The "Buzz" Coin Blog with Dave Harper

Giving a boost to new silver dollar
Posted by Dave

Yesterday the American Veterans Disabled for Life coins were put on sale by the U.S. Mint. Proofs are priced at $39.95 and uncirculateds are $35.95 until March 29, when the pre-issue discount ends.

More interesting to me, and perhaps no one else, was that there was an event on Capitol Hill to help call attention to the new coins.

It was at the Russell Senate Office Building from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Mint Director Ed Moy was among those in attendance.

Now I would expect Director Moy to attend a coin function. It is his job. More importantly, it is great to see a little bit of attention paid to coins by members of the legislative branch after the legislation has been passed into law.

This event in effect was a coin promotion, and promotion is something that every coin issue needs to one degree or another.

Back in the late 1980s and early 1990s when commemorative coinage bills were running out of control, Congress simply authorized them without regard to how they would impact the hobby in the long run and let the programs fend for themselves.

What a nice change last night’s event was.

Let’s hope we see more of this kind of thing.

Friday, February 26, 2010 2:00:22 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Thursday, February 25, 2010

When gold turns to paper
Posted by Dave

Coin collectors find that it is fun being a cheerleader for the price of gold and silver bullion.

This reflex kicked in last week among more than just coin collectors when it was reported that a South Carolina state representative introduced legislation that if adopted would ban “the unconstitutional substitution of Federal Reserve Notes for silver and gold,” within the state.

It seemed like a shot across the bow of politicians and big government in Washington, D.C., where there seems to be no say by the public over the issuance of trillions of dollars of currency and debt.

The legislator, Mike Pitts, seems to be looking at his legislation as a hedge against the economic collapse of the country.

A collapse may or may not occur, but if push came to shove in a financial emergency, South Carolina would probably find itself as short of gold or silver as states (and before them colonies) did throughout much of our history.

The result would likely be that any money issued by South Carolina would itself quickly turn into to paper.

On the bright side, collectors of this new paper money would have something new to collect.

Thursday, February 25, 2010 6:38:55 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Watching the downhill skiing?
Posted by Dave

Are coin collectors big Winter Olympics fans? I ask the question because since the games have begun in Vancouver, British Columbia, the number of collector e-mails to me has dropped off.

You can’t write something to the editor of Numismatic News if you are glued to the television to see the latest gold medal performance and get updated on the overall medal count.

It wouldn’t surprise me to learn that the average reader is indeed a fan. When the Summer Olympic Games were held in Los Angeles in 1984, coin collectors had been anticipating the event for many months by buying large numbers of U.S. Olympic coins.

In succeeding Olympiads, the interest in U.S. coin issues receded, but perhaps the underlying interest in the competitions remained.

So are you watching the Olympics when you should be writing to me about hobby issues?

And what did you ever do with the 1983 and 1984 U.S. Olympic coins that you bought?

Wednesday, February 24, 2010 2:03:07 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Tuesday, February 23, 2010

New cents head east
Posted by Dave

Collectors in Washington, D.C., will have the opportunity to get rolls of the 2010 cent with the new Shield reverse design on Thursday.

They will be available at two locations, Mint headquarters and Union Station.
The address of headquarters is 801 9th Street, N.W.

At Union Station, there is a kiosk at the east end in the Main Hall. The address is 50 Massachusetts Avenue, N.E., Washington, D.C. 20002.

Hours will be 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The public will be able to buy two to six rolls for face value in even dollar amounts, that is two rolls, $1; four rolls, $2 and six rolls, $3, the same terms as offered Feb. 11 in Springfield, Ill.,

This penny roll exchange as the Mint calls it was planned to occur simultaneously with the Illinois release ceremony, but Mother Nature had other plans that took the form of snow, shutting down the federal offices for four days.

Will Washington collectors take as many as the Springfield audience did, 20,000 rolls with a face value of $10,000?

