Best Of

Great coin, @Copperindian, and special too, in addition to the double stickers.

For the benefit of others, while many collectors may think that having both a CAC sticker and Rick Snow's Eagle Eye Photo Seal is redundant, it's not. Since JA and Rick each weigh the various stickering factors differently, the are many CAC FE's and IHC's that Rick won't sticker, as well as many Photo Sealed Flying Eagles and Indian head Cents that JA won't sticker. I say, having both of those stickers on a coin is having the best of both worlds! By the way, they both have tremendous respect for each other. Rick's Photo Seal is one of the only stickers that CAC will NOT remove when they apply their own sticker!

Ken, looking forward to dinner. I have a nice Napa Valley cab for us, only 457 cases made, and each of the top three wine reviewers tried it - scores were 98 points, 97 points, and 96 points - all three loved it! Hopefully we will too.

Steve

I grade it “Glorious!”
Screw the numbers.

In 2016 the US Mint released the Centennial gold coin set that had three coins, a Mercury Dime Centennial Gold Coin that was the first of three 24-karat gold coins the Mint issued to commemorate the 100th anniversary of three classic coin designs first issued in 1916. The coin features Adolph A. Weinman’s original “Winged Liberty” design. The release of the Standing Liberty Quarter celebrated Hermon A. MacNeil’s original “Standing Liberty” quarter design. The Walking Liberty Half Dollar celebrated Adolph A. Weinman’s original “Walking Liberty” half dollar design.

The 2016 Mercury Dime Centennial Gold Coin had a mintage limit of 125,000 coins and an initial household order limit of 10.

The United States Mint began accepting orders for the 2016 Standing Liberty Quarter Centennial Gold Coin on September 8. There was a household order limit of one for this product, while mintage was limited to 100,000 units.

The United States Mint began accepting orders for the 2016 Walking Liberty Half Dollar Centennial Gold Coin on November 17. The total number of Walking Liberty Half Dollar Centennial Gold Coins minted was limited to 70,000 units, with orders limited to three per household.

So where did sales end up for these three coins?

Mercury Dime: 124,885 coins
Standing Liberty Quarter: 91,752 coins
Walking Liberty Half Dollar: 64,441 coins

So the Mercury Dime hit the mintage limit minus returns, the quarter came up short by a small amount, and the half dollar by a little less. But all three sold very well at the time.

I had passed on this set based on the high mintages, and didn't even buy any to flip. Historically these numbers are very high, and would not make for great long-term appreciation other than the price of gold itself. But surprisingly these three coins do command prices over melt after almost nine years of maturity. This shows the power of the classic coin designs with modern coin buyers.

This leads to the 250th anniversary gold coins the mint will be releasing next year. So far they have announced this will include five gold coins (called Best of the Mint):

The five 2026 gold coins are:
A tenth-ounce gold coin using the designs from the 1916 Winged Liberty Head silver dime.
A quarter-ounce gold coin using the designs from 1916 Standing Liberty silver quarter dollar.
A half-ounce gold coin using the designs from the 1916 Walking Liberty silver half dollar.
A 1-ounce gold coin using the designs from the 1804 Draped Bust, Class I silver dollar.
A 1-ounce .9999 fine gold coin using the designs from the 1907 Saint-Gaudens, Roman Numerals (MCMVII), High Relief gold $20 double eagle.

Is this deja vu? It appears to be a reissue of the 2016 gold Centennial set, but includes two more coins. A Draped Bust one ounce gold, and a St. Gaudens 1 ounce gold as well.
Does the mint know this is mostly a reissue?????
They must, so I will give them the benefit of the doubt.

Anyway, we have the same coins that were already released, so there is a track record. I expect high mintages again but lower sales perhaps. Now people may want to buy the 2026 coins and also buy back the 2016 coins to make two coin gold sets of the ones they like the most.

For those that only want unique, they may opt for the 1 ounce Draped Bust gold.
St. Gaudens buyers will prefer that one to the others.

Anyway I found this interesting and wanted to share it, so it looks like a reissue and two extra coins, all in gold. Sales will do well, but they may only do about half of the 2016 coins. I was wrong before though, so maybe I get this one wrong as well. Either way the coins will be beautiful, and if the 2016 coins are any indication, they will hold value above melt years later (I will predict this, final mintages will be below the 2016 coins for all five issues). The St. Gaudens is technically also a reissue, as it has already been released in 2009, and had a final mintage of 114,427. So four out of five are reissues.

PS If the mint really wanted to do a set of the most iconic designs, a set of five native head gold would have outsold these. They should have considered the coins already released when planning for this perhaps.

Neat coin and great pics.

Posted on CoinTalk:

https://www.cointalk.com/threads/lordm-2025-fun-show-report-live-updates-from-the-floor.415802

I’m going for a date set, BU but raw, in a vintage Wayte Raymond National Coin Album. Bigger set than what the OP is wanting, but I think it will be a nice looking set once it’s complete.

In my mind, Morgan’s are so readily available and easy to grade that I don’t see the need to have them slabbed unless you have one with extraordinary toning or if you are going for a pop top, so that’s why I’m going with raw coins in an album.

Those SAFLIP's are great, Ive used them for years.

Acetone is extremely volatile, once you remove the coin from the acetone, it should dry in no more than a couple minutes.

Did you use pure acetone? (not nail polish remover which containd additives.) Acetone wont react with silver, you can leave it in there as long as you want. If its sticky, then I would guess there's still something on it and redo the acetone treatment.