Spanish 10 Euro Cent

Do you have a Euro coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

What can I say about the Euro that hasn't been said before? The exchange rate is about 13 U.S. cents for every 10 Euro Cents. They still pop up in my change, although this one was prompted out of register when I caught a glimpse of it. Cashiers are still nice when they're not too busy.

The new coin books are coming out and are tax deductible if used in part of your coin business. Still I can't afford them now and I don't have the time to bargain shop. I will need them seeing how most 2008 Euros are not listed although now some good online sites provide mintage information.

I'll keep it short and leave with the pictures and statistics on my recent find.

Here's the stats...
Type/Country: 10 Euro Cent / Spain
Year: 2008
Mintage: 139,256,940 (Not official)
Metal: Brass
Value: $0.15 in Very-Fine

Do you have a Euro coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

Mind The Gaps

Do you have a coin missing from your simple out of pocket collection and can't figure out why? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the mintage and history for you.

While taking inventory or checking off the list of coins I find in my change occasionally there is a gap. Some coins have a low mintage, some were only sold in special sets, but others just evade capture.

One commenter asked:

For about a year now I've been collecting canadian coins mostly from circulation (I live in Canada) and now I have a lot of coins including every penny from 1960 to 2009, except 1990. Was there a low mintage of this coin or something?

My response:

The average mintage is 500 million or more the 1990 cent had about 210 million made so while lower than normal it is not rare or scarce.

I have the same problem I have almost every Canadian cent from circulation except 1990. It's odd.

Expanding on this Canada made 1,066,628,200 cents in 1989 which led to a smaller 218,035,000 in 1990 then back to 831+ million in 1991. 1990 also introduced a new portrait. While there are some theories behind the lower mintage no good explanation of why they are seldom seen circulating was ever given.

I've found Canadian cents from 1942 and bought others from 1902 to date at low cost. With all that I have not found a 1990 and refuse to buy it, search rolls, or trade for it. 32 Canadian 1964 cents but not one 1990, it's odd.

Other low mintage cents I'm missing:

Canada 2003 92+ million 1990 218+ million 1958 59+ million 1949 33+ million 1948 25+ million 1947 74+ million

Now I just found this nickel.

This 1947 nickel has escaped me for 20+ years and finally I got it. Is it rare? No. Have I found older nickels? Yes. It just happens I never found a United States nickel from 1947 of any mint. This one is dented and damaged but very clear. 1938 and 1944 are other missing years plus counting mintmarks I'm still missing some fairly common nickels.

Is it possible to collect every coin from your change? (Without roll hunting or trading)
Yes. Just wait 80 years and always pay in cash.

Here's the stats...
Type/Country: 5 Cents / United States of America
Year: 1947
Mintage: 95,000,000
Metal: 75% copper 25% nickel
Value: $0.05 because it's dented

Sidenote: This image was taken with a 10 megapixel camera on loan, now it has been years since I bought my Canon A95 (5 megapixel) and the advances are great.

Want to know if they made a coin for a certain year and its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

Museum Quality: Part 1

Do you have old coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

My lack of updates are a sign of a lack of finds. I was trying to steer all my college work to coin related items I was even going to make a coin sorter but I was out voted. So while at a recent art course in The Metropolitan Museum Of Art I took a side trip to find historical coins.

In numismatics ancient coins are not my strong point. I never got into them since they aren't found in change (normally) and the nice ones are expensive.

A collection of Visigoth coins meant to mimic Byzantine coins (images of Byzantine coins were too blurry to post) eventually they took on a style of there own.

Top to bottom, left to right...
Type/Country: Justinian & Maurice Tiberius Tremissis / Constantinople
Year: 527-602
Mintage: Unknown
Metal: Gold
Value: Hundreds(museum pieces often carry an unknown premium)

Type/Country: Imitating Valentinian Solidus / Toulouse, France
Year: 450-460
Mintage: Unknown
Metal: Gold
Value: Hundreds(museum pieces often carry an unknown premium)

Type/Country: Imitating Justinian Solidus / ?
Year: Mid-500s
Mintage: Unknown
Metal: Gold
Value: Hundreds(museum pieces often carry an unknown premium)

Type/Country: Imitating Imperial Tremissis / ?
Year: Mid-500s
Mintage: Unknown
Metal: Gold
Value: Hundreds(museum pieces often carry an unknown premium)

Type/Country: King Reccared Tremissis / Mérida, Spain
Year: 586-601
Mintage: Unknown
Metal: Gold
Value: Hundreds(museum pieces often carry an unknown premium)



Fake coins have always been all the rage especially in Egypt around 308-320. Real coins were pressed in clay then the after they dried you have these terracotta molds. Next coins were cast with molten/soften metal of equal or lower quality. Not all forgeries were intended to scam instead it was for the lack of circulating money throughout the Roman empire.