Tuesday, February 23, 2010 2:04:38 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Monday, February 22, 2010

Quarter not a gold strike
Posted by Dave

Remember the gold-plated state quarters that were being sold on cable television? Not everybody does.

I had an e-mail inquiry about one that turned up in circulation.

“I recently found in my pocket change a 1999-D Georgia state quarter that is gold in color rather than silver. It resembles the color seen in a Sacagawea dollar, or the new Presidential dollar coins. Is this a common finding or a fake or ... ?”

This is a logical question, especially since it could be a wrong metal error.
I was able to tell the writer what it is he had.

The surprise to me, I guess, is not so much that one of these coins made it into circulation, because I have had inquiries of this kind a few times before. What is surprising to me is that so few of these gold-plated quarters have been spent and then found by collectors and others.

As people scramble to find money to pay bills, more of these novelty coins are likely to find their way into circulation.

Will the trickle become a flood?

Let me know if you have seen any.

Monday, February 22, 2010 2:02:43 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Friday, February 19, 2010

Close Denver Mint?
Posted by Dave

With coin demand at what seems to be a new permanent low plateau of around three billion pieces a year, the U.S. Mint faces the choice of what to do with all of its production capacity and employees.

Is it time to do the unthinkable and close the Denver Mint?

Philadelphia alone can produce more than enough coins to keep an adequate supply going under present conditions.

That, of course, is the key phrase: present conditions.

Can anybody now envision any circumstances where coin demand will once again run over 25 billion pieces as it did in 2000 and require multiple shifts to get all of the work done?

Under those high-coin-demand circumstances, retaining the two minting facilities would be crucial.

Those who remember the story of the closure of the San Francisco Mint in 1955 might use it as an object lesson as to what happens when capacity is eliminated. A decade later there was a national coin shortage. It was put back to work.

Should the whole Mint operation be restructured? Close Philadelphia, too, after building a state-of-the-art minting facility in a large open area where Interstate highways come together. The new plant could be scalable to rapidly increase production should higher demand ever arise.

Barring such radical changes, should the Mint jump into the international scrum and look for coin striking business from other countries as it used to do but hasn’t for many years?

Or will the Mint sit at the present default position with many underused presses and employees without tasks to perform?

Friday, February 19, 2010 2:08:47 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Thursday, February 18, 2010

Will Fillmore sales hit the gas?
Posted by Dave

Today Millard Fillmore gets his dollar coin. The official beginning of sales by the Mint of 25-coin rolls is noon Eastern Time.

How many Americans hearing the 13th President’s name without any other context provided would even identify him as an American President?

He sounds more like the guy who owns the gas station on the corner. He would have a nickname, “Phil,” and would have suffered no end of gags with his name relating to “Filling” the tank. That would make him either the most happy-go-lucky fellow in the neighborhood or the meanest, depending on how he handled the lifetime of jokes.

And don’t get him started on what the kids did to his first name in his youth.

But the facts are unalterable. He wasn’t a gas station owner. He was President of the United States, taking the office following the death Zachary Taylor in 1850. He was not elected in his own right.

Rolls of the dollar coins are $35.95 each from either Philadelphia or Denver, plus $4.95 per order for shipping and handling.

Visit the Mint’s Web site at www.usmint.gov for details.

Yes, I know I am not doing the 13th President’s reputation any good with these comments, but then again I might be because more people will probably better remember “Phil” at the gas station than Millard Fillmore, President of the United States.

Thursday, February 18, 2010 1:59:33 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Wednesday, February 17, 2010

If the story is cute, run away
Posted by Dave

Coin errors are both the easiest thing for collectors to understand and the hardest.
Everybody understands the concept of something going wrong. However, from there many tend to slide off into silliness.

You see cutesy stories or descriptions over time that are written to hype the current value of something online. These stories for the most part don’t stand up for long and buyers end up with a lot of virtually worthless cutesy coins.

The errors that stand the test of time tend to be immediately identifiable by all, have an essentially defined number that exist, an explanation as to how they were produced in a manner that is replicated over and over again in the same way and they can be seen with the naked eye.

