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| Above, a 2022 American Silver Eagle. Photo by Armand Vaquer. |
Currently, the silver spot price per troy ounce at Comex is around $82.00.
With silver garnering such high prices (it was over $100 last month), the possibility of silver coins being melted for industrial uses is looming.
Numismatic News posted an article taking a look at how metal prices may lead to melting of common silver coins.
They begin with:
For the last few decades, silver stackers and gold bugs have been preaching the imminent breakout of their respective metals, suggesting that gold could top $2,000, then $2,500, and so on, for an ounce. Those who took a shine to silver have suggested that $50 and even $100 an ounce was possible. A select few have even proclaimed higher benchmarks. For all the times those passionate defenders wound up crying wolf, but now the wolves are at the door.
But the effect this has on world coin pricing, aside from pushing the underlying base value higher, remains unclear. The high prices may already have priced some collectors out of the market. And some folks are cashing in their newfound wealth by sending common coins to be melted, though they aren’t reaping the full rewards of the increased melt value. The only thing slowing down the mass melting of common world coins is the massive backlog at refineries. The demand that started in the fall, as silver breached the $50 high-water marks of 2011 and 1979–1980, has not abated.
To read more, go here.
