Speculators and the world coin market

shirohniichan

When the US Mint released the Buffalo dollars back in 2001, speculators and dealers seemed to have bought the vast majority. The same thing probably happened with the Canadian "Queen Mum" silver dollars. If left to the collector market, I doubt collector demand would be high enough to sustain their current prices.

What other issues have high resale values yet remain mostly in dealer and speculator hands?

cladking

There are not a lot of world coins which are widely hoarded by speculators. Oh sure
there are probably some of the Euros being held for speculation and the Vatican coins
of the last couple years may qualify, but most speculation in world coins seems to be
more an individual endeavor than a mass one. That is that many collectors will be sit-
ting on a small hoard of 1907 British shillings or a stack of 1969 Indian proof sets, but
there are not small numbers of the same coin held by large numbers of people. At least
this seems to hold true in this country and may not in the domestic markets. Many of
the specially made for collector coin of the last few decades were bought more for spec-
ulation than for collection in many cases but many of these coins have been dispersed
in the intervening years. The most speculation which I've seen otherwise has been in
modern Canadian, British, and German coins and in older European and Canadian coins,
but this may well be more indicative of their popularity than it is typical speculation.

MacCrimmon

Well, I bought 20 of the 2001 Buffalo C&Cs and I sold them all. I learned the earlier you fill the "panic need" the more you'll make. After I had broke even, I held the rest for 6-9 months but the prices only dropped!! Boo-hooo! Ya'll can cry now!!

The Mistake by the Mint was not doing a dead knock-off in nickel with a matte finish......maybe they'll do it again with the Jeffersons and Buffalo combined.....uber cool! I'll buy them this time on many different cards!!!

shirohniichan

The most speculation which I've seen otherwise has been in
modern Canadian, British, and German coins and in older European and Canadian coins,
but this may well be more indicative of their popularity than it is typical speculation.


The RCM's strategy of issuing coins in mintages limited to 10,000 or so coins fuels the "rarity" speculators. Dealers and speculators can buy 8,000 of them and make supply seem very small. Even if only 9,000 collectors wanted them, there will not be enough supply to meet demand at issue price.

The Queen Mum dollars will probably drop in price over the next few years, also.

wybrit

1869 pennies? 1850 shillings? 1854 florins?

MacCrimmon

<< <i>.....1854 florins? >>



I've got a half roll of 'em left, but I want to sell as a complete lot! Just not enough time to parcel them out.

wybrit

I figured you might be sitting on three rolls of 1856 pennies.

farthing

The only series that comes to mind immediately are South African 1/2d proofs

shirohniichan

The $350 gold coins cold out at the RCM in hours (supposedly). How many collectors actually bought one for themselves? Gatewest advertises them every month in Coin World.

Are there any Royal Mint of RAM issues that are low in mintage and immediately snapped up by resellers?

How long can their high market prices last if they stay in dealers' stock or trade from dealer to dealer rather than from dealer to collectors?

SYRACUSIAN

Interesting subject shiroh. I cannot help you with any of the RCM examples that you've mentioned, but I've noticed a similar situation in Greece. Since the late 90s, virtually every issue of the Bank of Greece, including limited mintage special mint sets, (BOG does not produce mint or proof sets on a regular basis like other countries), is sold out within hours or days, depending on the item. In 1990, a gold NCLT coin was minted to celebrate 40 years of the successfull counter attack against Italy in 1940. It was a 1/4 oz proof gold coin, minted in 1000 examples and was sold at 5-10% more than its intrinsic value. The problem was that the majority of these coins were given to retired generals, admirals etc, and only a few were left for the collectors and dealers. Rumour has it that the coin was changing hands between dealers for as high as three times its initial price, only a few days after its release. By the time I became interested in that coin, four years later, I had to pay ten times the initial amount . The only new ones that were entering the market, were brought by the widows of those recently deceased generals . It remains the most sought after NCLT coin to this date, and its price keeps climbing, although not as fast as before.

I could think of many examples, but I'd rather hear the opinion of other members. I'm pretty much convinced that (in my country) the problem lies in a corrupted distribution system, that can be easily exploited by some BOG employees , unscrupulous dealers and other speculators.In fact, that's the reason why I gave up on NCLTs a long time ago , with the sole exception of the coin mentioned above.