What’s identifiable by all? Well, classic errors are 1943 cents that were struck on the copper-based planchet rather than a steel planchet. Catalogers maintain a census of them and when they come up for sale, as a 1943-S copper did at the Heritage Long Beach sale, bidding goes to the moon, in this case $207,000.

Another easily identifiable error is basically what introduced the mass of collectors to the error concept as an acceptable collectible. That is the 1955 doubled-die cent. There are a few thousand of these and they are listed in the popular price guides.

Again, collectors can easily distinguish the doubling in the date. The error experts know how they were produced so all of them are virtually identical because they were made from the same obverse die, which had the doubling on it. The doubled-dies are not struck twice.

If you need enormous magnification to see something, it drastically erodes value.
Another thing to keep in mind is that any errors on proof coins tend to be more valuable than the same error on a circulation strike because quality control is much higher for proof coins.

Now don’t get me wrong, there are many collectible errors that don’t necessarily fit all of these criteria, however, their existence tends to be explained in very dry and technical language rather than cutesy stories. Prices for the most part are reasonable. In other words, if you find one, they won’t make you rich.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010 2:08:39 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Check out the poll question
Posted by Dave

My week starts today. I am not used to having Presidents Day off and apparently my computer isn’t, either.

My e-mail crashed this morning as I tried to get going. Then my editorial software crashed.

It has been difficult getting up and running to find out what has been going on the last few days.

Gold has not been inactive while I have been. I see it is up strongly from last week at $1,116 a troy ounce.

Silver still sits under $16, at $15.85.

The number of responses from readers to our latest poll question as to whether banks are making enough of an effort to obtain 2010 cents is running fairly high. It will take me a while to clear them out of my e-mail.

I am not complaining. It is a very good thing to see interest in the lowly cent remaining at high levels after last year’s four-design anniversary year.

I will now have to wait for the poll to run its course in order to find out what the results will be.

If you haven’t voted, check out www.numismaster.com.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010 2:20:53 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Friday, February 12, 2010

Does $5 a roll for cents make sense?
Posted by Dave

Because federal offices in Washington, D.C., including Mint headquarters were closed for four days this week, it is a small triumph that the introduction of the new 2010 cent with the Shield design went off without a hitch yesterday in Springfield, Ill.

Everybody who wanted the new coins were able to buy 2-6 rolls of the coins, which were struck at the Philadelphia Mint, in even dollar amounts and once everyone was satisfied, those who wanted more could make multiple passes through the line.

A buyer on the spot was offering $5 a roll to those who had stood in line and gotten the coins for face value. That’s a nice profit. There is no way to know how many of the coins he was able to purchase.

How long can the secondary market keep prices that high? Time will tell.

Rumors swirl of scarcity but they all seem to trace back to people who are trying to sell the coins at high prices to collectors who for whatever reason don’t want to wait for normal banking distribution to occur.

Today is actually Abraham Lincoln’s 201st birthday and Monday we officially celebrate it along with George Washington’s birthday (which is actually Feb. 22).

What would Lincoln make of all this?

He would probably be pleased to know the Union is preserved and he is still remembered.

Friday, February 12, 2010 2:04:06 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Thursday, February 11, 2010

Don't treat dollars with kid gloves – use them
Posted by Dave

Numismatic News received a letter recently that said the Mint director treated the new Native American dollar coins too roughly at its debut event.

Referred to specifically was the pouring of new Native American dollars from a basket at a Jan. 25 ceremony in New York that was covered in Numismatic News.

The tone of the letter was such that you would think the Mint director was smashing proof sets with a hammer.

Now I know that the first instinct of any collector is preservation. That is laudable.

However, the purpose of any new coin is supposed to be use in circulation, not preservation. This is especially true of the new dollar coins that the Mint is trying to convince the public to use.

If it would make them circulate, I am sure the Mint director would scatter them on the floor at a barn dance.

However, the big problem for the Mint and the Federal Reserve is not that some coins will become worn. The problem is that not enough of them will be so.

