Silver Ikes - good deal?

[fistfulladirt]

A dealer has brown Ikes for sale at $7 ea. I have never found a 40% out of the hundreds I've searched, so I bought two. Anyone know if these are worth the price? Thanks.

ffd

 

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[Mentone Grizz]

Sealed and slabbed?? Looks like a good deal to me. At $7 each, probably slightly higher than melt value, but it appears to be a nice keeper. I would get more of them.
- Grizz

 

[snazzypit]

Melt is currently 6.56 on these, so definitely a good deal

 

[jim4silver]

FFD,

I would buy a few if you like them as collectibles, but I would not recommend buying a bunch of them as investments.

There are a ton of the brown and blue Ikes out there. Many dealers will wholesale them at melt (or even below) just to get rid of them. Coin dealers will generally treat them like 40% halves if you try to sell to them.

I don't know why that is considering the original buyers paid 10 bucks for the proofs back when they made them. There does not seem to currently be a demand from collectors for them I guess.

Jim

 

[fistfulladirt]

FFD,

I would buy a few if you like them as collectibles, but I would not recommend buying a bunch of them as investments.

There are a ton of the brown and blue Ikes out there. Many dealers will wholesale them at melt (or even below) just to get rid of them. Coin dealers will generally treat them like 40% halves if you try to sell to them.

I don't know why that is considering the original buyers paid 10 bucks for the proofs back when they made them. There does not seem to currently be a demand from collectors for them I guess.

Jim

Thanks for the advice Jim, he did seem a bit anxious to sell a bunch of them!

ffd

 

[AGCoinHunter]

Bought a few sets of these a while back for the Dansco 7070 types. Other than that, not much demand for them.

 

[EpsilonMinus]

That is very odd, considering a big, fat silver coin is a BIG FAT SILVER COIN. This reminds me of an anecdote my friend told me today. He said he was at a restaurant and the guy at the register was holding up a silver Ike and telling everyone who stepped up, "If you can tell me who is on this coin, you can have it." No one knew, except my friend, of course. Maybe this is why no one is buying them. Too bad, that is a hell of a nice coin there, cool score!

 

[jim4silver]

That is very odd, considering a big, fat silver coin is a BIG FAT SILVER COIN. This reminds me of an anecdote my friend told me today. He said he was at a restaurant and the guy at the register was holding up a silver Ike and telling everyone who stepped up, "If you can tell me who is on this coin, you can have it." No one knew, except my friend, of course. Maybe this is why no one is buying them. Too bad, that is a hell of a nice coin there, cool score!

I believe that the fact of the coin being only 40% silver as opposed to 90% or even .999 is what prevents it from having more popularity, just like the gold art medallions the US Mint sold years ago (like the Mark Twain, etc). These coins contain a full ounce of gold (some were 1/2 ounce), but are only 90% pure. They are generally unpopular with coin dealers and can be bought at or near melt. They are not bad looking coins either and have relatively low mintages.

Jim

 

[apush]

My two cents on this topic:

1st: I would have bought those coins as well
2nd: Why? Because they are unusual and have low mintage
3rd: By no means do I know a single thing about coins or their value except melt--ask Diver_Down (he can assure your that I do not)
4th: As a historian, I know things change over time and people within a culture add value to what we do not think is currently valuable
5th: Perhaps, in time, fads will change, and Ike silver coins will be in demand
6th: I will probably be in my grave at that time, but my grandkids might benefit.

apush

 

[SFBayArea]

take them out and put them in old cardboard albums to get them rainbow toned so they sell for a pretty penny.

 

[fistfulladirt]

take them out and put them in old cardboard albums to get them rainbow toned so they sell for a pretty penny.

SF, have you heard about the coin/cooked egg-whites in a baggie to speed up the toning process? Have not tried it.

 

[SFBayArea]

take them out and put them in old cardboard albums to get them rainbow toned so they sell for a pretty penny.

SF, have you heard about the coin/cooked egg-whites in a baggie to speed up the toning process? Have not tried it.

I've dealt and experimented with many processes to tone silver coins over the years. Yeah, I've tried the hard boiled eggs process and it's actually the sulfur from the yolk that tones it. The problem is that the sulfur is too much and often causes the artificial purple toned look quickly which is easy to tell and won't sell for moon money. Some people however do sell artificially toned ones on Ebay for a little over face. They ruin the coins in my opinion. If you go to the PCGS forum, people love the rainbow toners and if you get an uncirculated silver rainbow graded by PCGS it goes for moon money on Ebay. Over time and after extensive research I've actually come to realize that it's impossible to make legit rainbow toners that can pass as legit by PCGS overnight. The most you can do is speed up the process a little bit by using old folder like Wayte Raymond albums. People buy them to tone coins. I can't give out the secrets of what I learned over the years but that's the most amount of info I can give you.

HH

This Eagle had been in a holder for a while and looks nice. I took this pic last year and unfortunely the coin doesn't look as nice anymore as I left in there for another year and left it to tone for too long.