By David L. Ganz, Numismatic News

This is a two part column talking about auction pedigrees (Part I) with a focus on the Mickley-Hawn-Quellar 1804 silver dollar and the Anderson-Dupont-Yoder 1838-O half dollar. Part II tells the fascinating story of tracking down a footnote - a price realized 20 years ago - on a pedigreed piece highlighted in my new book, “Profitable Coin Collecting,” which Krause will publish July 20. Rare coins are white hot. On April 17, Heritage sold the David Quellar family specimen of the 1804 silver dollar for $3.7 million, and the Yoder family 1838-O half dollar (a circulated proof-45) for $276,000. Both coins and all others quoted refer to the hammer price plus the buyer’s premium, if any, charged winning bidders.

Both pieces realized prove the state of the market when looked at in the context of the lengthy pedigree that each offers. The 1804 dollar goes back 140 years; the 1838-O half dollar covers a half century of the coin market with its ups, downs, and sideways momentum.

For more than 40 years, I’ve been writing about the rare coin market and auction sale trends, and have charted the path that I called in one book “planning your rare coin retirement.” It’s become more important to me as I get nearer to my own; my 57th birthday (coincidentally my 43rd year as a coin writer) comes up July 28.

Read Mr.Ganz’s Full Article Here

By Gerald McKinstry for The Journal News 

For Jeff Haber and son Danny framing pennies makes sense.

For decades, the elder Haber stashed the often-overlooked or unwanted copper coins. More recently, he decided to put them to good use. “I had a ton of pennies,” Jeff Haber said. “I have 30 years of collected pennies.”

Inspiration came in the form of a portrait of Abraham Lincoln made entirely of pennies that he saw at the Ripley’s Believe It Or Not museum in Florida about eight years ago. He and his son decided they were up for the challenge.

“What we saw in Florida was absolutely incredible,” Danny Haber said.

The first portrait they completed is hanging in their home. A second was purchased by the Ripley’s museum for $500. Now, the two have completed a third portrait, which they are donating to New Rochelle High School.

This one used 2,400 coins, or $24. The Habers said they spent nearly two months positioning and gluing the coins.

Read the full Journal Article 

By Andrew Pridgen for the Nevada Appeal

Even during the most difficult economic times, someone’s making money.

This adage couldn’t be more true, both literally and figuratively, than it is this week in Carson City. As area numismatists are already well aware, this is National Coin Week.

Whether you’re looking through loose change for a newly minted Nevada state quarter or you’re Rusty Goe, owner of Reno-based Southgate Coins - who last week purchased an 1871 gold piece from the Carson City mint for $414,000, this week is literally one for the books for coin collectors.

“I think it’s a (hobby) that’s really starting to pick up a lot of new enthusiasts,” Goe said. “We have just a wide variety of customers. We have children on a budget, and we stock items to get kids started. And we have long-time collectors who have coins worth tens, sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

No matter the collector’s experience level, Goe said, one lesson is learned quickly for Northern Nevada hobbyists. (more…)

I have to absolutely frank with you and say that I am stunned that this magazine is free! Mike Byers has published yet another amazing issue of his wildly popular Mint Error News Magazine, devoted to error and variety coins. The current issue, number 23 in the series, has more 200 pages cram-packed with information, photos, and price lists relating to error coins! Even the advertisements are fascinating!

Although all of the magazine is interesting and informative, the error coin price guides painstakingly compiled by Al Levy are the only frequently-updated price guides of this type that can be found anywhere on the Web. Levy scans eBay, the widest-reaching coin market in the world, for the closing prices of hundreds of different types, dates, and combinations of errors. For example, on the page containing prices for the “Speared Bison” Nickels and “Extra Leaf” Wisconsin Quarters, we learn that prices are way down, partly due to new material coming on the market. Levy warns us about the do-it-yourself coin-wrapping equipment that allows people to wrap and crimp their own rolls of coins, so one should be very wary bidding on supposedly unsearched rolls that show an error coin on the end.

The cover story is about a Proof Utah State Quarter which was struck on an elliptical clip. (An elliptical clip is a coin blank that was erroneously punched into an oval, rather than round, shape. Such blanks are extremely rare, but for a Proof coin to have such a blank, with all of the careful handling and multiple inspections that Proof coins go through at the Mint, it’s downright newsworthy!)

Read Full Article on About Coins 

By Davd Ganz for Numsmatic News

Hi-o Silver! After years of being thought of as a backwater of precious metals, and even threatened with demotion to an industrial metal, silver is back in the spotlight. The effect on common date silver coins couldn’t be more welcome to collectors and investors, and is helping the market as a whole.

Up more than 29 percent over last year’s $13.38 average, silver has increased almost four times its 2003 average of $4.87 a troy ounce and three times its 1998 price average of $5.54 an ounce.

Here’s how the difference plays out on a common circulated Morgan dollar that contains .7734 troy ounces of metal. At $5.54 an ounce, a silver dollar has about $4.42 worth of bullion. A quarter has .18084 troy ounces worth of precious metal, worth just about a dollar. At the current $17.38 average, the silver dollar’s metal reserve is $13.44 and the quarter is about $3.15.

As gold crossed $1,000 and platinum $2,175, silver went over the important psychological barrier of $20 an ounce before retreating to profit takers. That approaches the 1979 average of $21.79, which is otherwise understood only in the context of the Hunt Brothers run on the silver market.

Read Full Artcle on Numsmatic News