Hypothetically Scenario

Could someone increase their net value by destroying a rare coin in which they have at least one other of that same rare coin?

For example, only 5 are known to exist (like the 1913 V nickel I believe), and lets say someone owns 3 of them at the same time. Could they destroy 1 and increase the value of the 2 in their possession by more than the loss of the destroyed coin?

It doesn't seem logical I know, but lets "talk" about this.

 

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How would you plan on going about informing the coin community that a highly desired rarity was destroyed without creating outrage?

 

Let's say you do own 3 1913 Liberty Nickels. Let's just say they are going for $3-4 million each. That's a total value of $9-12 million. If you destroy one, making the remaining two "more valuable" because there are now only 4 known to exist, your remaining two would need to increase in value to $4.5-6 million each just to break even.

The best way, I would think, to make your coins more valuable would be to destroy the other 2 you don't own.

 

This should be called the "Goldfinger Maneuver"

 

I believe that the price level of the coin that this type of maneuver would "work" on is no longer dictated by population of the coin. In the example of the 1913 Liberty, regardless of if there are five or four, the prices would remain more or less the same. These types of coins are essentially unique - you're not buying A 1913 Liberty, you're buying THE Norweb 1913 Liberty, etc.

 

Back in the early 90's, a few comic book dealers at shows started cutting apart Amazing Fantasy #15 (1st appearance of Spiderman) and selling it by the page and even by the "frame!" They wouldn't use pristine copies, but lower grade ones because they could sell the whole book for $2000 or piece it out and make $4000.

 

In your example I don't believe you would gain any value by destroying 1 of the 3 you own and would most likely lose substantially. Estimated values for items are only accurate when you can check them against recent actual sales. The more data (I.E. actual sales) the more accurate the valuation is. With an item with so little supply to meet the demand the estimated price of your coins means nothing. It all depends on who's in the market and what they are willing to spend on that day.

So with 3 coins you own 60% of supply. If you destroy one you only own 50% of supply. By keeping control of more of the supply you will be in better position to maximize profit and value of your coins. With more coins to potentially sell you increase your odds of one of them getting bought at top dollar.

 

Exactly! And, anyone who contemplated such a heinous act to satisfy his own greed should be keelhauled on an aircraft carrier.

Chris

 

You just do it man. You don't need anyone's permission to do it. You'll probably get more "what a psycho!" reactions than anger, although I would imagine some hardcore collectors would be upset. But again it's your coin to do what you please with.

Maybe if the reaction is widespread anger you could get one (or a group of them) to put up a "salvage fund" to buy it from you.

Good point. These unique coins do take on individual personalities that make it hard to think of one as part of a group.

Damn that's thinking outside the box. Especially good idea if the dealers(s) tearing them up had high grade examples in their inventory.

You guys are probably right, BUT, how 'bout this idea...














(Wait for it)












Do a tv special where you blow up the coin. Kind of like that bar owner in Chicago who blew up the Steve Bartman baseball. Maybe with the advertising revenue you come out ahead.

Not only might you profit more but you also accelerated the mature date of said profit. At worst you'll become famous as the guy who destroyed a million dollar coin. Imagine all the ladies you'll get too?! So there's intangible value there also Damn, now that's thinking outside the box.

 

I'd like to think our love of coins would render us unable to destroy something so rare. We are stewards of history by owning these coins!

And besides, if you owned 3 of the 5, you have already cornered the market by owning 3/5 of them. So put a price tag on your 3 of $15 million a piece and wait till someone wants it bad enough.

 

Thats like the dude that crushes stuff in a hydrolic press. He put a pretty valuable diamond in there but the money he made off all the YouTube views was probably 10x the value of the diamond he crushed. That's some pretty good ROI

 

Yea I've seen that guy's channel. Reddit made him famous.

Ok how bout this idea...

Buy two of the same rare coin. Make an identical (and I mean identical) counterfeit of one of them (without anyone knowing of course) and blow the counterfeit up. Sell the "remaining" one for more. Later on in time (like after statute of limitations is up haha) reveal what you did. Then sell that other one too! BOOM!

 

Have you ever heard of the "farm holidays" that occurred during the Great Depression? Basically, the area farmers refused to bid on family farms when put up for auction by the bank so the families could re-purchase them. The free market is capable of doing amazing things. In high-dollar coins there is a limited pool of buyers/sellers, most of which are more interested in the numismatic value of the piece over the monetary value. You'd be stuck in a catch-22 of a lowered population possibly equating higher book value, but you wouldn't have any legitimate venue to sell because you have been blacklisted.

 

Lol

Well ladies, fame and epic explosions are all compelling enough reasons to at least test the theory should I ever end up with 3 of the 5

 

I agree that free markets can do amazing things. And the Farm Holidays is an interesting example of that, however you're plucking just one example. One which was also 90 years ago.

Yea blowing up a valuable coin might upset the puritan collectors but lets face it, this isn't just a hobby anymore. I would say it's gotten to the point where most big coin purchases are done by investors. Or some who are both investors and collectors but put making money ahead of the collecting.

So I'm not convinced that publicly destroying a valuable coin would get someone blacklisted today.

 

You would be like a rock star coin collector, lol.

 

For some reason this thread reminds me of this...
In the movie Brewster's Millions, Richard Pryor mails a stamp worth $1 Milllion Dollars! The Inverted Jenny

 

You would need to at least disguise it as a charitable event or something... maybe A Coin Crush to Kill Cancer.. or something.

 

Maybe instead of destroying anything just simply take it off the market permanently. For example, one could donate a truly rare example to a museum's or society's permanent collection and that might increase the value of their coin without destroying the other.