Message:

<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kaparthy, post: 99816, member: 57463&quot;]<b>Collecting is not Investing</b></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Although there was as time when I collected gold bars (Engelhard, Mocatta, Credit Suisse), I never met anyone else who thought of them as numismatic items.&nbsp; COINS -- banknotes, medals, tokens, stocks, checks, drafts... -- are the stuff of collecting.</p><p><br /></p><p>Your credit union accounts will probably outperform the coins.&nbsp; Build the savings account into something for a CD, roll into it, keep the savings account to build the next one, and so forth.&nbsp; The stock market is always a longterm winner for investing.</p><p><br /></p><p>Coins are something else.</p><p><br /></p><p>People will tell you about making a lot of money buying and selling -- and indeed it is true: if you buy and sell.&nbsp; Buy and hold is not a strategy for investing.&nbsp; If you look at the world famous auctions of million-dollar coins, you see that Harry Bass, John Jay Pittman and the others could have &quot;made more money&quot; just doing their jobs (oil; engineering; etc.).&nbsp; The coins lost money relative to inflation -- and certainly relative to lost opportunity.</p><p><br /></p><p>To deliver to your granddaughter something that will excite a love of history -- and perhaps also an honest love for money -- I recommend the numismatic items: the coins, the banknotes, the stock certificates, etc.&nbsp; Imagine a 19th century banknote with Salmon P. Chase on it.&nbsp; How about a banknote from frontier Ohio or Tennessee with a SPANISH coin on it, and Spanish coin to go with it?&nbsp; (See here: <a href="http://scoan.oldnote.org/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://scoan.oldnote.org/" rel="nofollow">http://scoan.oldnote.org/</a>)</p><p><br /></p><p>Gold is nice.&nbsp; I like it.&nbsp; Give her a 19th century US $5 gold coin, a UK Sovereign with Queen Victoria, a French Angel and French Rooster.</p><p><br /></p><p>Don&#039;t forget ancients.&nbsp; You can buy a nice silver Roman denarius from the Pax Romana for the same price as a slabbed Morgan dollar.&nbsp; The same goes for silver of Alexander the Great.&nbsp; Personally, I am not much for generals and wars -- and your grand daughter may not be either. I collected small silver coins worth a day&#039;s wages from the towns and times of philosophers -- including two famous women: Aspasia of Miletos and Hypatia of Alexandria.</p><p>Look at past auctions here:</p><p><a href="http://www.coinarchives.com" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.coinarchives.com" rel="nofollow">www.coinarchives.com</a></p><p><a href="http://www.wildwinds.com" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.wildwinds.com" rel="nofollow">www.wildwinds.com</a></p><p>Find current sales here:</p><p><a href="http://www.vcoins.com" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.vcoins.com" rel="nofollow">www.vcoins.com</a></p><p><br /></p><p>If you want to give your granddaughter a pile of money, that&#039;s wonderful. If you want to give history, then give history.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

Your name or email address:

Do you already have an account?

• No, create an account now.
• Yes, my password is:
• Forgot your password?

Stay logged in