The way they are backing up in the hands of the Federal Reserve, I think it can be safely concluded that there will be more than enough high-grade dollar coins for future collectors to choose from.

That New York basket of coins might turn out to be the only 2010 Native American dollars ever used. No?

Well, you get my point.

Thursday, February 11, 2010 2:04:45 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

Comments [1]

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Shake and shiver
Posted by Dave

Ancient Romans believed in portents. Comets foretold momentous events. What would they make of today’s earthquake in Chicago and Washington, D.C.’s snowstorm?

It seems a bit like piling on, doesn’t it?

Then again, stuff happens.

Collectors know their coins provide a long view of the history of the United States or the world, depending on what they collect.

A little shaking and some snow don’t amount to much in the long term. However, shaking of disastrous proportions such as that which recently occurred in Haiti will have permanent repercussions that will ultimately be reflected in that nation’s coin and paper money issues.

Studying coins are a bit like studying layers of ice from core samples from arctic ice in Greenland, or tree rings in very old trees.

Sales numbers of American Eagles showed a high initital interest in bullion coins in the middle 1980s period when we all remembered the high inflation 1970s and feared those conditions might return.

Sales numbers dropped in the 1990s as buyers were more entranced by the dot.com stock issues of the decade.

The next decade’s sales shows the results of the growing economic dislocations we have been facing in our post 9/11 world.

However, there is something reassuring about holding something that is tangible in your hand. It is real. It lasts. It instructs.

All of this helps collectors put events in their proper contexts. Rattling teacups in Chicago are not likely to be followed by anything worse.

Snow in Washington will melt.

Collectors will go on collecting.

That’s the way of the world.

Wednesday, February 10, 2010 2:03:31 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Tuesday, February 09, 2010

Snow cancels note introduction
Posted by Dave

Snow has forced the cancellation today of the “Push the Button” ceremony to introduce the new Series 2009 Federal Reserve Notes at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing plant in Fort Worth, Texas.

Treasurer Rosie Rios was to make the journey to Texas to head up the event, but the storm that hit the nation’s capital and the resulting airport closures made that impossible.

No new date for the event has yet been set. Readers of my blog already know that the American Numismatic Association convention in Fort Worth next month would make an ideal time for such a ceremony.

Another ceremony that could be affected is slated to occur Feb. 11. Snow currently in Illinois should be over before the start time for the introduction of the new Shield cent design will be held at 9:30 a.m. on Thursday at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Museum in Springfield, the state capital and Lincoln’s home city.

I expect it will go on as planned, however, it is still early in the Illinois storm and flights could be cancelled that the Mint director would take to arrive. Snow is forecast through tomorrow noon in Chicago. Let’s wait and see.

Here in Wisconsin I have already shoveled out a couple of inches and it is coming down steadily. I expect to shovel again when I get home tonight and probably yet again tomorrow morning.

Tuesday, February 09, 2010 2:02:05 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Monday, February 08, 2010

Rounding when the cent is gone
Posted by Dave

I conducted an experiment in rounding on Friday. I didn’t realize I was doing it until I was nearly done.

Rounding is a concept that is pertinent to numismatics because it is the suggested remedy to abolishing the cent.

Cash transactions that end with one or two cents get rounded down to arrive at the final total. Cash transactions that total three or four cents get rounded up to the next nickel amount.

In the course of time all of the roundings come out to zero. The users of the system neither gain nor lose money through the absence of the one-cent coin.

On Friday I was doing my Berlin trip expense report. The receipts are in euro. The company wants the numbers converted to dollars. The spreadsheet keeps a running total.

The rounding experiment occurred in the hotel bill. The spreadsheet gets the total and I have to break it down item by item. As each item is entered, the running total gets closer and closer to the final number.

As I was converting each item into dollars and rounding up or down to the nearest cent I was thinking to myself about what I would do if the numbers didn’t match. Obviously, accounting departments don’t like unbalanced accounts.

