not a false positive. If the Seller is currently on that 1,350-mile line (which implies he's the original TPG client), the Buyer feels reasonably sure the slab is genuine. If the Seller falls far away from that line, say he's at a coin show in Seattle, Washington, then nobody knows whether the slab is "real," and nobody's worse off.

Another possibility is for (face-to-face) transactions, or eBay transactions, is for the Buyer to ping the slab number along with a personal ID code, and let the system tell you how far apart they are. Less than 100 feet = genuine slab. The Seller, of course, would not know the Buyer's personal ID number, and therefore unable to game the system. If the Buyer handles a lot of slabs, then it's worth subscribing to the service.

Whether all this is worth the effort, I'll leave to other folks. There is probably a foolproof high-tech way to do this, as long as part of the dynamics is a moving target.

 

Another reason why I only go for raw coins and crack out any slabbed ones I get. Not being able to interact with the coin aside from viewing through plastic takes away many of the most effective weapons in identifying a high quality fake.

 

I can see your point, and it's actually a great way to go about collecting. What it ALSO does is, it makes it crucial that the collector actually LEARN HOW to grade for him/her self, and learn to identify any specific die marriages in a particular series (though some series have multiple die marriages for a lot of dates). It also brings to the table the fact that a collector shouldn't just 'buy the slab/grade', which is all too common now.

LOTS of sellers of high value coins do just that (I can think of one young man right now, with lots of high-dollar coins for sale on ebay, and he buys what collectors on all coin forums like, talk about, think are 'hot' at the moment), and because of this, all he needs to do is open his wallet/checkbook, and never has to open a book to learn. A person can now act like a knowledgeable seller with actually having little knowledge. Just buy the grade, or, in this sellers case, just buy the toning, as long as it's in an authentic TPG slab. TPG's have been almost a double edged sword...they give us the comfort of knowing we have purchased an authentic coin with the grade we want, but has made it less important to actually study to learn/know the series and how to grade that coin/series.

 

This is sad....why can we not stop them? It could be done......IF they criminalize it in China...until them we are hosed.

 

It's not just coins. They have knock-offs through out all their commerce. It would hurt their economy if they didn't allow it, so there will be no help coming from China itself.