Mozambique Coins

Hi folks,

I was surfing various websites, and found someone selling a 1 centimo 1975
coin from Mozambique for 300.00(Cdn). Well, the coin is on my wantlist,
and since I have a habit of only wanting coins for about 30.00 or less,
unless it's Greenland or something rare that I just really want. I
immediately wondered if the price was wrong (or the person selling was ill
for asking so much). So I looked it up in Krause....

Sure enough, 1 centimo, in UNC is listed for 225.00$US.

The mintage doesn't appear low, there's no notes about melting. But all
those 1975 coins are listed at 100 and up in UNC. What's up with that?
Have they always been that expensive?

Cheers,
Colleen

There was an article in World Coin News sometime back about that series. It
seems they were minted in Eastern Europe and mostly not released, causing an
instant rarity. In recent years, however, several have been trickling out
of their hiding place, especially the 2, 5, and 10 centimo pieces. A few of
the one centimo coins have followed. I have seen several of all of these on
eBay, and they have been going for about a third of catalog. I myself
bought a 1 centimo in Unc for $62.00. I expect a deluge one of these days.

The same thing has been happening with the aluminum Vietnamese coins of
1945-46.

James

"R. Carvish" wrote in message
...

Hi folks,

I was surfing various websites, and found someone selling a 1 centimo 1975
coin from Mozambique for 300.00(Cdn). Well, the coin is on my wantlist,
and since I have a habit of only wanting coins for about 30.00 or less,
unless it's Greenland or something rare that I just really want. I
immediately wondered if the price was wrong (or the person selling was ill
for asking so much). So I looked it up in Krause....

Sure enough, 1 centimo, in UNC is listed for 225.00$US.

The mintage doesn't appear low, there's no notes about melting. But all
those 1975 coins are listed at 100 and up in UNC. What's up with that?
Have they always been that expensive?

Cheers,
Colleen

There's likely a few coins like this... I can think of a few Eastern
Europe coins that are recent, but even the people living in that country
can't get them that easily. Although they're not rare or expensive... just
not easy to find on eBay or from coin dealers.

I'm not quite ready to pay even 30% catalog just yet... I"ll wait it out,
and maybe at some point they'll come down in price. At present, the only
coins I'm willing to spend more than 50.00 on, are Greenland tokens.

Cheers,
Colleen

"James Higby" (heezerbumfrool[at]hotmail[dot]com) writes:
There was an article in World Coin News sometime back about that series. It
seems they were minted in Eastern Europe and mostly not released, causing an
instant rarity. In recent years, however, several have been trickling out
of their hiding place, especially the 2, 5, and 10 centimo pieces. A few of
the one centimo coins have followed. I have seen several of all of these on
eBay, and they have been going for about a third of catalog. I myself
bought a 1 centimo in Unc for $62.00. I expect a deluge one of these days.

The same thing has been happening with the aluminum Vietnamese coins of
1945-46.

James

"R. Carvish" wrote in message
...

Hi folks,

I was surfing various websites, and found someone selling a 1 centimo 1975
coin from Mozambique for 300.00(Cdn). Well, the coin is on my wantlist,
and since I have a habit of only wanting coins for about 30.00 or less,
unless it's Greenland or something rare that I just really want. I
immediately wondered if the price was wrong (or the person selling was ill
for asking so much). So I looked it up in Krause....

Sure enough, 1 centimo, in UNC is listed for 225.00$US.

The mintage doesn't appear low, there's no notes about melting. But all
those 1975 coins are listed at 100 and up in UNC. What's up with that?
Have they always been that expensive?

Cheers,
Colleen

A good strategy. I can think of another example, one of the Cambodian 5 sen
coins of 1979, which was way up in catalog value for a while, then a huge
hoard of them was released. Now they catalog for just a couple dollars.

For Greenland tokens you might watch for auctions by eBay seller
"pryttern" - he even has had the 1932 tokens. By the way, the 4th edition
of Krause 19th century SCWC includes listings for over two dozen 19th
century tokens from Greenland, all very expensive.

James



"R. Carvish" wrote in message
...

There's likely a few coins like this... I can think of a few Eastern
Europe coins that are recent, but even the people living in that country
can't get them that easily. Although they're not rare or expensive... just
not easy to find on eBay or from coin dealers.

