In March an 1822 Capped Bust Half Eagle graded AU-50 by PCGS became the world’s most valuable gold coin struck by the U.S. Mint. The rare gold coin, sold by Stack’s Bowers Galleries for $8,400,000 including a 20% buyer’s premium. This is the only example available for private ownership.
Imagine owning a coin that’s so rare that it’s the only one known to exist in a private collection. This is one of just three known 1822 Capped Bust Half Eagles with two others in the Smithsonian collection.
Rare Coin auctions of U.S. coins are doing very well in the past year even though almost all major coin shows were cancelled due to COVID-19. Buyers and sellers of Rare Coins have come together online eagerly bidding up prices on extremely rare and expensive collectibles.
Rare Coin Market Extremely Rewarding
Previously offered at Bowers and Ruddy’s October 1982 sale of the Louis E. Eliasberg Sr. Collection, there it realized $687,500.
It went unsold at its last offering by Stack’s Bowers and Sotheby’s back in May of 2016. It failed to meet its reserve and bidding stopped at $6.4 million.
In the March 23 to 26 auction in Las Vegas the very top end of the rare coin market was tested. The Stack’s Bowers catalogue, who provided these images, describes this 1822 Half Eagle in far less than glowing terms.
“This is not a gem, nor does it glitter like a jewel. This piece displays antiquity. It shows wear and use. Its surfaces suggest its life before collectors and cabinets and fame. Within the shadows of contrast between a coin worth $5 and a coin worth millions, this coin hides a story whose earliest details will forever remain unknown.”
Collectors always want what other people can’t have— regardless of the condition. This coin is the absolutely best example of a collector’s dream come true.