Is the mint ready for this?

cladking

The mint claims to make a profit on every cent it produces. Today the value of copper
has spiked upward to the point that the old copper cents are worth more as metal than
as currency. (It's at $1.46 and there are 145 unc cents to the opound) While this won't
have an immediate impact on cent consumption because of costs associated with hand-
ling the coins, it will eventually force higher output from the mint.

There are only about 75 billion copper cents left in circulation so production just might
ramp up pretty high. How quickly these coins are removed is difficult to predict and highly
dependent on future copper prices. Will the mint further reduce quality of existing coins
to churn out 15 or 20 billion zinc cents each year? Will they endanger the integrity of their
various coinage programs in order to make .0003 dollars per zinc Lincoln turned out?

Zinc has also been running up in price. Might this push the cost of the cent over 1c and
cause a loss for every coin produced?

IvanOnly

I might be wrong here, but aren't "Copper Cents" only 95% copper?

If this is correct, it would mean that you would need 161 Pennies to equal 1 pound of copper

95% of 3.11 Grams is 2.81

So each pennie has 2.81 grams of copper

divide that by how many grams are in a pound, 453.59237 (Thanks Google)

cladking

Copper is up another half a cent per pound since this was posted.

Zinc is up about 25% since the mint claimed to make .03c per penny produced.

cladking

<< <i>I might be wrong here, but aren't "Copper Cents" only 95% copper?

>>



Yes. The zinc is recoverable also but is worth only about $.52/ lb.

Artist

*

IvanOnly

<< <i>or abandoning it all together >>



We can only hope.

Don't get me wrong, I like pennies, however I would not be crying over it if they stopped producing them for Circulation.

kenoshapete

Artist -

Who's your highly credible source?

KP

coinpage

<< <i>...If this is correct, it would mean that you would need 161 Pennies to equal 1 pound of copper
95% of 3.11 Grams is 2.81
So each pennie has 2.81 grams of copper...(Thanks Google) >>




I get (3.11 * 0.95) = 2.9545 grams of copper per cent

453.59237 / 2.9545 = 153.52 cents to equal 1 pound of copper

so we're real close to melt down.

ms70

I thought that cents were more zinc than copper?

ziggy29

I wonder if a lot of 1959-1982 cents will be headed for the melting pot any time soon. It's close enough that it's not worth the cost of melting them down, but if copper rises much more, who knows?

Weiss

Call me stupid (everyone else does), but I've been saving pre-82 cents for about 5 years. I was too young to be able to get in on the 40% silver half dollars.

But honestly, copper will probably need to go significantly higher before it is worth the time and effort associated with pulling copper cents out of circulation--even if there is an automated way to do it using machines. A 20% increase in value over melt for the pre-65 half-dollars, for example, yielded $20 for every 200 coins. Not a bad return for handling 200 coins. But for that same $20 yield, you'd need to handle 10,000 copper coins (err, I think).

There is no secondary market for copper the way there is for silver. You won't be able to buy and sell bulk copper at your local coin or pawn shop. And it wouldn't be anywhere near profitable to buy and sell bulk copper coins on eBay because of the cost of transportation vs. the value of the coins.

I think copper will need to go to 30% more than the value of the coins at an absolute minimum to make pulling copper from circulation worthwhile. That could take years.

islemangu

Thats it.....going to start hoarding pre 82 Lincolns

sliderider

Modern cents are zinc plated with thin layer of copper. You can easily scrape off the copper and get down to the white zinc metal by rubbing a newer penny on the sidewalk. Older cents are almost all copper. I don't know exactly how far back, but 1982 seems to stick in my mind for some reason. The point that is being made here, I think, is that with copper on the rise, the government will begin pulling back all the older copper cents from circulation for their melt value. This could turn out to be a good thing as there are still many wheat cents out there and a melt might help to buoy prices on them a bit. The early all copper Memorial cents might see an upsurge as well, once they start disappearing from circulation. The mint cannot simply pull these coins from circulation without replacing them, so they will have to increase production to keep up with the demand for cents or there will be a shortage. My guess is that if zinc isnow too expensive to use, then some other base metal will be found to maintain profits for the mint. We may even see the introduction of our first plastic coinage if they can't find a suitably cheap metal to make cents out of.

richbeat

It will be interesting to see what the Mint does if prices continue to rise and if they produce cents at a consistent loss. They've already indicated in the past (several times) that they have no intentions of taking a loss. I'm a little surprised that I haven't heard of any testing being done of alternatives. They are running out of metal options. Aluminum is no longer an option. Wonder what they will do? It's beginning to look like they have a potential big problem on their hands, unless prices start to drop.

ddink

<< <i>They've already indicated in the past (several times) that they have no intentions of taking a loss >>



Considering that the only people who have any say in the matter is Congress, I should think it doesn't matter too much what the mint's "intentions" are. Sorry--nothing against the author of the post, I just have very little respect for the Mint, due to their extreme non-collector-friendly attitudes.

cladking

The mint might claim that a coin which costs more to mint than its face
value simply isn't needed for commerce and stop making it on their own
authority. It would then take an act of Congress to bring it back. ...or at
least a few phone calls.

They've pretty much run out of options as far as coinage material. The
costs of the production alone likely runs over 1c already. The vending in-
dustry would be devastated by a plastic cent and plastic prices are sky-
rocketing.

Unless copper begins a sustained retreat, these may be the final days
for the cent. At the least there will probably be an effort to reduce cent
consumption by eliminating it from more transactions.

It would be great if they'd switch back to copper and make them for mint
sets, proof sets and roll sales. With all the capacity which can be freed up
it may be a remarkable opportunity to make a lot of changes and improve-
ments.

Dog97

The government pays farmers not to farm.
The government pays alcoholics to drink.
The government pays drug addicts to do drugs.
The government pays fat people to eat.
The government pays $6,000 for toilet seats.
The government pays $600 for hammers.
The government pays Mexicans to sneak over the border.
The government pays foreigners to come here & start business then move them overseas.
So they government will not hesitiate to pay more than 1¢ for a penny. When it costs $1 to make 1¢ the government will simply start to regulate the price of copper & zinc after it gives the Ball corp billions of $$ in tax write-offs and subsidiaries for the $$ lost making planchets.

LindeDad

Anybody figured in the energy cost to melt the coins. I think you will lose money melting them. The melting point of copper is higher than silver or gold by a bunch.

cladking

<< <i>Anybody figured in the energy cost to melt the coins. I think you will lose money melting them. The melting point of copper is higher than silver or gold by a bunch. >>



The coins don't have to be profitable to melt for the mint to need to replace them. As soon
as people save them from circulation they have to be replaced. They also don't have to be
profitable to melt to have people melting them. The folks who melt copper for various reasons
will simply start throwing in coins as soon as the price crosses $1.51

I've heard dealers say that they occassionally sell BU memorial rolls and mixed wheat rolls to
art students to be melted down to make sculpture. It's just easier to buy what's available
then to shop around for the best price, especially when you only need 20 or 30 pounds. As
the price increases so does the consumption of the old cents.

richbeat

ddink:

True to some extent. Whether it's the Mint or Congress, my point was that striking cents at a loss has not been tolerated in the past. They reduced the size of the cent, came close to changing the metal content to aluminum in 1974, and did change the metal content to copper plated zinc in 1982. Yes, it takes Congress to pass into law these changes. However, as cladking says, to simply stop striking cents does not need Congressional approval. This time, however, the circumstances may be unique enough that the only viable option is to discontinue the cent, or possibly to only strike them for collector sets and rolls.