I'm not quite ready to pay even 30% catalog just yet... I"ll wait it out,
and maybe at some point they'll come down in price. At present, the only
coins I'm willing to spend more than 50.00 on, are Greenland tokens.

Cheers,
Colleen

"James Higby" (heezerbumfrool[at]hotmail[dot]com) writes:
There was an article in World Coin News sometime back about that series.
It
seems they were minted in Eastern Europe and mostly not released, causing
an
instant rarity. In recent years, however, several have been trickling
out
of their hiding place, especially the 2, 5, and 10 centimo pieces. A few
of
the one centimo coins have followed. I have seen several of all of these
on
eBay, and they have been going for about a third of catalog. I myself
bought a 1 centimo in Unc for $62.00. I expect a deluge one of these
days.

The same thing has been happening with the aluminum Vietnamese coins of
1945-46.

James

"R. Carvish" wrote in message
...

Hi folks,

I was surfing various websites, and found someone selling a 1 centimo
1975
coin from Mozambique for 300.00(Cdn). Well, the coin is on my wantlist,
and since I have a habit of only wanting coins for about 30.00 or less,
unless it's Greenland or something rare that I just really want. I
immediately wondered if the price was wrong (or the person selling was
ill
for asking so much). So I looked it up in Krause....

Sure enough, 1 centimo, in UNC is listed for 225.00$US.

The mintage doesn't appear low, there's no notes about melting. But all
those 1975 coins are listed at 100 and up in UNC. What's up with that?
Have they always been that expensive?

Cheers,
Colleen

"James Higby" (heezerbumfrool[at]hotmail[dot]com) writes:
A good strategy. I can think of another example, one of the Cambodian 5 sen
coins of 1979, which was way up in catalog value for a while, then a huge
hoard of them was released. Now they catalog for just a couple dollars.

I should check and see if I have those, but it doesn't sound very familiar
in my collection. I'm not really active with collecting Asian coins, I
collect those haphazardly.

For Greenland tokens you might watch for auctions by eBay seller
"pryttern" - he even has had the 1932 tokens. By the way, the 4th edition
of Krause 19th century SCWC includes listings for over two dozen 19th
century tokens from Greenland, all very expensive.

I mostly collect 20th century (some 21st century, but not seriously). This
way I can limit what I'm looking for so it doesn't get out of hand, but I
may be interested in 19th century if it's from Greenland (or other
countries that I find interesting).

I have bought from Pryttern before, I got my Thule Kap York 100 ore from
him, and a 1922 10 ore Mining token (don't remember what it's called),
both at very good prices. He offered to help me with the 25 and 5 ore
coins, as they're also in the under 30 USD range, but I tend to
procrastinate a lot on more expensive coins. I buy a lot on a whim,
depending on how I feel. I'm not very organized in coin shopping, it's
mostly "I have money, I'm shopping" and then I flip randomly through my
wantlist notebook for a country I haven't worked on in a while.

I probably should become more disciplined, I can spend 100USD easily when
I feel like shopping, but if I were focussed, I might get some coins I
really wanted.

Cheers,
Colleen

Ï "R. Carvish" Ýãñáøå óôï ìÞíõìá
...

Hi folks,

I was surfing various websites, and found someone selling a 1 centimo 1975
coin from Mozambique for 300.00(Cdn). Well, the coin is on my wantlist,
and since I have a habit of only wanting coins for about 30.00 or less,
unless it's Greenland or something rare that I just really want. I
immediately wondered if the price was wrong (or the person selling was ill
for asking so much). So I looked it up in Krause....

Sure enough, 1 centimo, in UNC is listed for 225.00$US.

The mintage doesn't appear low, there's no notes about melting. But all
those 1975 coins are listed at 100 and up in UNC. What's up with that?
Have they always been that expensive?

Hi Colleen !

You may want to look at this coin, it starts at $24.99 and has a BIN price
of "only" $59.00...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...300459 4&rd=1

(not my auction :-)).

--
E' mai possibile, oh porco di un cane, che le avventure
in codesto reame debban risolversi tutte con grandi
puttane! F.d.A

http://gogu.enosi.org/index.html
http://www.romclub.4t.com/rabin.html


Cheers,
Colleen

Betcha anything that as soon as this one sells, there'll be another just
like it a short time later. Usually the guys that got their hands on one
got their hands on several.

