What is Junk Silver?

“Junk Silver” in the numismatic circle refers to worn circulated silver coins. For example, the US silver coins, minted before 1965, are often called junk silver coins. These coins have at least 40% – 90% silver content, depending on what type of coins. The pictures on my website show some circulated US Morgan Dollar, Peace dollar, Mercury Dimes, Walkers, Barbers dimes.

As guide, if you are starting to keep these kind of silver coins, look for those with 90% silver content. I have listed some examples here -

Morgan (1878-1921) – 90-percent silver, Peace (1921-1928 and 1934-1935) – 90-percent silver, Liberty Head “Barber” (1892-1915) – 90-percent silver, Walking Liberty (1916-1947) – 90-percent silver

These circulated worn coins and do not have any collector’s value because there are signs of wear and tear, scratch marks, nasty nicks etc. “Ugly” can be another word to described the coins BUT, the value lies in the silver content. Other countries that uses this informal term “Junk Silver” are the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia.

In the US, they are usually sold in a “bag” with a face value of e.g. $1000. Depending on what type of coins, It usually contain 90 percent of silver. This is another inexpensive method of buying silver. If silver price rises up ten cents, a bag of US silver coins might rise $70. It depends. But of late, the price of Junk Silver is already commanding a small premium above spot, not as cheap as they used to be.

If your looking into buying them, $1,000 face value usually comes in a bag and it has about 715 ounces of pure silver when refined. Newly minted coins with 90% contained about 723 ounces of silver. For Junk Silver, due to “wear and tear”, a bag of dimes or quarters will average about 715 ounces.

Coins like Mercury and Roosevelt dimes, Washington quarters, Franklin, Kennedy, Morgans, Walking Liberty are considered as junk silver. But do take note that even though it may be considered as junk, a single key date coin or error coin can be worth hundreds of dollars. For example, a key date 1916d mercury dime in fine condition is worth hundreds of dollars.

These are some old US coins. Try searching around your house, attic, basement, kitchen cabinet… who knows what surprises you might find.

Junk silver do have few advantages over traditional silver bullion. Firstly, they are cheaper and you might be able to buy them near spot price. Secondly, in small quantities, you might already have some of these coin in your possession. Search your drawers, attic, cupboards, piggy banks etc. Thirdly, junk silver is relatively easier to get. Think about it, about 3 Franklin half dollars adds up to 1 ounce of silver. As I have mentioned, the price of junk silver is now commanding a small premium about spot, so you need to hunt around for a good bargain.

Source by Eric Tan

What is Junk Silver?