How times change. When I started collecting in 1957 all the good coins had already been removed from circulation. Every coin had been looked at dozens of times by collectors. There was no chance of finding even a VG '15-S buffalo far less an AU or Unc. Now here we are 65 years later and no one blinks an eye when such a scarce coin is found. Despite the fact people are NOT pulling '68-S nickels out of circulation, there aren't any. Or closer to the reality there are so few you probably won't find one in two boxes of nickels. When you've found 1000 of them 99.9% will be VG- to VF. Find another 2000 and you'll have a nice AU. If you look through millions of nickels you can find one like this. The odds of finding this coin through chance are exceedingly low so chances are it was just stumbled on after someone split up a mint set or roll. The tarnish suggests it might have recently come out of a mint set. Why do I keep thinking that in 50 years it will be far easier to find a '15-S than a '68-S? How many '15-S nickels are in collections compared to a '68-S? Why was a 42 year old '15-S a very old coin but a 65 year old '68-S is a modern? There's no demand for a '68-S no matter how common or scarce it may be. I see nothing too unusual about this coin beyond the fact that it's a slider Unc that probably saw some circulation briefly after having sat out for a very long time. Most of he circulation probably occurred within the last ten years judging by the many small scratches.
I sort of agree, and I searched for 30+ years before finding what I wanted- a 66FS. Present retail on a 66FS is about 3.75K, and wholesale is about 3K. I commend the member for even finding one, and being interested enough to keep it. Somebody else is looking, considering the Stacks Aug. 2021 sale was 4K, and the Stacks sale in 5/19 was 3K.
Now that you mention it, I'd wager even the pictured coin would bring several hundred if it is FS. Of course it isn't and the services wouldn't grade it as such unless it's MS-60 but it would be quite a curiosity. It's amazing how few people collect moderns compared to buffaloes or older jeffersons.
I was going to add this, but since I do not have the piece in hand, and suck at "grading" from photos so I don't, I did not want to give false expectations. I do, however, recognize your talents for the last several years, and your undeniable expertise in Moderns, as I have mentioned on different times on various Boards. With that caveat of any opinion I have, I peg this piece with the limited knowledge the photo offers and without a view of the reverse, at a typical xf-au 68s strike. I would most definitely have enjoyed seeing the reverse, and if FS I would be all over the piece.
What's happening here? Is that just shadow? I get it it's difficult to answer questions that aren't asked, and he didn't ask. But we've a lot of those types, don't we? Maybe this is the mysterious question, this funky area on the bottom. Or maybe not...
I can't tell from the picture but I'm guessing it's tarnish and why the coin was just spent. Dirt accumulations can look like this in a photo but beat up AU's rarely have such accumulations.
People didn't save moderns because of mintages. If collectors started saving AU '68-S nickels today in 50 years there would be more AU '15-S's than AU '68-S's. While the '68-S is common "enough" in Unc there are other moderns that are not. It is a strange state of affairs.