I don't see a picture, though, and that's a caution for me, at least.

James
'pig in a poke'

"gogu" wrote in message
...
Ï "R. Carvish" Ýãñáøå óôï ìÞíõìá
...

Hi folks,

I was surfing various websites, and found someone selling a 1 centimo
1975
coin from Mozambique for 300.00(Cdn). Well, the coin is on my wantlist,
and since I have a habit of only wanting coins for about 30.00 or less,
unless it's Greenland or something rare that I just really want. I
immediately wondered if the price was wrong (or the person selling was
ill
for asking so much). So I looked it up in Krause....

Sure enough, 1 centimo, in UNC is listed for 225.00$US.

The mintage doesn't appear low, there's no notes about melting. But all
those 1975 coins are listed at 100 and up in UNC. What's up with that?
Have they always been that expensive?

Hi Colleen !

You may want to look at this coin, it starts at $24.99 and has a BIN price
of "only" $59.00...
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...300459 4&rd=1

(not my auction :-)).

--
E' mai possibile, oh porco di un cane, che le avventure
in codesto reame debban risolversi tutte con grandi
puttane! F.d.A

http://gogu.enosi.org/index.html
http://www.romclub.4t.com/rabin.html


Cheers,
Colleen

"gogu" ) writes:
Hi Colleen !

You may want to look at this coin, it starts at $24.99 and has a BIN price
of "only" $59.00...

Thanks for the link. I'm on a household limit of $100 per paycheck on
coins (assuming a regular 32 hour work week, that's full time where I
work). I get to spend more, when I work more

It's on my watch list, when pay day comes, I'll be able to check it out, I
can't afford 60.00, but I can certainly afford and will pay 25-30. I
noticed the seller mentioned recalled and destroyed, it would be
interesting to find out if they were destroyed, or are just hiding out in
a vault somewhere. If the latter is the case, sometime they'll all come
out hiding.

Cheers,
Colleen

"James Higby" (heezerbumfrool[at]hotmail[dot]com) writes:
Betcha anything that as soon as this one sells, there'll be another just
like it a short time later. Usually the guys that got their hands on one
got their hands on several.

I learned that lesson a few times the hard way... Me and some guy bid this
Tuvalu dollar up to 10.00, I got the second chance offer at 9.59 and took
it. I found out the week before there was one for 6.00, didn't sell, and
the one the week after for 6.00 didn't sell. That guy must have been
laughing all the way to the bank... except he lost his list fees on the
others.

I don't see a picture, though, and that's a caution for me, at least.

It seems he doesn't have pictures of anything, that may just mean he
doesn't have a scanner or isn't computer technical. There's no colours or
anything with his listings, he lists the same way I used to in 1998-99,
with a text terminal in an editor.

I get more worried when someone lists "two coins from Denmark, 1 ore and 1
krona", says no year, type or grade, then you use "ask seller a question"
and they don't answer you. Even for 1.99, I'm not taking chances on grade,
year, issue, etc. With no picture, and no details. I don't like to deal
with people who don't communicate.

Colleen

I don't think they were recalled, I think that the government in Mozambique
at the time was in such turmoil that the coins never got delivered. The
fact that several dozen exist that even I know of, all in Unc., suggests
that there were quite a number of them that survived, and, as you suggest,
maybe all of them are hiding out somewhere. I'd be cautious.

The 1 centimo that I bought for $62.00 I later sold for $125 to someone who
didn't care to be cautious.

James

"R. Carvish" wrote in message
...

"gogu" ) writes:
Hi Colleen !

You may want to look at this coin, it starts at $24.99 and has a BIN
price
of "only" $59.00...

Thanks for the link. I'm on a household limit of $100 per paycheck on
coins (assuming a regular 32 hour work week, that's full time where I
work). I get to spend more, when I work more

It's on my watch list, when pay day comes, I'll be able to check it out, I
can't afford 60.00, but I can certainly afford and will pay 25-30. I
noticed the seller mentioned recalled and destroyed, it would be
interesting to find out if they were destroyed, or are just hiding out in
a vault somewhere. If the latter is the case, sometime they'll all come
out hiding.

Cheers,
Colleen