I am curious about copper penny rolls. What is the going rate per roll? Is there much demand? For instance rolls of non-wheat lincolns from before they switched metal to zinc and such (remind us please what year was that switch.. 1982?) How many folks here roll em just for the copper? Or maybe you roll em for reasons beyond base metal...
I seriously doubt rolls of pre-1983 are worth only face. The link to $2 melt value isn't very telling either. Either there is little to no interest in this, or my forum skills suck. I assumed this was a "thing". Let's pretend I have 20 such copper rolls recently pulled from circulation. Make me an offer...
Offer: I'll give you $10, and you can pay the shipping to get them to me. There is a cost for delivery if you are trying to sell and profit. Why pay you more than face if I wanted such coins when I could just find the coins myself. I could just sort them out myself, so why pay someone else for the convenience, particularly if I enjoy CRH or like Lincolns.
If there is some money to be made it is out in the future somewhere. Unless you are able to find someone who does not want to spend time actually looking at rolls of cents looking for copper. There are such people out there, I have heard of people selling new two dollar bills for a premium, when they could just go to a bank and get all they want. I like to look for wheats and varieties in rolls, it is an inexpensive way to keep my hand in the hobby while saving up for coin shows.
Aha.... thanks chip for some insight. Secretly this is what I was thinking, but wasn't sure of current prices/demand. My bet is, within the next few years the US mint will suddenly announce that it is discontinuing pennies (logic dictates they will follow Canada's footsteps) then POOF good luck finding any coppers in circulation. Speculating that a roll of coppers are currently worth about $1.50 (sorry krispy I've decided I won't sell you my hypothetical rolls for less than that), post-discontinuation the value would triple or 10x pronto! Couple that with likely spot bullion increases and you've got yourself a damn fine coin to start stacking cheaply.
Problem for you though silv is that you've got a coin that has been minted so much you could blanket vast quantities of territory with it like dirt, couple that with horders who have been stashing these things away in coffee cans, jars, buckets, and trash cans in their homes, garages and storage facilities ever since the switcheroo in '82, AND, there's no such thing as melt value on these coins unless the government says it's okay to do so, a question that has been discussed with copper and nickel coins much before this, and while not technically illegal at to do at this time (melt them), it is strongly discouraged officially, and could be changed at any time to a legal matter, just to control what the public intends to do... Similarly look at some history of PMs. While you have just witnesses a spike up in metals in the last couple years, copper has bit hard, really hard, before silver and gold, as they started to come down. Copper might be an industrial metal but with a lack of jobs by the laborers who work with the stuff, there's not really much demand and plenty, plenty, plenty of copper in the ground and above, so it's in no shortage where demand can be met. History has also shown that metals prices, particularly after a rise up, can sit stubbornly "level" for a VERY VERY long time before they go anywhere again, if not until the next economic crisis point cycles around. No one has a functioning crystal ball to know when the next opportunity in the metals market will roll around. Copper coins also take up a whole lot of space while you are culling them and waiting for that future to roll around. My offer still stands as well as illustrates the point I was trying to make and which chip echoed. You'll face that with most people if you are trying to sell them on this idea. Your thoughts are not a hole in one idea which you've got yourself focused on, nor is it original as there are many out there already attempting to do what you are thinking about, so you are way behind vast numbers of people doing this already. If you're thinking you'll be sitting on a mountain of numismatic potential, I'd also think again when it comes to circulating coins, particularly ones that corrode and have a lot of wear, dirt and handling on them. Save your pennies for a rainy day, then cash them in an invest in actual numismatically valuable cents or other pieces you enjoy and which have potential in gaining or maintaining a premium when trading, they take up a lot less space as well.
Aw crap my math is off forgot roll is 50 not 100 pennies DUH. Krispy I thought you were offering half face I was hypothetically insulted So.... copper roll face value: $0.50 today's roll value: $0.75 - $1.00 tomorrow's value: $3.00 - $10.00+!
Don't mind the mistake, but I'm still offering what I was before, tomorrow and for the foreseeable future.
I agree the future value is not a slam dunk. However copper pennies are cool, and the penny's days are probably numbered. But yeah copper rolling might be nothing but...
Hilarious. I've seen horde photos of that much silver weight too though, doesn't mean others though give up stacking it. But what a back ache. I'm now thinking that instead of rolling coppers I should bucket them. Perhaps this has been discussed here before, but I'm curious if they stop minting pennies does that mean it would become legal to melt?
Well to be clear, there is no law in place now which clearly states that it is currently illegal to melt them, but it has been strongly urged not to do so and I think you'd find it pretty hard to find a metal dealer willing to actually melt them, even if they took them off your hands for cash value. What happens if/when Congress passes legislation to cease minting cents is anyone's guess. They've already stopped minting 95% copper cents obviously. What has been getting tossed around lately is changing composition of the circulating coins to something cheaper and yet durable without eliminating the small cents, but even that has no clear resolution nor publicly announced plan of moving ahead. So, tf you have the will and the space you might as well go ahead and start dumping them into buckets. Chances are that if you ever did amass that many as in the example photo above, and you wanted to cash them in at a bank or coin star, you'd have to crack all those rolls to feed them through a coin counter. So I think you can save your time by not rolling them or utilize the time sorting them out by general condition or date or separate all that you find with traces of verdi gris on them.
Anyone who pays more than 50c per roll for copper cents is a fool. I've explained why so many times here, and I'm not going to repeat it again. Do your own research. Chris
Which one of you pokes ventured down to my man cave and shot that fripping picture? Who the hay let you in in the first place?
@SM LOL! Maybe it was Google who got in your cave... Do a Google image search for "penny hoarder" and various images like this can be found.