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Where are collectible coins?
TigersFan2
Posts: 1,442 ✭✭
For the sake of my question, let's define "collectible coins" as follows:
(1) U.S. coins
(2) 1964 and earlier coins for everything except cents and nickels.
(3) 1958 and earlier coins for cents.
(4) Buffalo Nickels and earlier for nickels.
(5) Coins that aren't destroyed or lost forever.
Once we narrow the definition down to this, what percentage of "collectible coins" are held by (A) Collectors in their personal collections, (B) Dealers in their inventory and (C) Non-collectors who have some "collectible coins" in a drawer, jar or other convenient place?
When I go to a coin show, I always go away with the impression that a lot of coins are held by dealers in their inventory. But I also wonder how many coins (and possibly some very valuable ones) are being squirreled away by non-collectors who just have them because they were dad's or grandpa's or something.
(1) U.S. coins
(2) 1964 and earlier coins for everything except cents and nickels.
(3) 1958 and earlier coins for cents.
(4) Buffalo Nickels and earlier for nickels.
(5) Coins that aren't destroyed or lost forever.
Once we narrow the definition down to this, what percentage of "collectible coins" are held by (A) Collectors in their personal collections, (B) Dealers in their inventory and (C) Non-collectors who have some "collectible coins" in a drawer, jar or other convenient place?
When I go to a coin show, I always go away with the impression that a lot of coins are held by dealers in their inventory. But I also wonder how many coins (and possibly some very valuable ones) are being squirreled away by non-collectors who just have them because they were dad's or grandpa's or something.
I love the 3 P's: PB&J, PBR and PCGS.
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As a onetime detector nut, I also like to think about the untold millions that are sleeping in the very ground beneath our feet. I've seen some very surprising stuff dug up. (And managed to dig one or two pleasant surprises myself over the years.)
People squirrel away the old, odd and unusual.
Most likely millions of coins held in jars/drawers here and there and everywhere.
Oh, the places you'll go and the coins you'll see!
I picked up some borderline BU Lincolns from the 1914 - 1919 range, at a flea market in rural England, for basically nothing, plus a bunch of other 1909 - 1915 or so EF to AU coins.
Probably change from American Soldiers in WW1, that nobody paid attention to.
Within the last 2 years, picked up a bunch of quarters, halves, and dollar coins, at a little shop in the Azores for 16 cents each. They did not look real good, almost all had a greenish tint from salt air, but I used them within a week after arriving back in the US. I was on a cruise ship that stopped at a small port, on a Sunday, nothing open, but I found this little shop, and he had a bunch of coins, mostly European, but between my Spanish and his Portuguese, we had a good time.
Let silver go north of $50 again, and there will be another boatload of silver coins, domestic and foreign, come out of the woodwork.
Don't forget overseas.
I picked up some borderline BU Lincolns from the 1914 - 1919 range, at a flea market in rural England, for basically nothing, plus a bunch of other 1909 - 1915 or so EF to AU coins.
Probably change from American Soldiers in WW1, that nobody paid attention to.
Within the last 2 years, picked up a bunch of quarters, halves, and dollar coins, at a little shop in the Azores for 16 cents each. They did not look real good, almost all had a greenish tint from salt air, but I used them within a week after arriving back in the US. I was on a cruise ship that stopped at a small port, on a Sunday, nothing open, but I found this little shop, and he had a bunch of coins, mostly European, but between my Spanish and his Portuguese, we had a good time.
Let silver go north of $50 again, and there will be another boatload of silver coins, domestic and foreign, come out of the woodwork.
The 1914-1919 cents etc. you picked up in rural England may very well have come from the pockets of American sailors rather than American soldiers. Merchant marine and US Navy sailors would have been present in the UK in substantial numbers but soldiers would not have been (unlike WWII). Virtually all US soldiers and marines in the AEF went directly to France, the great majority not arriving until well into 1918. Most left in 1919 and went directly back to the US.
Don't forget overseas.
I picked up some borderline BU Lincolns from the 1914 - 1919 range, at a flea market in rural England, for basically nothing, plus a bunch of other 1909 - 1915 or so EF to AU coins.
Probably change from American Soldiers in WW1, that nobody paid attention to.
Within the last 2 years, picked up a bunch of quarters, halves, and dollar coins, at a little shop in the Azores for 16 cents each. They did not look real good, almost all had a greenish tint from salt air, but I used them within a week after arriving back in the US. I was on a cruise ship that stopped at a small port, on a Sunday, nothing open, but I found this little shop, and he had a bunch of coins, mostly European, but between my Spanish and his Portuguese, we had a good time.
Let silver go north of $50 again, and there will be another boatload of silver coins, domestic and foreign, come out of the woodwork.
This past April, I saw a few circulated 1940s era Washington quarters at a street flea market in Barcelona, Spain. A week later, I saw some more 1940s Washington quarters at a flea market in Cannes, France. Strange that both places was circulated 1940s era Washington quarters and not other denominations. And both times the asking price was on the high side.