Coin Collecting News

By JOSEPH GOLDSTEIN for the New York Sun

The federal government’s attempt to stop a group of gold-standard activists from minting an alternative to the greenback is about to face its first legal test.

A dozen people around the country filed suit in U.S. District Court in Idaho this week demanding the return of all the copper, silver, gold, and platinum coins — more than seven tons of metal in all — that the FBI and Secret Service seized in November during raids of a mint in Idaho and a strip mall storefront in Indiana.

The Justice Department had decided that the coins, many of which bear the familiar symbol of Lady Liberty and the phrase “TRUST IN GOD,” were being illegally marketed as government-sanctioned currency, according to the sworn affidavit of an FBI agent.

The creator of the coins, Bernard von NotHaus, who lives in Miami, claims that the federal government is trying to shut down production of his liberty dollars, as the coins are called, because of the competition they pose to the greenback. In recent years, his precious metal coins have outperformed the dollar, whose value has plunged in relation to gold.

The raids in November were the result of a two-year undercover investigation of Mr. Von NotHaus and how he sold liberty dollars. The Justice Department has not followed up with any criminal charges against Mr. Von NotHaus or the regional distributors of his coins.

In the suit filed in Idaho, the various plaintiffs say the federal government has no right to continue holding onto their coins any longer.

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by Greg Reynolds for CoinLink

This is the fourth part of my review of the auction of the Millennia collection of world coins. Please click here to read Part 1- Overview & Famous Pieces or here to read Part 2 - European Coins, or here to read Part 3 — Latin American coins.

The sale was conducted on May 26, Memorial Day, by the firm of Ira & Larry Goldberg. The coins in the collection span more than two thousand years of history, and many coin-producing societies are represented

The main purpose of Part IV is to cover the structure of, and the plan for, the Millennia collection. Several more coins from the collection will be discussed and related to the plan, with emphasis upon types that were not discussed in the first three parts.

The Millennia collection contained coins of many nations, and this collector never intended to complete a series of coins ‘by date.’ Also, there was not a plan to construct a type set of all denominations of any one nation.

Generally, for each nation or coin-producing society represented, there is a carefully selected group of high quality Crowns (large silver coins), plus a smaller number of gold coins, if any. Curiously, all the Belgian coins in the Millennia collection were gold coins.

A 4.22 gram (0.15 ounce) Belgian coin, a ‘lion of gold,’ which was minted in Bruges, is noteworthy. It is not extremely rare. It is important in an artistic and cultural sense. The growling lion and other symbols are carefully chosen and placed. It was probably minted in the 1450s, and it provides clues regarding the independent and defiant, as well as flamboyant, personality of the reigning Duke, ‘Philip the Good.’ It is also one of the few coins of the period that is not overcrowded with design elements. This coin has sizeable, carefully balanced fields. It is NGC graded MS-62, a high grade for a Belgian coin from the 1400s. It sold for $5750.

For Britain and for a few Latin American societies, there were more gold coins than Crowns in the Millennia collection. A substantial percentage of the gold coins that circulated worldwide from the 1730s to the 1850s were minted in Latin America within the Spanish Empire or by former Spanish colonies that became independent. It is thus logical that there were a large number of Latin American gold coins in the Millennia collection. To a meaningful extent, Ira Goldberg intended for the Millennia collection to reflect the large coins that were widely used, and characteristic of their respective societies, over the last two thousand five hundred years. Large coins usually weigh more than one-half an ounce. Continued

The Royal Canadian Mint received a welcome accolade from its peers when the Mint Directors Conference, holding its 25 th annual meeting in Busan, Korea, presented it with the Most Technologically Advanced Circulation Coin Award for its 25-cent breast cancer coloured circulation coin. This is the second honour earned by this inspirational and innovative circulation coin, which was previously recognized in May 2007 as the “Best New Coin” by the International Association of Currency Affairs.

“The Royal Canadian Mint makes a great effort to be the best Mint in the world and it is immensely rewarding when our efforts are validated by our peers” said Ian E. Bennett, RCM President and CEO. “I welcome this award as the Mint marks its centennial year, and as my fellow employees and I proudly celebrate a century of innovation and achievement.”

The 25-cent breast cancer circulation coin features the iconic pink ribbon, the symbol of hope and awareness in the effort to create a future without breast cancer. Thirty million breast cancer coins entered into circulation beginning on April 1, 2006. These were the second coloured circulation coins to be produced by the Royal Canadian Mint’s Winnipeg facility, following the popular 25-cent poppy coin in the fall of 2004. Considered one of the most innovative mints in the world, the Mint has pioneered and perfected the technology process to apply colour to circulation coins.

About the Mint Directors Conference

The Mint Directors Conference (MDC) was organized for the purpose of exchanging information on all monetary matters and related legal, economic, technical, administrative and numismatic questions of interest to the minting industry. The MDC provides a forum for co-operating on the study of current issues and mutually agreeable solutions. The MDC also promotes study and research into all coin-related matters, including the implications of new means of payment

Penny McKim is an antiques hobbyist who considers herself a skilled treasure hunter. So when she came across a shoebox full of coins and medals at a church flea market in Montgomery County, she had an idea she’d struck gold.

Turns out that $5 box contained three ounces of gold in the form of a distinctive medal presented in 1928 to Charles M. Schwab, the man who built Bethlehem Steel into a world titan.

”It’s rather ironic,” said McKim, of Stowe, Montgomery County. ”Schwab was a powerful man who ended up dying penniless, yet I’m sitting here with three ounces of his gold.”

Exactly what that treasure is worth remains in question and probably won’t be known until the day McKim sells her find. She’s already heard from gold dealers offering her $1,300 for the right to simply melt down the 14-karat-gold medal and mine it for its gold value.

”Oh, good heavens, I hope she doesn’t allow that,” said David Alexander, a medals expert with Stack’s, a New York auction house that specializes in rare coins and medals. ”I’m quite sure this is a one-of-a-kind piece. It should not be destroyed.” 

The piece, a Bessemer Gold Medal, was awarded to Schwab by the Iron and Steel Institute of London. Now the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, the trade group has been giving the medal since 1874 to one person each year for outstanding services in the steel industry, said Hilda Kaune, library coordinator at the London institute. Continued

IRVINE, Calif. – Teletrade, America’s largest fully automated Internet auction company for certified coins and currency, will auction “The Kovach Collection of Period One & Two California Fractional Gold” on Sunday, June 22, 2008, in online Auction 2546. The auction will be live at www.teletrade.com from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. eastern time and will include more than 1,500 certified coin lots. The complete auction catalog will be viewable on the Teletrade website beginning Friday, June 13.

California Fractional Gold has a storied history complete with touches of controversy that only adds to the mystique. The tiny small denomination gold pieces were privately issued during the California Gold Rush economy, hand-struck mostly by entrepreneurial San Francisco jewelers, as a result of the Federal government’s unwillingness to issue sufficient small denomination coinage.

“The Kovach Collection” is listed as the “3rd Finest Set of All Time” on the PCGS Set Registry, retired in June 2007, and Teletrade will auction more than 75 coins from the set in individual lots. The collection represents Period One, struck 1852-1856, and Period Two, struck 1859-1882.

“These tiny coins tell such an intriguing story of California and the Gold Rush, it’s easy to see why collectors of Fractional Gold find them so fascinating,” said Ian Russell, president of Teletrade. “This Registry Set is a tremendous accomplishment, and Teletrade is thrilled to be able to offer these coins to our customers. This collection is truly a part of numismatic history and California history, as well.”

Continued