Money

"In 1950, Louis Eliasberg paid $4,000 for an 1873 CC Seated Liberty. That $4,000 placed in a savings account would have yielded $15,000. Playing the stock market $116,000. The coin sold for $550,000."

• Money! We All Want it, But What is Money?



• He Who Owns The Gold, Makes The Rules: The Golden Rule



• Some Significant Coins That Shaped Our World.

Next time you're watching the Wimbledon Tennis Championships think about this: The length of a tennis court is just over 23 metres. If you built a box that long, that high and that wide you could put all the gold ever mined thoughout history into it and perhaps still have room for a bowl of strawberries and Navratilova. The supply of gold is limited, and no more than 160,000 tons of this most precious metal has been produced in all human history, and the hunger for it has a history all its own.

Money Has Been Faked, Manipulated and Experimented With.

Money in it broadest sense is anything that can be used as means of exchange or store of wealth. Our earliest ancestors tried many forms of money: shells, turtles, arrow heads, eggs, even beads. But for most our last 3000 years money has meant gold.

Gold, the soft, lustrous yellow precious metal, has been sought and treasured by mankind since ancient times. The Greeks found it in river beds in Asia Minor and used it to craft some of the world’s first coins struck more than 2,600 years ago by King Croesus of Lydia.

The Egyptians brought gold down the Nile from Nubia, and both the Roman and Byzantine Empires struck magnificent gold coins that are prized by today’s collectors. Across the Atlantic, the ancient American Indian civilizations of Mexico, Peru and Colombia fashioned exquisite ornaments from the yellow metal they called the tears of the Sun.

When Spanish conquistadors crossed the Pacific to South East Asia they fund an archipelago where the people dripped with some of finest goldwork ever seen, dressed with belts made of pure gold threads almost as fine as silk. For three and a half centuries in what became known as the Philippines the Spanish desperately searched for but never found the real Eldorado in the highlands of the Cordilleras mined by the mountain people nugget by nugget to buy salt in the lowlands.

Gold coinage returned to Western Europe in the late Middle Ages with great international coins called the Florin and Ducat.

One day our children or grand children might look at todays use of coins and currency as strange as the use of turtle shells, gold dust, cowries and “wampum” is to us in the modern age of charge cards.

How We Lost Our Gold as Money.

The spring of 1932 was a bitter end to the winter for most people. Banks by the thousands were closing, taking with them people’s life savings. Huge lines were to be seen as depositors hoped, and prayed, that they could get something, anything from their deposits, before it was too late. Many investors were taking deposits out in gold or gold certificates. None knew that their plans would be dashed by a law designed to kibosh the Kaiser.

Following the 1929 stock market crash the U.S. Treasury was in a quandary. Gold was been sucked out of the economy at a rate of $20 million per day – straight into private hands seeking to protect themselves from the economic fallout.

The government increased the money supply, more currency was printed backed up by less gold, debasing the once mighty dollar.

In the three years since “the Wall Street Crash” of 1929, 5,000 Banks had closed. Those that survived had just six billion dollars to support more than 40 billion in deposits – the arithmetic simply did not work.

President-elect Franklin Delano Roosevelt realized something had to be done – and fast. He convened a meeting of his cabinet, which had yet to be sworn in, and strategy was discussed. He elected William Woodin as Treasury Secretary, who coincidentally collected gold $5 coins, dusted off an obsolete law and waited for his inauguration.

Within a day of being sworn into office, Roosevelt invoked the 16-year-old Trading with the Enemy Act, indeed for use against the Kaiser's Germany in WW1, and stopped the flood of gold from the economy by shutting down all banks for 4 days. This gave them enough time to plan their next move: get the gold back.

Within days, scrip, a form of private debt was being issued across the country to settle trade. In addition to scrip, barter systems, and credit stamps were being used to conduct business. A bill was rushed through congress and signed into law. Another 2 billion dollars would be printed and pumped into the economy.

