Rare and valuable coins aren’t hard to find at the moment.
In the past month we’ve seen a new record set for a British silver coin with a $1 million-sale of a Petition Crown.
If we look at a 10 year record, the £396,000 paid for a 1693 Reddite Crown in 2014 was a record setter at the time.
The coins are very similar, so that’s a measurable growth of well over 100%.
And when we look at this top 10 of the world’s most valuable coins you’ll see that many of these sales are recent.
Let’s list them:
10 - Umayyad Gold Dinar from 723 the Umayyad Caliphate
Sold in April 2011 for $6,029,400
This is the most valuable Islamic coin in history.
This is massively the oldest coin on our list.
New collectors are sometimes surprised that, while age can contribute to value, the most valuable coins are often quite modern.
In fact, two examples of this coin type have sold for the same fee eight years apart: once in 2011 and once in 2019.
They are the most valuable Islamic coins and the most valuable coins sold in Europe.
The coin is from the rule of Yazid II, the short-lived 9th caliph of the Umayyad Caliphate, an Islamic empire of enormous wealth that at its greatest extent included most of North Africa and Spain.
This coin has particular significance because it is earliest known example of a coin known to be struck in Saudi Arabia.
It is also extremely rare and in very good condition.
9 - Flowing Hair Dollar from 1794 United States of America
This "flowing hair dollar" is in the Smithsonian, very few are likely to be sold ever again.
Being first is very important to collectors, so the first US coin (there are other US firsts by the way) was always going to be in demand.
A quick look at the coin tells you how it got its “Flowing Hair” name.
Dollars are Spanish originally. As a new nation fought over by a number of European powers the US used a number of “foreign” coins in its early days.
The dollar was a hit and was chosen as a national currency.
The US mint was called for by act of congress in 1791 and established the following year. “Calling for” and “actually working” proved to be somewhat different things though, and it wasn’t until 1794 that the Flowing Hair dollar designed by Rober Scot was first struck.
The design only lasted until 1795 and they’re extremely rare - only 140 have been certified as genuine.
8 - Fengtien Tael from 1903 from China
Considered the finest of the Dragon coins, this piece travelled far and wide before returning to China this century.
The enormous price paid for this coin at auction in Beijing tells us the story of one of the most significant trends in modern collecting.
China’s new-found prosperity is allowing Chinese buyers to bring home items sold (sometimes looted) from their home country.
The Fengtien Tael was known as the “King of Chinese Coins”.
It’s a unique item from a turbulent period in Chinese history.
At the opening of the 20th century China was still very largely dominated by foreign, imperial powers. And overseas money circulated freely.
The Fengtien Tael is a remnant of an attempt to address that.
This coin was struck at a provincial mint in Fengtien province in a new mint.
The spelling of FEN-TIEN is atypical.
Just a year after it had been struck it was in the US at an exhibition.
It was found and bought by an American collector via Hong Kong in 1952, before it was sold for a record price for a Chinese coin of over $150,000 in 1991.
In 2010 it returned to China in a private sale and by 2022 it had multiplied in value and exceeded an insurance valuation of $5 million to again set a Chinese coin record of $6.9 million.
7 - Paquet Liberty Head double eagle from 1861 USA
Sold for $7,200,000 in August 2021
The rim invited damage, but the lettering is now considered very beautiful on the Paquet double eagle.
Anthony C. Paquet is accidentally responsible for one of the great rarities of American coin collecting.
In 1860, as the assistant engraver of the San Francisco mint, he was asked to put together a new reverse face for the double eagle coin (a gold $20 piece used mostly as a bullion coin these days).
His design may have looked lovely. But the narrow rim meant it would quickly wear out in circulation). So, it had to be changed. Before the message got through, $385,000 worth of them had been struck and sent out from San Francisco and Philadelphia mints.
Despite the delay, the relatively quick recall makes Paquet double eagles very rare. But, their rarity wasn’t really appreciated, so collectors didn’t save them as rare coins.
The mint top brass were right. Released, circulated coins are often badly worn. And, delay between their minting and the realisation that they were so scarce means the vast majority are in poor condition.
It wasn’t known that Philadelphia and San Francisco-struck coins were differently set up until the late 1980s.
So, this coin, the “finest known specimen”, attracted huge bigs and this huge price.
Paquet’s work on this occasion may not have lasted, but it’s now appreciated for its beauty as well as its rarity.
6 - Brasher Doubloon with EB on Breast from 1787 private mint in the US
Sold for $7,395,000 in December 2011
Very much made by hand, the stamps on the Brasher doubloons aren't uniform.
I know Brasher Doubloons because of their appearance in one of my favourite detective stories, The High Window by Raymond Chandler.
They’re a good subject too - easily valuable enough to tempt someone to forging, stealing, blackmailing and killing for (of course, we don’t find this acceptable).
The coins were valuable from the off, worth 16 dollars, which was a lot of money in 1787.
America’s currency was still in flux, and Ephraim Brasher took his lead from Spanish issues of escudos and dollars to set the value.
They were privately issued rather than official government currency, and all are very rare, very well made, and extremely valuable.
This one is identified with Ephraim’s initials on the breast of the eagle. It is believed to be the first gold coin made in the United States.
It’s been sold several times, twice in 2011, when an investment company picked it up for nearly $7.4 million in a private sale.
Subsequent auctions suggest they have made a shrewd purchase.
Buying rare coins today
If this has whetted your appetite for rare coins then we can help you find them.
10 most valuable coins in the world PART 2 here.
