I found this video quite some time ago, but out of respect for Steve Irwin, I thought it best to wait to post it. The video is called The Coin Hunter.

1. What 1985 coins have at least one star? Answer Jefferson 5-cent piece (nickel) and Kennedy half dollar

2. When was the Eisenhower dollar first included in Proof sets? Answer 1973

3. What 20th century US denomination was not struck except for patterns in the 19th century? Answer The $50 Panama-Pacific commemoratives; earlier forms were pattern only

4. What two different 1938 coin designs of the same denomination were struck? Answer Buffalo nickel and Jefferson nickel

5. What Chicago beer magnate became a world-renowned coin collector? Answer Virgil Brand

Since the U.S. Mint began issuing unique quarters for each of the 50 states a few years ago, coin dealers say there has been a surge of interest and hype surrounding numismatics, the fancy term for collecting and studying coins and paper money.

Collecting the state quarters circulating in the money supply is not likely to ever be very profitable, although there are some collectors speculating on certain rare state quarters such as “proofs,” which are coins made under unique conditions and with extra care to give them sharper detail than coins put into the money supply. You’re not likely to get one of these back as change at the newsstand.

When it comes to older collectible coins, from rare wheat pennies to Morgan silver dollars (named for the assistant engraver who designed it in 1878), there is money to be made, though the average returns are not as impressive as the stock market’s recent returns.

The Professional Coin Grading Service, a division of Collectors Universe, publishes several indexes of commonly traded coins. Its trademark index, the PCGS3000, is up about 3 percent over the past 12 months, up 13 percent since October 2003 and up 43 percent since December 1994.

By comparison, the Dow Jones industrial average is up about 15 percent in the last year, 22 percent since October 2003 and 218 percent since December 1994.

A look at a chart of the PCGS3000 shows a troubling spike in May of 1989, when the index hit an all-time high of 181,089 - almost three times its current level of about 67,000.

That spike was caused when Wall Street firms such as Merrill Lynch & Co. and Kidder, Peabody poured a lot of money into rare coins, only to pull out quickly when the market proved too thin to sustain the gains, according to Scott A. Travers, a New York coin dealer and author of “The Coin Collector’s Survival Manual” and other books on the subject.

Today, even though gold prices are approaching $600 an ounce and thereby lifting the intrinsic economic value of gold coins along with their value to collectors, many people are afraid to recommend coins as a long-term investment, said Travers.

“It’s a shame that it happened,” Travers said of the 1989 bubble. “If that hadn’t happened, we’d be in a totally different position today.”

According to Travers, there are three main types of risks involved in collecting coins, especially for novices. First is the acquisition risk, in which you pay too much for a coin. The second is the market price risk, in which the value of the coin goes down after you buy it. The third is the selling risk, when you might get tricked into selling the coin for less than what it’s worth.

Much of the acquisition and selling risk can be avoided by making sure you’re dealing with scrupulous dealers who are members of the American Numismatic Association and the Professional Numismatists Guild, Travers said.

It also is important to learn how to “grade” a coin - determine what condition it’s in - or else only buy coins certified by one of the top grading services.

If you’re willing to put in the time to educate yourself about how to grade and identify rare coins, it’s possible to find valuable ones by buying bags of unsorted coins from dealers - or even in your change jar.

Read the rest at the ABC News.

Less than a month before Election Day, a politically connected coin dealer accused of embezzling from a state investment in rare coins went on trial Monday in a scandal that has rocked Ohio’s Republican Party.

Tom Noe, 52, is accused of stealing more than $2 million from a fund for injured workers and spending it on his business and renovating his home in the Florida Keys.

“He needed money. He needed it desperately,” prosecutor John Weglian said in opening statements.

Noe, once a member of state boards that oversee the Ohio Turnpike and Ohio’s public universities, was a top GOP fundraiser who gave more than $105,000 to Republicans, including President Bush and Gov. Bob Taft during the 2004 campaign.

He is charged with corrupt activity, theft, money laundering and forgery. If convicted, he could get up to 10 years in prison on the corrupt activity charge alone.

Defense attorney William Wilkinson said Noe’s contract with the Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation allowed him to borrow money from the investment fund or loan it to others.

“You can’t steal something from the owner of property if they give you permission to use it,” Wilkinson said.

Federal prosecutors have not said whether any of the coin money was used for political contributions. If the state money had been funneled to campaigns, authorities could have sought a stiffer penalty.

The scandal has raised Democrats’ hopes of retaking the governor’s office from the GOP, which has dominated the state since 1990. Democratic Rep. Ted Strickland has held a double-digit lead in the polls over Republican nominee Ken Blackwell, Ohio’s secretary of state.

The state invested $50 million with Noe from 1998 to 2001, but Weglian said he spent only a fraction of that figure on coins.

Prosecutors said Noe kept two sets of financial records — one for the workers’ comp agency and one for his own business. When state officials wanted to check on the status of the coins Noe told them he had bought, he created false documents and borrowed coins from other dealers to trick investigators, Weglian said.

“If Tom Noe wasn’t a thief, he wouldn’t have had two sets of books,” Weglian said.

Read the full article.

LOS ANGELES - Police used to seeing peddlers on skid row hawking counterfeit DVDs, T-shirt rip-offs and other mundane items have been surprised to discover a new object for sale in the impoverished, drug-plagued district: rare coins.

Authorities have come across the small, shiny objects - some bearing dates that would make them nearly as old as Los Angeles itself - at least four times recently. The items have been confiscated and were being examined for their authenticity.

“These coins looked real and authentic,” said police Capt. Andrew Smith, who saw two men on a downtown L.A. sidewalk selling for $20 each 24 silver dollars bearing dates from the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries.

The LAPD said it hasn’t received any reports of a stolen coin collection, so detectives are trying to work backward, hoping to trace the coins through the skid row denizens who possessed them.

Detectives also found several such coins in August inside the jacket lining of a suspected drug dealer arrested on skid row. In September, officers recovered more coins while searching a parolee in the area.

“They were in collector sleeves. There was 24 silver dollars dating back to 1794,” Officer Stephen Nichols said.

Coin experts said the 18th-century coins would be the most valuable of the batch if they are authentic.

“It’s possible that someone down and out wanting to get a few bucks wouldn’t know what they had,” said Charles I. Carmona, a gem and coin expert.

Read the full article.