Posted on 03/23/2009 4:39:33 PM PDT by ml/nj
I would like to buy several ($1000) bags of junk silver coins. I'm concerned about how to securely make the exchange of my paper money for these coins. Does anyone have any experience and/or advice.
ML/NJ
Bring a gun?
Don’t be a SUCKER.
What exactly are “junk silver coins” ?
Here is a safe alternative. Fine silver casting grain.
Send them a cashiers check or credit card number and they will ship it to you insured. If you don’t use it, they will buy it back.
buy lead and brass instead
Ebay has certain controls Guarantees on Purchases .
You can buy All the Silver you want from Established sellers....you don’t have to deal with Newbees.
Buy low, sell high!
I think coins where the surface has rubbed off so you can’t really even read the date on the coin, much less tell what type of coin it is.
Recommend silver eagles or silver rounds instead.
What are those?
They’re fake 0bama commemorative coins. Just quarters with stickers stuck on them.
Here is an explanation:
Older United States silver coins (1964 and before) are now in demand because of their silver content. (Many were melted down years ago.) At one time these were referred to as - junk silver - because they had no special collector value at the time. Junk silver is still used today to refer to old silver coins. However, times have changed. Today “junk silver coins” are becoming harder to find.
From: http://lynncoins.com/jsilv.htm
Recommend silver eagles or silver rounds instead.
I’ve got a 1929 Silver Dollar that I would not sell for a million dollars.
Now a million rounds of 00 Buck,this baby’s yours.Maybe.
Purchase from reputable dealer in state with no sales tax. NH is still good.
NO IDEA! That’s why I said what I said.
The silver in the eagles costs more than the silver in junk. Junk silver has the advantage that it is recognized by everyone and is easily used as cash when fiat money becomes worthless or is decreasing toward that state rapidly.
I took a bunch of 1950s and earlier Jefferson nickels to a local coin dealer last week. He said they’re not worth anything beyond face value, but then proceeded to ask if I’d take 5 cents each for them. LOL. I figure they have to be worth a little more than current nickels, due to silver content during that time.
Are sales of gold and silver registered?
They are what used to be referred to as "lawful money." The legal definition of a dollar is a coin containing a specific amount of fine silver. When I was growing up (until 1964) the coins minted by the United States values at 10 cents and about each contained the amount of silver proportional to their value. The word "junk" is used to distinguish them from coins which have some numismatic value.
ML/NJ
There used to be a futures contract on $1000 face-value bags of coins on the old NYMEX (before NYMEX bought COMEX, whose members killed the contract).
See all the useless 'knowledge' one accumulates over 36 years of trading?
;^)
I think gold has to be. Have to be careful if you do this stuff out in public. Remember Tom Noe? He had a bunch of coins in his car and then dropped his kids off and in the five minutes he was gone, thieves broke into his car and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of coins (they basically followed him around all day, hoping he'd stop, and that the car would be left unattended, even just for five minutes).
ML/NJ
bump
Nickels were never silver. They were nickle. Hence the name “nickle”.
Not true. Silver was used to make five cent pieces during World War II. I don't know just how much silver was used, but apparently the nickel was needed for the war effort.
ML/NJ
Seems to sell for several dollars an ounce over spot prices.
Consider buying Canadian Maple Leafs@ 3.99 over spot, or Buffalo rounds @ 1.29 over spot at APMex.com.
Forget the castings & other unrecognizable stuff. Also, we are still in a deflationary period. Yes the fed is monitizing, but there is no mechanism to inflate the economy. This will not cause wages and prices to increase (if you think it will try finding a new job). Not yet. There will be a better window to buy both silver and gold (unless there is a war).
Yeah yeah. And they made steel pennies too. So what. The fact still remains that the metal content of nickels is practically zip. You won’t be cashing them in like silver dimes and quarters.
The wartime alloy nickels have larger mintmarks above the dome of Monticello on the reverse.
Coin collector checking in:
1942-1945 nickels do contain silver. They were 35% silver, 56% copper, and 9% something else; I cannot recall exactly what right now. Pre and post 1942-1945 nickels contain 75% copper 25% nickel content.
If you insist on buying junk silver, try not to buy dimes. Quarters, halves & dollares are much better. The dimes are typically worn and have lost up to about 8% of their weight in wear.
Consider that Roosevelt forced everyone to turn in their gold at $22or $23 an oz. Then he devalued the dollar to 35 an oz. The kleptocrats will work it one way or another to strip our assets when Mr. Mierda meets Mr. Fan. Make sure you can eat and protect your family imho.
People buy and sell silver dimes by the pound, not per coin...or so I’m told.
Believe me, I haven't forgotten. This is one of the reasons why I'm looking to silver for the time being.
ML/NJ
Wartime Nickel=0.05626 oz
Silver dime=0.07234 oz
Silver Quarters=0.18084 oz
Silver Half Dollars=0.36169 oz
Silver Clad Halfs (1965-1970)=0.14792 oz
Silver Dollars=0.777344 oz
Take the price of Silver (around $13.60/oz) times the content to get the value.
But dealers will never give you 100% of value or else they wouldn't make any $$$$$.
The average bag of 90 percent junk silver contains 715 ounces of pure silver (after accounting for wear). $1000 face value dimes and quarters are currently trading around $11980, which means you are paying $16.75 per ounce of silver. Silver is currently selling on the spot market for $13.74, which means you are paying a $3 per ounce premium or about %22 which is quite high. My belief is you buy silver at the cheapest premium you can. You can buy 1 ounce rounds from an outfit called First Majestic Silver, direct from the producer, online, at $1 per ounce premium, one of the lowest premiums around. They limit your purchase to 200-300 ounces per purchase, but they are honest and ship pretty quickly, depending on demand. They are publicly traded on the Frankfurt exchange TSX: FR and operate out of Canada. I have ordered from them a lot and they have fulfilled orders flawlessly. A first rate operation.
