Alright gonna pick up somewhere between 100-200oz of physical.

Is something like 10oz bars a decent size? I want to avoid paying too much rake but also don't want 100oz bars that I can't split up

I still don't quite "get" junk coins.

Nice work, I freakin like it.

i bought a bunch of silver eagles from apmex a while ago and paid $2.62 over spot per coin, just got an email from them offering me $3 over spot per coin to buy them back. obviously %age-wise it's less than i paid, but i thought it was interesting as they send me what feels like 3 e-mails a day asking me to buy more and this was the first one they've sent asking to buy some back.

Likely because you are paying less of a numismatic premium and closer to actual spot.

I got a handful of 1oz bars... silver for eggs?

Surprised how close the junk coins were to bullion at my local mint


Junk
quarter bag - $8276 = 46.234/oz
tenth bag - $3348 = 46.5/oz

NWMMint Bullion
10oz bars - $465.20 = 46.52/oz
5oz bars - $232.60 = 46.52

And these prices are from this morning. They've dropped a bit obv

BTFD Ladies! The Ben Bernack is on tomm....wonder what wonderful news he has to tell us?

Quarters, dimes, half dollars and dollar coins from 1964 and earlier - 90% silver, 10% copper. (also half dollars from 64-70 were clad in 40% silver). When these old silver coins have no numismatic value due to scarcity/condition, they are referred to as 'junk silver'. These are ready for circulation and obtainable for usually just under spot. You can also get them for 1x face value by searching boxed rolled coins. You'll find the most silver in half dollar rolls and dime rolls, from my experience. Some people have amassed hundreds of ounces of 'free' (face value) silver by diligently searching boxes.

Another benefit of junk dimes, for example, is that they are pretty much the smallest fractional piece of silver. 10 oz or 100 oz bars are fine but if we ever truly have to barter with silver (not that I wish for such a societal reversion) then junk silver will be invaluable for making change.

Of course with the value of 1 silver dime now over $3.26 and rising we might have to bust out the metal snips for making change on even the dimes.

One final thing about the junk coins is sometimes people don't know what they have and you can score pieces with numismatic premium for melt value, or there is the fact that eventually some of the dates/mints/variations will eventually develop numismatic premium if people continue melting down junk silver coins.

One thing to be aware of with junk silver, the more worn it is the less silver the coin actually contains obviously. I've heard estimates that a roll of well-worn dimes is up to 10% less silver weight than a roll of uncirculated dimes. So always buy by weight if you can, versus face value multiples which most people use.

I like variety... I started buying 10 oz bars, then 1 oz coins like Eagles. Then I started buying junk silver, mostly dimes... then 1 oz rounds like prospectors, and some modern 'numis' like australian lunar series coins, some BU Morgans, and a few American the Beautiful 5x5 oz coin sets (which were available well under melt value until recently thx to US govt price controls)

Val: By saying half dollar rolls & dime rolls are most likely, do you mean you literally are buying boxes of coins from somewhere (bank?) and searching through each one for pre-64 coinage?

What years are half dollars worth more because of the silver content?

I have bought a few boxes, yes. My father has done more - at his business he doesn't pass paper dollars unless the customers ask for it instead of coins (lol) so he is always buying boxes of $1 dollar presidential coins and $500 boxes of half-dollar coins to make cash change.

But some people have big daily system in place. Hit Banks A, B, C in the morning and buy boxes of half dollars, search them that day, remove the silver, and return the coins to alternative branches D, E, F and rinse/repeat

half dollars from 1916-1964 are 90% silver. 1965-1970 are 40% silver. You might also find special proof set Kennedy half dollars from 1992 on which are 90% silver, if some punk kid stole grandpa's coin set collection and broke them out of the cases


Coinflation.com is a good site that lists current melt values of US coinage including silver. I am also hoarding copper pennies 1982 and prior, and all nickels as these are worth more in metal content than face value .

if even a 1/4 of the morbid predictions of http://www.inflation.us/ come to frusion silver is going to rocket.. silver is not coming back down to 30, 35 40 then staying there, to many people are wise now.

The fundamentals of the dollar and sht that the fed has been doing is criminal.

its over and if that lot "over there" are done, then you have to look at whats to come.

there is going to be inflation, if only for that point alone silver is a wise investment.

when silver hits 60 and 80 an oz which it will.. what reason are you going to put up and say well x y and z.

what ever you say its bs, the system is broken and the pain is coming.

you cant even take delivery of huge orders if at all, and then it takes months.

Silver is precious in the world we live in, it is used in every developed nation on earth.

Your not going to lose on silver, so why not load up every way from sunday, what silver is going to go back down to 20?

lol

Do you need a merchant account to buy boxes of coins? this kind of sounds like fun. Do banks care that people do this?

How often do you find half dollars? Is my math wrong or is each one ~1/3 oz?

It printed a shooting star/nasty doji yesterday on a wide ranging day. So based on that imo we should see 42 or lower before we test the highs again. May test highs again eventually but could prob be atleast a week or so. Time for a pullback (flag).

if inflation kicks in wont the government raise interest rates which hurts silver?

You don't need any special account, just ask if they have rolled coins or boxes of rolled coins available. Some smaller banks won't have boxes, but they should be able to order them for you. I've heard some people 'bribe' the tellers with donuts or something because after a while they might not be happy about dealing with all the heavy boxes of coins or putting your rejects through the coin counting machine all the time. This is why most people like to pick up the coins at one branch and drop them off at a different one, or else they might get tired of your shenanigans more quickly.

Some banks might charge you a service fee, just don't go there. You will have more success probably, by going to smaller banks or even grocery store cashier windows who will have more hand-rolled coins or coins from local people actually spending them. Large banks that service places like Wal Mart with coins will be ordering coins from places like Brinks and they will have machine rolled coins, I have found very few silver pieces in these. They might be machine-sorting them for themselves before delivering the boxes of rolled coins to banks.

How high do you think they will raise interest rates? Can you imagine what would happen if they raised interest rates to say, 10%? The economy would collapse. They will raise rates very slowly over a long period of time.

My primary hope with silver is to not look like an idiot in front of my wife. So here's hoping it doesn't tank

Im not saying its going to be anything drastic, but several people are saying this is going to go up indefinitely because inflation is going to be so high. But ignoring that interest rates are incredibly low right now.

Hopefully, yes.

However a 1% rise in rates would cost the US gov't around $150B per year on top of the $1.5T existing deficit. The government simply cannot finance itself if rates rise any appreciable amount. For kicks and giggles if rates mirror 1980 (20%) thats $3T/year in interest payments.

edit: if you want to be a nit the rise in interest rates would only apply to new debt, however given the large roll every year it doesn't change that the US gov't would be unable to finance itself if rates rose materially

While I do not think QE will be ending many people do think it will end this summer and if Ben Bernanke says anything tomorrow that supports this we could get a rather vicious sell-off.

Great read thx all...well since poker went away for the time being i am looking to put a little money into some silver, of course i start looking after its skyrocketed this yr but didn't think about it until now...

My question to you pro's out there as a personal opinion am i better just trying to look around for junk silver and wait on buying bullion or should i get some bullion and some junk?

I only have about 4-5k for investing, used to be a lot for silver but doesn't look like it anymore...thx for helpin out a fellow 2+2 newbie

P.S. i like reading about the junk silver, makes me wanna go thru all my spare change looking for more then just some face value coins