nickels for the future???

[jr doyle]

i've been hearing a lot lately in the podcast world about holding on to nickels as an investment since theyre still made of nickel and dont require any "sorting". anyone have any thoughts about this? it's portrayed like the silver back in 64. people say it's just a matter of time before they dump the nickel for a cheaper metal as the price of nickel continues to rise with other metals. is anyone doing this? any thoughts one way or the other? last i looked on coinflation nicels were valued right around .05 give or take .002

[Taylor3006]

I have been putting away copper pennies (pre 1982) and nickels for a while. Don't see the harm in it as long as you aren't paying a premium for the coins and you have the room to store them. If nothing happens, ya just spend them or deposit them in the bank. BTW you can still find the occasional silver nickel in change so look at them carefully especially if you buy lots of rolls of the coins. IMHO it is a fun way to build some cash reserves with the potential of being worth more than face value.

[Sperls]

What are the date ranges for silver nickels?

[TexDaddy]

What are the date ranges for silver nickels?

1942-1945. They are easy to spot due to the large 'P,' 'D' or 'S' mint mark over the dome of Monticello on the reverse side of the coin.

The wartime nickels are 56% copper, 35% silver and 9% manganese.

Even though it is currently illegal to melt cents and nickels for their metal, I save all I get. As indicated above, they will always be worth at least face value.

[Old_Grey_Mare]

"The U.S. Mint's report to the U.S. Congress with solidly-researched and tested recommendations for new coin compositions is due to be released in just 10 days--on December 14, 2012. Once Congress acts and debases the nickel (most likely switching to almost worthless stainless steel coin planchets), the window of opportunity will close. This may be our last chance to stock up on real nickels in quantity without any sorting. If you haven't yet assembled your stack of nickel boxes, then do so NOW!"
from SurvivalBlog.com

[ncjeeper]

i've been hearing a lot lately in the podcast world about holding on to nickels as an investment since theyre still made of nickel and dont require any "sorting". anyone have any thoughts about this? it's portrayed like the silver back in 64. people say it's just a matter of time before they dump the nickel for a cheaper metal as the price of nickel continues to rise with other metals. is anyone doing this? any thoughts one way or the other? last i looked on coinflation nicels were valued right around .05 give or take .002

Nickels have 75% copper in them that makes their metal value worth more than their face value.

[Alan Georges]

Nickels have 75% copper in them that makes their metal value worth more than their face value.

Exactly right.  At the moment the site Coinflation (http://www.coinflation.com/) puts the metal value of a nickel at 5.18 cents.  That's only 3% over face value, but just a couple of years ago it was nearly 40% above.  I wouldn't be surprised to see that again before long, but would be extremely surprised to see it drop much below its current value.

And even 3% over face value is a screamin' deal compared to currently-minted quarters, which run about 80% below face.

But wow, it takes a lot of nickels to make up one silver dime.  Something like 48 at current values.  Making change is going to get cumbersome if we have to downshift to going by metal weights & values.  OTOH, we'll all get better at doing mental math.

[TexDaddy]

Actually, to get the 5.18 cents per nickel, you have to count the value of the nickel as well as the copper. Nickel is going for well over twice what copper is right now. Currently copper is $3.6416 per pound and nickel is $7.9143 per pound, so that 25% nickel counts.

To track base metal prices: http://www.kitcometals.com

[jr doyle]

thanks all for the replies. might go stack some rolls of nickels this weekend!

[fred.greek]

Emergency Preparedness recommends some amount of cash, why not keep such in home emergency cash in bank sealed boxes of  nickels?

$100 in nickels comes in a box, about the size of a large brick, and weighs around 22 pounds.  It’s NOT going to be destroyed in a fire, and the opportunist burglar is not going to stuff it in their pocket…

It's cash, what's the downside?  Loss of what, 1/10 percent annual rate in your Wells Fargo savings account?

[Machine]

Pre-82 pennies are a better value than nickels, but at least with nickels there is no sorting. I have been tempted to do the coin hoard and sort, but chose to just save whatever pre-82 pennies or nickels that I get as pocket change. I just don't think it will be worth the hassle. They could also revalue the currency and ruin all of your hard work.

