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For those of us that are ignorant. A question.

SkyManSkyMan Posts: 9,493 ✭✭✭✭✭
in Precious Metals
One thing I've never understood is people talking about silver coins getting melted when silver reaches $ X an ounce. Why would a person/dealer/whatever melt 90% silver coins? I mean everybody knows the weight characteristics of a bag, and I would think even well worn common dates have some minimal numismatic value. Thank you for helping me to understand this!
Toned Franklins

U.S. Type Set

Comments

  • CladiatorCladiator Posts: 18,041 ✭✭✭✭✭
    I don't think many of us "normal, little people" are melting any 90% or have in the past.

    When you hear folks talking about melting their 90% I do believe they are talking about selling the silver to a company that very well may melt it. Or, they are selling to a company that they think will re-sell to a company that will end up melting it. The actual melters are usually refineries or private mints and will use the coins, once melted, to make their own brand of silver bullion.

  • SkyManSkyMan Posts: 9,493 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>I don't think many of us "normal, little people" are melting any 90% or have in the past.

    When you hear folks talking about melting their 90% I do believe they are talking about selling the silver to a company that very well may melt it. Or, they are selling to a company that they think will re-sell to a company that will end up melting it. The actual melters are usually refineries or private mints and will use the coins, once melted, to make their own brand of silver bullion. >>



    Yes, I understand that it is not the "little" people that actually melt it.

    What I DON'T understand is WHY people melt the coins in the first place.
    Toned Franklins

    U.S. Type Set
  • CladiatorCladiator Posts: 18,041 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>What I DON'T understand is WHY people melt the coins in the first place. >>

    ...to make their own brand of silver bullion
  • secondrepublicsecondrepublic Posts: 2,619 ✭✭✭
    Melting it doesn't make sense... 90% is already very sellable, recognized, and in demand.
    "Men who had never shown any ability to make or increase fortunes for themselves abounded in brilliant plans for creating and increasing wealth for the country at large." Fiat Money Inflation in France, Andrew Dickson White (1912)
  • WeissWeiss Posts: 9,941 ✭✭✭✭✭
    People who buy and sell a few rolls of '64 Kennedys or a bag or two of silver dimes do not make the market. They don't even merit a smirk from the machines that do.

    THIS is the silver market, since we're talking physical:

    image

    And the machines demand to be fed nothing but LBMA:

    Good Delivery Silver Bar

    The physical settlement of a loco London silver trade is a bar conforming to these specifications:

    The gross weight of a bar should be expressed in troy ounces in multiples of 0.10, rounded down to the nearest 0.10 of a troy ounce.
    Marks

    Serial number
    Assay stamp of refiner
    Fineness, expressed to either three or four significant figures
    Year of manufacture (expressed in four digits)
    Optionally, the weight, which, if included, may be shown in either troy ounces or kilograms

    Minimum silver content
    750 troy ounces (approximately 23 kilograms)
    Maximum silver content
    1100 troy ounces (approximately 34 kilograms)
    Minimum fineness
    999.0 parts per thousand silver

    Recommended dimensions (approximately)

    Minimum Maximum
    Length 250mm 350mm
    Width 110mm 150mm
    Height 60mm 100mm
    We are like children who look at print and see a serpent in the last letter but one, and a sword in the last.
    --Severian the Lame
  • CladiatorCladiator Posts: 18,041 ✭✭✭✭✭
    You buy some 90% on eBay for melt + XX premium.

    You sell to a stacker like one of us for melt + X premium.

    That person sells to a dealer for melt + no premium (if they are lucky lol)

    That dealer sells to a refinery or private mint for less than melt.

    The 90% silver coins that demand such a "numismatic" premium on the retail market don't have squat of a premium by the time they are sold to someone that's going to melt them to make their own product.
  • EagleEyeEagleEye Posts: 7,677 ✭✭✭✭✭
    After you've had to count a bag of dimes, while fishing out any stray clads, you'll understand why they are not popular outside the general collector market.

    Pretty soon, a 1953-D quarter may be a rarity in anything but MS-64. In fact, if you think about it, the 1932-D & S quarters may actually become the easiest coins to get in the future in circulated grades. Future shock!
    Rick Snow, Eagle Eye Rare Coins, Inc.Check out my new web site:
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