I needn’t have worried. By following the standard rounding convention, all of the numbers added up to the penny.

I had my expense report completed and I had a lesson in just how rounding works in real life.

Monday, February 08, 2010 2:01:13 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Friday, February 05, 2010

Don't just watch gold
Posted by Dave

Economic statistics have always interested me. I began reading them when I started delivering newspapers at the age of 11.

At first it was simply the prices of gold and silver that interested me, but both were government controlled at the time and so did not need checking daily. I slowly branched out to reading the financial news and commodity prices.

This process did not occur overnight, but it did occur.

Connecting the numbers to numismatics is always the challenge.

There are people who mistake the prices of silver and gold for a barometer of the health of coin collecting. They are not.

The peak of the coin boom of 1964 was followed by a terrible hobby crash that nearly cost the founder of this firm, Chet Krause, the company. But since there was no hobby stock exchange to point to, it happened below the public radar.

Personally, I was swimming against the prevailing tide, but I had a job. I had the desire to spend some of my income on coins.

Even as others hobbyists were leaving the hobby in droves, silver got frisky after government controls were lifted and the remaining hobbyists were fascinated by it. Some made money on it.

The overall health of the hobby, though, is based on the number of participants. These participants are limited in their actions by their incomes and in turn their incomes are dependent on whether they have jobs.

While it is interesting and even profitable to watch silver and gold prices, a figure that does a better job of hobby health forecasting is simply the employment numbers.
The last time unemployment was as high as it is now was the early 1980s. Economic recovery then helped generate a hobby boom that was led by silver dollars.

Today it was announced that another 20,000 employees were cut in January. Some of them likely are coin collectors.

As they cut their hobby expenditures to stay financially afloat, their cutbacks will work their way through all of numismatics. These cuts run from proof sets to modern commemoratives to anything else that the average collector buys. Ouch.

Robust numismatic health will not return until robust economic health does.

Friday, February 05, 2010 2:20:12 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Thursday, February 04, 2010

Treasurer misses chance
Posted by Dave

Call me cranky this morning. Perhaps it is residual jet lag from my trip to Berlin. But I am reacting negatively to ostensibly good news.

I was notified by the Bureau of Engraving and Printing that the new Series 2009 $1 Federal Reserve Notes would be ceremonially introduced Feb. 9 at the Fort Worth note printing plant.

Treasurer of the United States Rosie Rios is leading what is called a “Push the Button” event to get the presses rolling.

Every new administration marks the event of new currency series in some way. This is certainly appropriate.

Paper money collectors have been waiting since last year for this to occur. Other administrations have gotten the event out of the way within weeks of taking office.

Of course, other administrations did not have a financial crisis to tend to as they were sworn in.

But I cannot help but feel that BEP missed the boat in its scheduling. Next month the American Numismatic Association will have its convention in Fort Worth.

How appropriate it would have been if ordinary collectors could have had the opportunity to go, or at least enjoy the idea that our government officials consider them important enough to schedule such an event when they are in town.

BEP has been very supportive of ANA in terms of having its booth at the conventions, so I know there are people there who are aware of the schedule. I assume the decision was made further up the chain of command.

However, just returning from Germany, where the head of government gave 15 minutes of her precious time to kick off a national coin issue as the World Money Fair was being held there, it makes me think that just a little coordination in this country would have yielded major benefits for the government and the BEP collector client base that it has worked so hard to cultivate.

Thursday, February 04, 2010 2:08:32 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Big hopes ride on big numbers
Posted by Dave

One of the goals that U.S. Mint Director Ed Moy set for his trip to the World Money Fair in Berlin last week was to find “pockets” of planchets to meet the continuing heavy demand for gold and silver American Eagles.

It is to be hoped that he was successful. The future of the proof and uncirculated “W” collector versions of the American Eagle gold and silver coins hinges on the outcome.

For the silver Eagle, the Mint had a magnificent January. It sold 3,592,500 coins. This compares to 1,900,000 in January of 2009, a year, which during the summer, the Mint briefly did catch up.