[snickers]

I'm a little confused about what to do with all of my coins. It looks like all current quarters, dimes, and nickles are made out of mostly copper... should we just stash all of our coins?!

According to Wikipedia and my calculator:

*Post '65 quarters are 75% copper and weigh 5.67g, meaning they have 4.25g of copper.
*Pre '82 pennies are 95% copper and weigh 3.11g, so they contain 2.9545g of copper
*Nickels are 75% copper and weigh 5g meaning they contain 3.75g of copper
*Dimes are 2.268g and 91.67% copper, so they contain 2.07g of copper

I would assume quarters and nickles are a good bet in terms of composition. I think the reason people would go for pennies is they are easily recognizable? For now, I'm going to hold on to my coins until we hear more about what congress is doing with our coinage.

Also here is a pretty recent post about nickles from survival blog: http://www.survivalblog.com/nickels.html

[Scottman]

well if you're doing it for the metal, if you could get 5 nickels for one quarter would you?

I believe Jack talked about this in one of the old podcasts, something about the composition of the coin and the energy needed to separate the metals.

I sort my change at the end of the day, doing this I even have 10 pounds of pre 82 pennies... The numbers aren't that great, for me it seems its about 1 pre 82 to 10 or more post 82 pennies.

I read about the nickel idea years ago on SB. I decided it would make sense for me as an emergency fund in case poverty ever set in. I'm not sure I will be consciously asking every week, for some reason I want some other preps or silver.

[Taylor3006]

It's about metal value vs face value of the coin. A nickels metal value exceeds its face value, just like pre 1982 pennies. That is why people are keeping/hoarding them. Copper prices would have to get quite high before the metal value of a quarter exceeded its face value. This isn't rocket surgery, holding onto pennies and nickels is a no risk gamble in an attempt to either make a small profit or to preserve purchasing power. Wikipedia is a cute site if you need info on popular culture. For coin info try coininflation.com (I think that's it). Realcent.org has some great discussions on the subject as well.

[snickers]

Ok I get it now, thanks for clearing that up Scott and Taylor.

Metal value vs face value, got it.

[Scottman]

No problem! I'm curious on peoples ratios of nickels to silver/gold.... What's recommended?

[Scottman]

Looking at people's weekly ratios would tell me where people place more value

[Taylor3006]

Looking at people's weekly ratios would tell me where people place more value

I have no set ratios, I put away gold when it was at $700, silver at $6, and copper pennies whenever I ran across them. I use the same strategy used for pennies for the nickels and currently have several hundred dollars of both. I had goals with precious metals, $1000 face of junk silver and 10oz gold both met and exceeded. There is no downside to holding nickels and pennies so I just keep acquiring them since they are accumulated at face value. Essentially just saving nice, spendable money that has the potential of being worth more than I paid for it seems like a no brainer to me.

[American Redoubt]

I agree with your statement:

"Emergency Preparedness recommends some amount of cash, why not keep such in home emergency cash in bank sealed boxes of  nickels? $100 in nickels comes in a box, about the size of a large brick, and weighs around 22 pounds.  It’s NOT going to be destroyed in a fire, and the opportunist burglar is not going to stuff it in their pocket… It's cash, what's the downside?  Loss of what, 1/10 percent annual rate in your Wells Fargo savings account?"

I get a $100 22 lbs nickel brick each pay check -- it's a simple home savings account that is hard to steal.  But silver seems to be where one should also put 10-20% of your net income if you can since it is currently so undervalued at $28.92 compared to the traditional ratio of silver to gold.  Been doing it ever since I read, http://www.survivalblog.com/nickels.html.  Check this out too: https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Asurvivalblog.com+nickel&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a, specifically:

http://www.survivalblog.com/2012/12/debasement-is-still-inevitable-another-year-for-the-real-cupronickel-nickel.html

http://www.survivalblog.com/2010/12/letter-re-us-nickel-five-cent.html

http://www.survivalblog.com/2012/01/letter_re_clarification_on_sto.html

Nickels are a multipurpose hedge, for:

    • A currency swap
    • Slow currency inflation
    • Rapid currency inflation
    • A total currency collapse