On the same webpage, the US Mint warns about these coins:
The coins are real, but the "president" is a fake.
Posted on 02/06/2011 4:25:44 PM PST by blam
Why You Need to Own Nickels, Right Now
Robert Wenzel
Saturday, February 5, 2011
On November 11, 2010, I wrote in the EPJ Daily Alert:
Back at the commodity level, copper is the latest to hit a record at $8,966 a ton. Copper is certainly not a "goldbug" play and is simply an indicator of economic (inflationary) demand. At some point, nickels, which are mostly made of copper, will start to disappear from circulation.
There's right now 6.2 cents worth of metal in a nickel [Note the value is now up to 7.2 cents.-RW]. When I run into someone that does not have a strong background in investing, I now tell them to buy nickels. You need storage space and a strong back to move them around, but a $100 box of nickels (roughly the size of a very large brick) can be lifted without a problem. You can stack plenty of "bricks" on a hand truck.
What's great about this investment is that there is no downside. In the unlikely event that there is no inflation, you can just spend your nickels... again, this is a great conservative investment...I fully expect the coins will eventually climb in value to at least double their 5 cent price.
The government has made it illegal to melt them down, but you will never have to do anything close to that. When you need to liquidate, just sell them to a numismatic dealer.
Gresham's law (bad money drives good money out of circulation) will take over at some price point and the coins will simply disappear from circulation, just like the pre-1965 silver content dimes and quarters have, and trade at much higher prices.
Those silver dimes now have over $2.00 worth of silver in them, the quarters have roughly $5.27 worth of silver, and you will never find one in circulation. The current nickel has 7.28 cents worth of metal content (mostly copper) in it. At some point they will disappear from circulation.
Indeed, that may not be far off into the future, if the story starts to get around about nickels the way it seems to be.
Financial author Michael Lewis told a story about a huge nickel investor, this week on the television show, The Colbert Report. The must see video is here.
Note: You can track the metal value of nickels and other coins at Coinflation.com.
They haven't made pennies out of copper since about 1981. They are almost all zinc now.
Somewhere around here (or maybe out at the old family homestead) I have some of the wartime funny pennies, they were not made out of copper either. :’) Also have a colonial (or early republic) 3 cent piece, that appears to be iron or something.
Yep, I used to always ask to change bills for a couple rolls of nickels every time I had bank business. They never blinked, ever. Plenty of people need change for their own businesses. Free money, handed over the counter.
On the same webpage, the US Mint warns about these coins:
The coins are real, but the "president" is a fake.
I did the same except that I got 12 rolls every Tuesday and Thursday. The reaction was the same. Right!
I've been gone (no accounts) from that bank now for about six months.
In fact, lol, I went into the bank once and said that I want 12 rolls of quarters (by mistake) and a voice from behind a wall said, "He means 12 rolls of nickels." I hadn't realized that I had said quarters. That's how predictiable I had become.
I told a twentysomething cashier that he should “keep an ear out” for coins that sounded “funny” (clank rather than clink) because that meant they were real silver. He said he’d never encountered any such thing. He’s probably right.
Back about 20 years ago I got a silver quarter in change out of a copy machine.
So when is the last year that copper pennies were made?
Awesome post.
I was told about the increase in value of nickels a few years ago and I have a couple coffee tins full of them. I never spend one.
No they won't.
The only coins widely circulated that will appreciate are the copper penny (about 10%, in circulation still) and the US nickel that this article is about.
I remember old black pennies, we called them lead pennies, when I was a kid, I was born in 1943. We knew they were somehow related to the war but not how.
I now think they were zinc.
Silver "War" Nickels 1942 - 1945 Silver "War" nickels were produced by the United States from mid-1942* through 1945. The coins were manufactured from 56% copper, 35% silver and 9% manganese. This allowed the saved nickel metal to be shifted to industrial production of miltary supplies during World War II. Silver nickels are distinguised by a slightly different coloration than ordinary nickels and by the appearance of a large mintmark above Monticello's dome on the reverse side of the coin. The marks are "S" for the San Fransico mint, "D" for the Denver mint and "P' to indicate production at the Philadelphia mint, being the first coin to feature the Philadelphia intial, as no mint mark was the usual designation for Philadelphia mintage before 1979.
www.warnickels.com
Guest Post: Silver Breaks Its Golden Shackles
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/guest-post-silver-breaks-its-golden-shackles
We know. No-one is planning to do any melting.
Cute take on Obama though.
I had one one time- but it was magnetic.
I can't find any evidence for it on the nickels yet.
And probably before the 2012 elections.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.