Is this an augury of successful catch-up in 2010?

It could be, but January is a peculiar demand month because so many buyers are not the usual investors, but rank and file coin collectors who want the new date as soon as they can get them.

February sales will probably give us a clearer picture as the collector demand is satisfied.

The gold sales number does not particularly stand out. In January 85,000 were sold as compared to 92,000 in January 2009.

At first blush, you might think that the Mint is falling behind, but then when you consider it had 51,000 2009 coins left over in January, it would seem that overall demand is a little bit weak. If this is the case, the Mint is closer to catching up with the gold American Eagle than we might realize.

Wednesday, February 03, 2010 2:03:40 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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Tuesday, February 02, 2010

'Generation Billions' meets downsized mintages
Posted by Dave

Mint production continues to slide. The figures for January, while up from zero in December, show that only 218,410,000 coins were struck.

The bulk of the mintage was in dollar coins that the public doesn’t want or need and new one-cent coins that the public does not need but collectors are anxious to find because they have a new reverse design.

There were 74.48 million Presidential dollars struck, which seems to indicate that the Mint remains on the path of building up an excess supply. Of course, the design has changed, as we have entered the fourth year of the Presidential program.

Native American dollar production amounted to 25.2 million coins.

Cent production totals were 115,230,000 in January. Denver came in with an even 50 million and Philadelphia chipped in 65,230,000 pieces.

With the early reports of the coins emanating from Puerto Rico, the hobby knew the new cent coins were in the pipeline, but where else they will turn up besides the coin exchange in Springfield, Ill., Feb. 11 is still mostly a mystery.

A mintage of 3.5 million half dollars provided the Mint with enough coins to get the 2010 bag and roll quantities out there. This was divided as 1.7 million coins from Denver and 1.8 million coins from Philadelphia.

No nickels or dimes were struck.

There are also no quarters. This might strike collectors as strange, but word from the World Money Fair in Berlin is that the release date for the America the Beautiful quarter series will be in late April.

Design work apparently lags because of the original lateness of the congressional authorization, giving the Mint less than its optimal lead time.

Do these mintage numbers seem strange to you in any way?

As a collector who grew up as part of “Generation Billions,” these totals seem tiny.

Tuesday, February 02, 2010 5:00:51 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

Comments [2]

Monday, February 01, 2010

No firm cent ground to stand on
Posted by Dave

The fifth World Money Fair to be held in Berlin is now history and I am on my way back to the United States. There are many things on my mind as I try to digest what I have experienced over the past week.

A conversation I had with a blank supplier was most interesting. We were talking about the most recent news that it cost 1.61 cents to make a U.S. cent and a bit over 6 cents to make a nickel in fiscal year 2009.

What were the U.S. Mint's options, I asked?

Bottom line, the reply came, was the Mint probably just has to live with it.

The only cheaper alternative was some sort of coated steel planchet, copper coating for the cent and nickel coating for the nickel. These would be cheaper, but in the case of the cent, it would still cost more to strike the cent than face value. However, even to make this change, the Mint would be taking on a future problem. Apparently, when coins of this composition need to be retired, there is no easy way to dispose of them. Metal recyclers do not like coated steel blanks. It is just not commercially feasible to do it. That makes the coins little more than trash for a landfill and that is not the most environmentally sound thing to do. This hasn't stopped countries from using this type of blank, though.

The supplier recounted a story where one place used retired unrecycled coated steel coins as footings in a small construction project to get rid of them. That is not something that could be done in the United States on a large scale or perhaps any scale at all, so why create the problem in the first place?

So the problem of what to do with the cent and the nickel will probably persist for years.

"You can't very well drop the cent, now can you?" I was asked rhetorically. "If you do that, you might as well go and add a zero to the currency."

With all of the inflation fears out there, even a hint of such an outcome would be enough to prevent any boat-rocking actions with the cent.

Monday, February 01, 2010 2:00:33 PM (GMT Standard Time, UTC+00:00)

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