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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;GDJMSP, post: 2143766, member: 112&quot;]The precious metal content of a counterfeit being what it is supposed to be is not unusual. There are many, many counterfeits, both gold and silver, that have the correct precious metal content. Some are even known to have too much. But the trace elements, that can be a pretty good tell. And in fact some counterfeits are identified by their trace elements, or the precious metal content being too high. </p><p><br /></p><p>This is why weight and diameter alone cannot be used to definitively identify a fake and that design diagnostics must be used to identify them. This has been the case for centuries. A good example of that would be the counterfeit Netherlands ducats minted by the Russian Royal Mint in the 1700&#039;s and 1800&#039;s. It got so bad that the Netherlands mint even stopped minting ducats and sent an official diplomatic request to the Russian government asking them to stop minting counterfeit Netherlands ducats and stating that they would not mint any more of them until the Russians stopped. </p><p><br /></p><p>And to illustrate just how good those Russian fakes were, even today the TPGs are still fooled by them and they slab Russian fakes as being genuine Netherlands ducats. The same kind of thing has happened with counterfeit Morgan dollars, they were so good the TPG slabbed them as genuine, only later to discover they were not.</p><p><br /></p><p>And unless I am mistaken this is the point Matt has been making all along. The counterfeiters have been good for a long time, but now they are even getting better. Good enough to fool the TPGs too ? Dunno and can&#039;t say. But it has certainly been done before, and still happens, today, with Netherlands ducats that were minted almost 200 years ago.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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