The government knew where the gold was, but they had to get it back. The new legislation made it illegal for private citizens to own gold. Newspapers published long lists of those hoarding it, which shamed them into handing it back to the government. It was that or the thought of up to 4 years prison. Gold was out, paper was in, and a new government policy was born: Halt Inflation.

Officially the United States Treasury redeemed all gold at $20 per troy ounce. Within 3 years gold had been re-valued and set at $32 per ounce. An irretrievable loss of 60% to private citizens.

The law banning gold remained on statute books until 1973. the collapse of the Bretton Woods accords led to the abandonment of the gold standard, and the free market valuation of gold.

The rest is the history of our generation. Gold has moved form $32 per Troy ounce to over $600. At the same time the purchasing power of the pound sterling has declined about 90%.

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Types of Coins

Coins have been struck since about 700 BC, and have been issued by almost every nation in the world. People who appreciate history, geography, languages, or culture will find unlimited opportunities in coins. If the world of Roman coins is all Greek to you then

It is widely accepted that the Greeks invented ancient coins in Lonia just after 700 B.C. However, recent evidence suggests China was using bronze “Spade” coinage 1000 years earlier. The invention of coinage should not be underestimated. It meant the end of barter and the beginning of international commerce. The first Greek coins, called electrums, were from a mix of gold and silver nuggets found in streams. Greek coins also were made of copper and bronze. The most common denominations were silver drachms and Tetradrachms, as well as gold Staters.

Greek coins are miniature sculptures of great beauty, depicting gods and goddesses of the city, and animals - especially lion, eagles and bulls. The coinage of Alexander The Great portrayed Alexander as Hercules, with Zeus holding an eagle on the reverse. Lifetime issues of Alexander were made from the treasures he captured while conquering the world. Those same coins paid the fearless soldiers in his army.

Roman coinage used the same metals but carried a different message. Lifelike portraits of Julius Caesar, Augustus, Marc Anthony, Nero, Marcus Aerelius, and over 120 others adorn the observe of the gold Aureus, silver Denarius, and bronze Sestertius they issued. Both obverse and reverse legends described the emperor's accomplishments.

Byzantine coinage was issued primarily in gold Solidi and copper Folleses, and usually bore a cross or portrait of Christ in addition to a portrait of the emperor. With striking visuals, ancient coins can offer their owners a near-photographic image of past cultures. .

COMMEMORATIVES

"Commems" were struck to mark special anniversaries or occasions. They were usually silver half dollars, but dollars and gold coins also have been issued.

PIONEER GOLD AND PATTERNS

During the mid-19th century and throughout the gold rush of the 1850s and 1860s, several private mints issued gold coins. Today, these fascinating relics of Americana, know as Pioneer Gold, are quite rare.

COLONIALS

These were usually copper pieces struck during the 17th and 18th centuries, serving as circulating coins in the years prior to America's independence. Before the first U.S. mint opened in 1793, the individual states, private coiners, or foreign mints issued the coins used. At least two designs are attributed to Benjamin Franklin.

EUROPEAN GOLD

Classic European gold coinage is an overlooked but extremely promising sector of today's gold market. WE HIGHLY RECOMMEND EUROPEAN GOLD COINS AS AN INTELLIGENT ALTERNATIVE TO MODERN GOLD BULLION for those customers seeking low-priced "bulk gold."

We also offer unusual and extremely high-quality European and World Gold coins for collectors and investors. Much of the information you need in order to learn more about this historical and fascinating sector of the gold market appears below.

Among savvy investors, European gold coins are recognized as one of the most advantageous ways to invest in "bulk" gold. Gold coins like British Sovereign "Kings", French 20 franc "Lucky" Angels, and German "Wilhelm II" Gold 20 Marks, to name only a few, offer all of the benefits of gold modern bullion, plus the added leverage to the gold market that comes only with scarce, collectible gold coins.

With so many choices today for the purchase of modern bullion coins, many investors don't even realize that these European gold coins exist! But for almost for the same price per ounce as modern gold bullion, classic European gold coins offer many additional benefits.

And don't forget, with changes in European tax law in 2001, rare coins that trade at 30% above melt value are exempt from value added tax, between 10 and 25% in most European countries.