A young lady that works for me brought this in to ask me about the value. It isn't a bad looking eagle though I am confident it is a damaged one. I took off the bezel and don't really see any rim damage at first blush but certainly it has been cleaned and rubbed. This eagle is valued at melt isn't it?
Final chapter. She was going to take it to a "we buy gold" place for $1250.00. I told her to bring it to me and I gave her $1500.00 so I now own a damaged eagle..... Now watch gold take a nosedive next week!
I don't have any way to test it, Jeff. I am rather of the mind that the bezel is plated like Sal said and the chain is likely gold filled. I'll carry them to my dealer buddy at some point and let him put his tester on it.
That's probably most likely, but it won't hurt to check. Don't forget to start with a magnet test, too!
I'm reminded of a gold eagle I bought in a bezel that was, to my eye, really ugly. But it was clearly hallmarked 14k. I found a dealer at a show who thought the bezel was pretty, and bought the whole thing for a nice profit over what I'd paid. Alas, I sold it when gold was well under $2k.
@Randy Abercrombie Check the bezel everywhere for a mark. If it’s not marked you should be able to take to a jewelry store to have it tested.
If the chain is gold that was a good score. I got a thin gold chain at my wedding that weighs half an ounce, as much as the coin.
The gold coin has been worked over with jewler's polish and has no numismatic value. it's probably less than melt which is scrap. At the last Lakeland coin show, when gold was under $3,000, a dealer was offering old gold coins in a collectable grade, EF-AU, at 99% of melt.
If gold's actively correcting around the time of the big show here in June, maybe I should buy some stuff. If it's actively spiking again, maybe I should sell some. We'll see.