The case was full of coins but the reflection and my camera skills made shooting difficult. The coins were in a corner next to the elevator showing a complete lack of respect.


Type/Country: Augustus/Capricorn Silver Cistophorus / Ephesus (Turkey)
Year: 25 B.C.
Mintage: Unknown
Metal: Silver
Value: Hundreds(museum pieces often carry an unknown premium)

I'll show a few more at a later date and maybe do a little more research on what I saw and the museum experience altogether. I will post some more images on my other blog as soon as possible.

Do you have old coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

1955 Error (Non-Famous)

Do you have an error cent and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

Anytime I find a 1955 cent I hope that it is the famous doubled-die error that would make it over $1,000.00 easily. Even one of minor varieties would be cool to find but this find would not make me a thousandaire.

Although it does have some error that may not be clear on today's enhanced scans. Pushing the scanner to 700 dpi and raising the contrast while lowering the brightness I tried as best as I could to show the defects.

The front of the coin has a break from Lincoln's brow to the back of his hair.
The back has a break halfway through the right wheat ear with three thin die cracks reacihng the rim.

Honestly they're there.
It is not wear or outside damage instead I think it is a late stage die that began to break. Back in the 1950s dies were often used until failure. While this holds little significance in coin collecting world it can gain more. A quick Google search "1955 die crack" turns up others that are similar even a few that are nearly exact.

If a collector wanted he/she could buy them up and try to match the error and get what is known as progression. It is exactly what it sounds like, following the progress of a die crack or break. This brings up the value but still not by much.

Here's the stats...
Type/Country: 1 Cent / United States of America
Year: 1955
Mintage: 330,958,200
Metal: 95% copper 5% tin and zinc
Value: $0.25 because it's starting to green

Yes there is an argument that this is not an error coin since no mistakes were made but just a naturally occurring metal failure process but that is for another time.

Do you have an error penny and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

Coin Drive

Do you have a real Euro coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

Thinking about a post I made over at My Box Is Warm about things gone missing like thumb/flash drives I remembered a cool little one I came across.

These USB Flash Drives are made by a company I never heard of called LaCie, a quick search shows they specialize in external hard drives. Although a 7.5TB hard drive sounds cool I liked these little 8GB and 4GB flash drives pictured below.


For $29.99 and $19.99, for the 8GB and 4GB respectively, it's not a bad value for style but seeing how some people can't tell the difference between U.S. nickels and Spanish 20 Euro cents I don't think these will become common. Just a few months ago both were listed $5.00 cheaper so maybe if the have a sale it will be a good opportunity.

Check out how these drives blend with the Euros.

If I had a budget or if this blog were something more than informative I would get one of each and fill them up with the coin books I can purchase in .pdf format along with a complete list of legit coin websites built into a modified Firefox browser made for collectors. Portable OpenOffice with spreadsheets ready for a simple entry to organize your personal collection or install one of those professional coin software programs. Then do some sort of giveaway.

But alas I won't!

Do you have any type of money and want to know its value? Leave a question or comment and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

Eh, er. How can I explain?

Do you have a Euro coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.

I'm in line waiting to pay for a highly overpriced textbook when the young nice and giggly non-American student in front of me wants to pay with exact change. That is nice and all but she didn't understand why her two nickels where rejected by the cashier. Kindly everyone points out that those are Euros and not nickels, she asks "What's the difference?" Not knowing how to explain the entire currency system I traded a dime for the Euros and she paid the dime forward and hurray the line moved on.

I assumed the woman was Eastern European by old-fashioned visual and audio cues but wouldn't they still know of Euros? Plus who has Euros in their purse and still not know they aren't nickels. She responded in English very well.

You might think it was a scam to pass off funny foreign money as U.S. but 40 Euro cents is about 50 U.S. cents and she got rid of them for 10 cents. She did not stay long enough to try to give her my change of 26 cents to attempt to cover the exchange rate. Could it be I offended? No because she was so happy when she left after also refusing her receipt.

Strange exchange. I'm usually good at explaining money value but this nervous exchange had thrown me off. Either way I got me some Euros for cheap.

Here's the stats...
Type/Country: 20 Euro Cents / Spain
Year: 2001
Mintage: 146,000,000
Metal: Brass
Value: $0.25 in Very-Fine for each

There were two but I just scanned it once because it would have been redundant, you know why repeat, there is no point in showing them again and again.

Note: The image was done using my other scanner. I rarely use it and the luster comes out less shiny but the details are high. (Click on image for a larger picture) The problem is I have less setting control. I'll probably use the regular scanner for future scans.

Do you have a European coin and want to know its value? Leave a comment/question and I will do my best to find out the price and history for you.