Coins

For the last 35 years, give or take, many nations around the world have minted a variety of commemorative coins.  In this endeavor, the United States has been the first amount equals, minting dozens of different types of commemorative pieces.  These commemorative issues have celebrated such diverse organizations, people and events as the Girl Scouts, Dolley Madison and the World Cup of soccer, among others.

However, modern U.S. commemorative coins also share one common feature; they are all, without exception, terrible investments.

One of the primary rules of investing in art and antiques is that anything intentionally issued as a commemorative item is rarely a good investment.  This dictum applies not only to commemorative coins, but to any other commemorative souvenir as well.  There are a couple reasons for this.

First, the issuing company or agency is typically interested in making a profit – the larger the better.  This means they rarely put stringent limits on the number of commemoratives they release.

The second problem is that when people buy commemorative issues the first thing they do is hide them in closets or bury them at the bottom of dresser drawers.  Consequently there is almost no natural attrition of the commemorative pieces in question.  If a million were originally produced, it is a fair bet that somewhere approaching a million are still around, and almost all of them will be in pristine condition too!

Modern U.S. commemorative coins illustrate this point perfectly.  Since the early 1980s, the U.S. mint has struck commemorative half dollars, silver dollars and $5 gold coins.  From the program’s inception in 1982 through 2014, there have been, in total, over 13 million uncirculated and 51 million proof specimens struck.  Although technically legal tender, none of these issues has circulated.

Instead, each one of them left the mint encapsulated in hard plastic for preservation purposes.  It is almost a guarantee that very close to all 64 million of these modern U.S. commemorative coins are still out there, lurking in ordinary peoples’ desk drawers and safety deposit boxes, patiently waiting for the day they can be sold at a big profit.

Unfortunately, that day is unlikely to ever arrive.  Recently I was browsing the website of the well-known bullion dealer APMEX.  They had mixed-type, modern U.S. commemorative $5 gold coins available in bulk.  These pieces are struck in 90% fine gold and contain 0.24187 troy ounces of pure gold each.

You can buy as many of these official U.S. government mint issued gold coins as you like for less than 8% over the spot price of bullion – about $23 per coin over spot.  That, my friends, is only half a step removed from the coins trading as pure bullion pieces, with absolutely no numismatic (collector’s) value whatsoever.

That isn’t the end of the bad news for modern U.S. commemorative issues, though.  With the exception of the very first commemorative half-dollar struck in 1982, all subsequent commemorative half-dollars issued by the U.S. mint are composed of an abominably cheap copper-nickel alloy.  Only commemorative silver dollars are struck from the traditional 90% silver alloy.  Of course, the U.S. mint still charges a premium price for these half-dollar issues, despite them being struck in base metal.

As if all this wasn’t bad enough, the coup de grace is that modern U.S. commemorative coins have – almost to a coin – universally poor designs.  So in addition to celebrating rather mundane or obscure topics, U.S. commemorative issues of the last few decades are also artistically uninspired, to put it kindly.  Stylistically the coins are unspeakably dull; it is obvious that the die engravers weren’t trying very hard.

It is possible that you may have received a modern U.S. commemorative coin as a gift or perhaps even purchased one for yourself or for a loved one.  I sincerely hope you do not believe that these pieces are good investments, because nothing could be further from the truth.  Possessing unattractive, lifeless designs and struck in massive quantities, these commemorative issues are best ignored and left to rot in attics and basements.

If you must speculate in them, then the deal that APMEX offers – less than 8% over spot for $5 gold commemoratives – is a great starting place.  If things end badly then all you could possibly lose would be the modest premium over bullion value.

One delightful art buying trick for the serious art connoisseur is to purchase works in bulk. I am aware that this might seem counterintuitive at first blush. Art – good art anyway – is not mass-produced. Instead, its one-of-a-kind, unique nature is part of its allure. But there are certain unusual situations where one is afforded the opportunity to buy in quantity. When those circumstances arise, don’t be afraid to be unconventional in your art buying.

I’ll use my own situation as an example. Way back in 2006 I was monitoring eBay for deals in an area of special interest to me – medieval South Indian gold coins. And I was in luck. A seller from Great Britain was looking to sell a small collection of six half pagodas from the South Indian Vijayanagara Empire.

These were highly collectible, intriguing little gold coins with Hindu gods and goddesses on the front and native script on the reverse. I don’t know where the seller acquired this collection, but it may have had to do with the fact that India was once a colony of the British Empire. This means there are a substantial number of cultural and commercial ties between the two nations.

Photos revealed the coins were very high quality pieces, with exceptionally strong striking and good centering. They were very close to what I wanted, although not perfect. The coins were unattributed as to ruler and the collection contained duplicates. In short, it was a generic lot.

I placed a bid of £168.99 British pounds which was duly accepted. When combined with shipping and handling and converted at the prevailing dollar-pound exchange rate my total cost was just over $58 U.S. dollars per coin. Quite a bargain for 500 year old gold coins in phenomenal condition!

Many years have passed since I purchased that lot of amazing medieval Indian gold coins and I still proudly own them. However, it is only recently that the true wisdom of buying these pieces in bulk has become apparent.

Today gold half pagodas from the Vijayanagara Empire cost anywhere from two to three times as much as I originally paid. This equates to an approximately 8% to 13% return per annum (in U.S. dollars) over my holding period. However, due to the weakness of the British currency over the last several years, if calculated in pounds my return would be 11% to 17% per annum!

It can be difficult to predict how well specific segments of the art or antique market will perform in the future. But art buying in quantity allows you to effectively leverage your collecting knowledge. It takes almost the same amount of time to evaluate a lot of a half dozen similar coins as it does one.

The same idea applies to many other areas of the art market as well. So, provided you have done your due diligence first, it makes sense to opportunistically buy interesting specimens in bulk if you are presented the chance. Although it may take many years for such a move to pay off, in the end you’ll be very glad you did it.