The advantage to dimes is when silver gets to 500/oz trying to spend dollars is like walking around with 100 dollar bills and trying to make change. The same with gold, try to find 1 gram pieces same reason.
barbra ann
I don’t think old nickels are made of silver. Just old dimes, quarters, half-dollars, and dollars.
Good point, that many who get silver bars or granules forget.
I found the site below of interest in that if we do go into hyperinflation, even our "junk" coins issued today will disappear as their intrinsic value passes face value, just like what happened to the 90% silver coins.
and
library user: He said they’re not worth anything beyond face value, but then proceeded to ask if I’d take 5 cents each for them. LOL. I figure they have to be worth a little more than current nickels, due to silver content during that time.
Exccept for the WWII years, there's no silver in them. However, hang on to them. As per the following link, those nickles already have 2 1/2c intrinsic value. Might come in hand soon for REALLY small purchases. Most other current coins, including the current "gold" dollars have only 3c intrinsic value.
CHECK IT OUT
I got a 1964 half last year at the grocery store. The cashier asked me if I minded getting a 50 cent piece in change and I said “Not when it’s silver!”
First one in 20 years; I don’t know how it got back into circulation...
good advice.
You can go to a local coin store to buy a bag once you know the price. You will pay spot + a bit for the amount of silver in the bag (which is determined by formula, bags are often sold by face value. Because they are all made out of the same material (90% silver or 'coin silver') and the original weights were in proportion it doesn't matter much if you get dimes, quarters, halves or dollars, though some dealers charge more for the rare halves. Most dealers sell bags of all one type, which might be best. I think mostly they are all sold by weight, the formulas having long ago been agreed to and coin dealers having better things to do then count out every dime in a $1000 bag of dimes.
I've used the prices from NW Territorial Mint for junk silver in my chart. They would be a good place to buy it from, as I have done business with them with total satisfaction. If you are in Portland and want to walk in Columbia Coin is a very good shop. Most cities have reputable coin dealers who have been around for years, ask around.
And then you'll have a bunch of old worn out silver coins that without close inspection look a lot like the government issued non-silver self-counterfits in circulation.
So, let me be the second person to suggest either American Eagles or generic "rounds". You can buy Eagles at a fair price from either Kitco or Apmex on line stores. I have bought from both with no problems.
You can by generic rounds from Northwest Territorial Mint. These are the best deal: the mark up between the spot price of silver and the price for their coins (er, 'rounds') is only about $1.10 an oz. (APMEX has other brands of generic rounds as well.)
The American Eagle has the same amount of silver but a much higer premium per oz.
(But it is quasi legal tender. Personally seeing as FedGov/FedBank have destroyed the value of the dollar I don't see any reason to get their signature of my 1 oz silver coins. I greatly prefer that they come from some honest hardworking miners and private mints than the clowns with the government "permit".
OK! Time for pictures, links and numbers!
| Spot Prices per Oz. as of post time | |
|---|---|
| Gold | $942.00 |
| Silver | $13.67 |
| Bullion Prices by Dealer | All coins are Silver | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Product | Price Per Oz. | $ over spot |
| APMEX | American Eagle | $ 17.71 | $4.04 |
| Kitco | Canadian Maple Leaf | $17.93 | $4.26 |
| NW Territorial Mint | NWT Round | $15.07 | $1.40* |
| NW Territorial Mint | "1/10th Bag", $100 face value | $15.20** | $1.53 |
* NWT Requires minimum purchase of 50 oz and payment by check.
** 90% US silver is usually sold in $1000 face value bags. I've used the $100 face value bag for my calculations. It weighs 72oz. 72 * .9 = 64.8 oz of pure silver (to aproximate the comparison with all the other cois which are .999 silver, or just shy of 100%) The price for the 1/10th bag is $985 divided by 64.8 oz = $15.20 an oz.
They are all a little harder to do business with than Amazon, but they need to be.
NWT doesn't sell bullion for credit cards, at least not at the discount rates. They do ship via FedEx and insure at their costs. Lead times are long (10 to 12 weeks) but accurately quoted. They usually deliver a few weeks earlier than they say.
APMEX (American Precious Metals Exchange) takes credit cards but charges a bit for it. You also pay your own shipping.
KITCO also only takes checks, but it's not obvious, you use a card to order, then get a login, and mail a check. Sorry I don't remember if they comp shipping. Probably not.
OK, the fun part! Pictures. These are all the same size and color in real life, sorry the photos are all slightly different.
Silver American Eagle
Silver Maple Leaf
Obverse and Reverse of the NWT Silver Round.
They also mint rounds with Pan American Mine logo on them. These are cool! Who wants dead presidents, when you can have live miners. Very Randian!
Bag of 90% silver pre-1964 US coins.
Oh yeah, one more thing to remember: gold and silver (and platinum) are measured in Troy Oz, which is not the same as the oz. you are used to. It is heavier, and there are 12 troy oz's to a troy pound (a measure rarely seen) All PM dealers use Troy Oz's or grams. Keep this in mind.
Probably from a coin collection. Someone didn’t know the value.
All silver coins are struck in 1964 or earlier with 90% purity. Each bag contains either all dimes, quarters, or half dollars. No mixed bags. For all dollar bags, call for price and availability. Full bags with $1000 face may be shipped as 2 sealed half bags.
Don’t buy dimes.
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