Star Wars Coins Issued By Pacific Island Nation 129
19061969 wrote in with a link about how the Pacific Island of Niue is issuing a set of commemorative Star Wars coins. While the $2 coins can be used as legal tender on the island, the government hopes they'll be bought by collectors and help increase tourism to the tiny nation. From the article: "The coins, which will show a Star Wars character on one side and the Queen of England on the other, will be worth NZ$2, but made of NZ$117.25 worth of silver, meaning that if you're looking for practical tender, these aren't the coins you're looking for. 'You wouldn't want to go and spend them because they're only worth $2, but the value is much more than that,' Chris Kirkness of the New Zealand Mint told the Australian Associated Press."
Re:I say buy all of them (Score:4, Informative)
Except that the coins are being sold for a considerable premium over the spot price of silver.
A set of 4 1-ounce coins is £239.80.
Spot price of silver is about £25 per ounce, or 100 for 4. So there's about a 240% premium for the coins.
Re:Bullion? (Score:4, Informative)
Isn't this really just a set of bullion coins, up to and including the fact that they're technically legal tender but you'd have to be out of your mind to actually spend them? Or are they hoping that value to collectors might push the value of these things up even further than the cost of the silver itself?
The value of "legal tender" bullion coins over a private mint, is at least theoretically, the worlds legal forces will treat copies as counterfitting vs simple copyright infringement.
If I took a R2D2 action figure (for the foreigners, "action figure" = "doll for boys") and did some lost wax casting action and sold little $2K gold R2D2s, there is only wimpy copyright law preventing others from gold plating lead and tungsten R2D2s and marketing them as my own product for, say, $1900.
On the other hand, even counterfeiting foreign currency is a quick trip to jail...
Also public mints usually have some law about only minting true dates or something like that. Stamp all the pennies you want, more or less, as long as they're stamped "2011". On the other hand, a private mint could notice that proof grade 1909-S-VDB pennies sell for slightly more than pennies from a 2010 proof set, and there is really nothing stopping a private mint from making a new run of "model 1909-S-VDB psuedopennies".
I am told that a large number of "collectable" coins are manufactured/faked in China. Supposedly most 1909-S-VDB "proof" pennies are fake, but we can't / won't enforce the law. Its more of a "in theory" rather than "in practice" argument.
In summary : At least in theory, public minted coins are less likely to be counterfeit than private mint coinage.
Re:I say buy all of them (Score:4, Informative)
American eagle gold coins are legal tender [usmint.gov].