Why is the 1915s US-Philippines Centavo so expensive?

IloiloKano

For some issues in this category, I can understand why prices would be so out of proportion with mintage figures, and I am fully aware of the conditional rarities that abound, but mintage of the 1915s One Centavo (at 2,500,000) exceeds the mintage of the 1908s (at 2,187,000), yet prices across the board are way higher for the 1915s.

Also, the 1920s had an equal mintage figure at 2,500,000 and its prices are also lower (in all grades) than the 1915s.

I am happy to own an NGC graded MS58 example , but I am still curious. What is the cause of such high prices for this one year? Can anyone offer a theory?

IloiloKano

Is there anyone that can offer a clue?

krueger

I have read eyewitness accounts of the times stating that during the Japanese occupation of the Philippines of WWII, the Japanese took the precious metals out of circulation for the war effort. This included copper and nickel coins. We the U.S. did the same thing with changing our copper cents to steel ones and our nickels became a low copper-silver-maganese product. The nickel coins of Argentina 1890-1920 are very difficult to find as it has been speculated that the nickel went to the German war effort, other southamerica coins as well.

So why is the 1915-S supposedly scarce. Possibly withdrawal and melting for war materials during WWI 1914-1918. It could be that during WWII this date got hit harder in the Japanese withdrawal, or was melted for some other lost reason. Manila Mint records were destroyed in the December 1941 Japanese bombing of the mint. The 1906-S pesos got hit the hardest when silver went up in 1906 and were melted. We will never know each dates complete history, or what went on during all those years.

Thats what little I know.

Krueger

IloiloKano

<< <i>Possibly withdrawal and melting for war materials during WWI 1914-1918. >>



Thank you Kruger! That is a plausible explanation, which would also explain why the 1920s Centavo with the same mintage is so much lower in value, though still pricey in MS60 and better grades.

Checking the other denominations to see if a correlation exists...

The 1916s 5 centavos is a serious key with only 300,000 minted, so it can't be compared.

No 1916 ten or fifty centavos were minted.

The last pre-commonwealth peso was minted in 1912.

However, the 1916s Twenty Centavos (mintage 1,435,000) is higher priced in all grades than the 1919s Twenty Centavos (Mintage 850,000), which appears to demonstrate a correlation, especially since it is the only other denomination for which a meaningful comparison can be made.

Another supporting observation is that in 1917 (except for the 50 centavos) and 1918, mintage figures were abnormally high, as if the purpose was to replace coinage that had been lost due to the war. A similar huge mintage of coinage (of every denomination) occurred in 1944 (MacArthur's return) and 1945 in order to resupply coinage that had been looted by the Japanese and shipped back to Japan to be melted to help pay for their own war effort.

Though I have no actual documentation of what occurred, I believe your proposition is quite likely the case.