Fake Gold Bullion Possible?
Weather11am
Posts: 2,045 ✭✭✭
I was wondering if this is even possible, you buy a 1/10 gold american eagle when in reality it might just be silver and only gold plated. Could this happen in the future? Should you look out for it? Same with platinum. Can you tell the difference between platinum and silver? Thanks!
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Comments
With high bullion prices the criminal element will be active.
<< <i>With high bullion prices the criminal element will be active. >>
TODAY'S bullion market may "decriminalize" it.
<< <i>Can you tell the difference between platinum and silver? Thanks! >>
If you see a "Monster Toned" Platinum Eagle offered anywhere, RESIST the urge to bid on it.
I can't remember the details
<< <i> Can you tell the difference between platinum and silver? Thanks! >>
At the same size, platinum is much much heavier than silver. You can easy tell by feeling the weight in your hand.
Platinum is twice as heavy as silver. The only way to make a convincing fake platinum of the proper size is to make it from gold and plate it. Even then it will be almost 10% underweight. (But a very slight increase in thickness can hide most if not all of that.)
You have the same problem with plated silver fake gold. Silver only weighs about half as much as gold.
<< <i>ICG discovered fake bullion submitted a couple years ago
I can't remember the details >>
You're right.. it was a pretty shoddy job, too.
details on the 2002 tenth oz
Well, I bought a collection this past weekend of mostly half dollars (kennedys) and the seller had one 100oz
Englehard bar. I looked carefully at it and on the end, right in the middle, there was a 3/16 to 1/4 inch drill
hole that had been partially hidden with melted silver! I backed off in a hurry! I did not weigh the bar. The
seller indicated that he paid $10,000 for the bar in '80 or '81. I asked why he would pay double the price of
silver and he said that he was betting on the Hunt brothers driving the prices even higher! Ooooops, that
didn't work out well.
So, could there be gold plated silver bars? Yes, there sure could be. The size would be the tell as the silver would
be so much bigger than the same weight gold. An ounce of gold is soooo much smaller than an ounce of silver.
bob
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire
I've always looked for the drill hole when buying bars. This is the first I've ever seen. What was different
however, is that the bar did not look like the normal nice and smooth Englehard bar. This one had what
I can only describe as itty bitty pockets and voids all over the bar. It was a rough texture. There should
not be a filled hole on the end as that's not how they were poured. The bar was sold to him in Cleveland.
bob
Here is a link for Gold acid testing.
gold acid test
CJK
Washington: Government Printing Office, 1878, Page 9-10. – Historical Reference Collection, United States Mint.
PRECAUTIONS AGAINST COUNTERFEITING.
I have long been impressed with the belief that the worst danger which threatens our gold coin, from counterfeiters, is the filling with an inferior metal or alloy. By this art the piece presents genuine exteriors, but the inner part having been removed, a disk of platinum, pure or alloyed, is inserted in its place and closed with a ribbed rim of gold. It is, therefore, partly genuine and partly counterfeit, and its value is reduced by several dollars, differing according to the denomination of the piece.
<< <i>I'm not sure how mad i would be if my gold was filled in with platinum >>
Notice the date? 1878. Platinum would have been far less valuable than gold.