Proof Coin at Bullion Price?

[timsk]

2000 Queen Mother 100th Birthday £5 Crown Piedfort Silver Proof

I appreciate that it's struck in 56.56 grams of 925 sterling silver as opposed to 2oz of 999 fine silver but, even so, on the face of it this looks like a good deal to me. Am I missing something, or should I be backing up the truck to the door of Britannia Coin Company's dispatch department?

[harrygill111]

I guess the piedfort proof just Isn’t popular, this works out to about £35 an ounce of pure silver. However, these have sold for as little as £40-£45 delivered on ebay recently, so about £26 and ounce which is about the going rate. 

eBay is a good place to back up the truck if you have time to trawl, and generally Piedforts give better value. I recently picked up a 1989 £2 Silver Piedfort Proof, Two-Coin set at spot, after the seller gave me a partial refund because the rim was starting to milk. I managed to clean it up with a simple pencil eraser, compromising the proof finish somewhat, but who cares, it was just about the metal weight at that price.  

 

Edited November 10, 2022 by harrygill111

[LawrenceChard]

41 minutes ago, timsk said:

2000 Queen Mother 100th Birthday £5 Crown Piedfort Silver Proof

I appreciate that it's struck in 56.56 grams of 925 sterling silver as opposed to 2oz of 999 fine silver but, even so, on the face of it this looks like a good deal to me. Am I missing something, or should I be backing up the truck to the door of Britannia Coin Company's dispatch department?

 

23 minutes ago, harrygill111 said:

I guess the piedfort proof just Isn’t popular, this works out to about £35 an ounce of pure silver. However, these have sold for as little as £40-£45 delivered on ebay recently, so about £26 and ounce which is about the going rate. 

eBay is a good place to back up the truck if you have time to trawl, and generally Piedforts give better value. I recently picked up a 1989 £2 Silver Piedfort Proof, Two-Coin set at spot, after the seller gave me a partial refund because the rim was starting to milk. I managed to clean it up with a simple pencil eraser, compromising the proof finish somewhat, but who cares, it was just about the metal weight at that price.  

 

They got "jobbed out" after flopping. We bought a lot of them. The single crowns sold better and were more popular.

Silver Piedfort Proof

 

Quantity	Rate	Buy
1	£45.00

This was from our 24carat.co.uk "heritage site"!

😎

[CollectForFun]

56.56 grams of .925 at £55?

That's 1.68oz of silver at £55 or £32.74 per oz. Is that supposed to be the "bullion price"? I'm not so sure...

[Pete]

During my "learning phase" as a stacker I bought loads of superb looking sterling silver proof commemoratives.
I was watching eBay like a hawk believing I was buying great coins at low prices, beautiful, boxed, limited mintage etc.
However when it comes time to sell perhaps as you switch to bullion, then you may ( I certainly did ) is that your prized collection is only worth scrap value in most instances.
All depends on whether you want to hold PMs as an investment or to admire and show to your friends.

[harrygill111]

@timsk here are a couple of simple fomulas that are handy...

 

To figure out how much pure silver troy Oz the piece contains:

• Pure metal troy ounces = (Weight in grams  x  Purity) /  31.1035
• So in this example   (56.56 x 0.925) / 31.1035 = 1.68 Troy Oz 

 

To figure out the metal value: 

• Metal Value of the coin = Pure weight in troy Oz  x Spot Price      
• So in this example    1.68oz * £18.70 = £31.45

 

To find a fair price on bullion pieces replace the spot price above with the going rate for the metal, if going rate is £25 an Oz, then a fair price is about £42.05. 

 

Obvisouly a fair price is subjective and will vary for diffferent piece's finishes etc but hopefully this helps. As Pete mentioned, beware of the tonnes of commerative and British Isles coins. Unless you like them of course, in which case buy away!  

Edited November 10, 2022 by harrygill111

[timsk]

Thanks for your comments everyone - much appreciated. On balance, I don't think I'll back up the truck just yet!

Using harrygill111's price of £42.05, (many thanks for the equations btw - very helpful), I'm paying an extra £12.95 for it's theoretical numismatic value (inc. P&P). The risk is whether this increases or decreases over time. If the latter, will the spot silver price increase sufficiently to offset it? Both risks strike me as being small, with the potential upside that both of them (i.e. spot silver price and the coin's numismatic value) rise over time. That's a risk I'm happy to take and so, on that basis, I'm inclined to buy. That said, if eBay sellers are letting them go for £10 - £15 cheaper then, obviously, that's an even better bet. However, having had a quick gander, I can't see anyone offering this coin for less than £55.00. As I'm new to the game, I'm probably not searching the platform in the best way that leads to the needles in the haystack. 

 

". . . All depends on whether you want to hold PMs as an investment or to admire and show to your friends."

I've tried showing a few coins to friends and they look at me as if I've completely lost the plot! So no, that's not my motivation Pete, investment is where I'm at.

Edited November 10, 2022 by timsk

[LawrenceChard]

3 hours ago, timsk said:

Thanks for your comments everyone - much appreciated. On balance, I don't think I'll back up the truck just yet!

Using harrygill111's price of £42.05, (many thanks for the equations btw - very helpful), I'm paying an extra £12.95 for it's theoretical numismatic value (inc. P&P). The risk is whether this increases or decreases over time. If the latter, will the spot silver price increase sufficiently to offset it? Both risks strike me as being small, with the potential upside that both of them (i.e. spot silver price and the coin's numismatic value) rise over time. That's a risk I'm happy to take and so, on that basis, I'm inclined to buy. That said, if eBay sellers are letting them go for £10 - £15 cheaper then, obviously, that's an even better bet. However, having had a quick gander, I can't see anyone offering this coin for less than £55.00. As I'm new to the game, I'm probably not searching the platform in the best way that leads to the needles in the haystack. 

". . . All depends on whether you want to hold PMs as an investment or to admire and show to your friends."

I've tried showing a few coins to friends and they look at me as if I've completely lost the plot! So no, that's not my motivation Pete, investment is where I'm at.

We used to record the original Royal Mint prices on many of our old pages, but we failed to do so on this one:

https://24carat.co.uk/frame.php?url=2002crownqueenmothermemorial.php

I think (guess) they were about £95 each.

It is still a nice coin, but personal preference rules. Certainly cheaper than £180 (RM price) for the most recent silver piedfort proof crowns.

😎

[Chorlton]

The challenge with silver is the relatively low value and the costs involved in buying / selling a lot of low priced items compared to a few high priced items. Each time there is a postage and packaging cost and with few higher priced items this is small compared to the value and also less effort than putting numerous items in the post. This does not mean good value is not there just need to be careful to fully cost things.

 

[MonkeysUncle]

I wouldn't back a truck up for those. No value at that price and the Queen Mother is not a pretty sight in that image!

Moose tooled to borrow a delightful term...