• When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Wow! World's Largest Coin and it's gold!

22 posts in this topic

I saw a 2007 Canadian $1000000 Maple Leaf on display at Vienna's Kunsthistorisches Museum where it was on display as part of its coin collection. That one was 100 kg (220 lb) and was pretty darned big, 21 inches in diameter. Great museum BTW in the heart of Vienna.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A publicity stunt, and nothing more. The Chinese, Canadians, and a few other countries have done things like this. Its nothing new.

 

I'm sure that you're right but it is still amazing and fun to look at!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A publicity stunt, and nothing more. The Chinese, Canadians, and a few other countries have done things like this. Its nothing new.

 

A publicity stunt? Are you sure?

 

I would expect to see these in circulation by the end of the year. It may take a few extra years to put a bigger slot in all the coke machines. I heard NGC was buying extra plastic so they could slab all these coming off the press (I can't wait to get a early release!!).

 

A publicity stunt.............phff......I think not!

 

Nick

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A publicity stunt, and nothing more. The Chinese, Canadians, and a few other countries have done things like this. Its nothing new.

 

A publicity stunt? Are you sure?

 

I would expect to see these in circulation by the end of the year. It may take a few extra years to put a bigger slot in all the coke machines. I heard NGC was buying extra plastic so they could slab all these coming off the press (I can't wait to get a early release!!).

 

A publicity stunt.............phff......I think not!

 

Nick

 

:signfunny:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A publicity stunt, and nothing more. The Chinese, Canadians, and a few other countries have done things like this. Its nothing new.

 

A publicity stunt? Are you sure?

 

I would expect to see these in circulation by the end of the year. It may take a few extra years to put a bigger slot in all the coke machines. I heard NGC was buying extra plastic so they could slab all these coming off the press (I can't wait to get a early release!!).

 

A publicity stunt.............phff......I think not!

 

Nick

 

No---it really is a publicity stunt. Mr. Obviousman knows what he is talking about.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I still think the title of the Largest Coin belongs to the stone coins of Yap Island.

 

yap1996-1.jpg

 

YapStone2.jpg

 

yapmon2.jpg

 

yapmoney.jpg

 

Many of the mottled gray stones are centuries old and are worth thousands of dollars. The larger pieces are seldom moved and instead change hands in something akin to an electronic bank transfer. They are used to buy land, pay for services or provide compensation in cases of wrongdoing or negligence. Even stones that sank offshore long ago still hold their monetary value.

 

In Yap's warring past, a stone could buy a clan's neutrality, pay for the killing of a rival or secure the pardon of a captured warrior.

 

The Bank of Hawaii used to lend dollars to islanders who put up their stones for collateral, but it has since closed its Yap branch. The island's remaining bank, the Bank of the Federated States of Micronesia, doesn't lend money for rai.

 

Branch manager Cyril Pong Chugrad notes that calculating an international exchange rate for stone money would be problematic. "Stone money can be used for a lot of things," said Pong, whose family owns several rai. "But to value it in U.S. dollars is very difficult."

 

Most rai (stone discs) are highly valued: By one account, a stone of "three spans" (about 25 inches across) would have been sufficient in the early twentieth century to purchase 50 baskets of food or a full-sized pig, while a stone the size of a man would have been worth "many villages and plantations." Obviously, these stones do not change hands very frequently, since expenditures of such magnitude are rare. For more ordinary transactions, the Yapese either used pearl shells or resorted to barter.

 

More than a century later, the official currency of Yap is now the United States dollar. Stone discs are still legal tender in the villages, though, where the people maintain a relatively traditional lifestyle. Over 2000 of them exist, on display for all to see: some outside houses, where they remain heirlooms and give the occupants great prestige. Others lie in public areas. Never stolen, they occasionally change hands, remaining in the same location and often being grown over with vegetation. The stones even have a "bank" of sorts, a canal in which most are stored.

 

The US dollar is the common currency in Yap, but the stone money is still used to this day for major transactions like payment of dowry or purchase of land.

 

The Rai are not carried about, for obvious reasons. Individual pieces are found all over Yap, but most are kept in "Stone Money Banks" in the villages.

 

When Rai shift hands as the result of a land transaction, a wedding or otherwise, the news spreads fast and it is soon common knowledge that a particular piece has a new owner. The Rai are seldom moved, but remain where they stand.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

NGC should make a mattress size slab for that thing.

 

With wheels and a trailer hitch please....

 

Then we can see some pictures of slabs with cars that aren't scale models!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I still think the title of the Largest Coin belongs to the stone coins of Yap Island.

There is a four-ton coin like the one pictured. It was carved from rock, weighed ~4 tons and was sent by ship towards an island. However a storm came in a knocked the boat and the huge coin over. To this day the coin is nowhere to be found but is still trading hands and being used becuase it is still believed to exist.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you are interested in how and why the coin was made, check out this video made by the Perth Mint: Making Australia's One Tonne Kangaroo Gold Bullion Coin (4:23)

 

Can we assume they only made the one coin? Are they going to sell it?

 

Only one coin was made, and according to the CEO of the Perth Mint, Ed Harbuz, the coin was created to raise awareness of the Kangaroo Bullion Coins. The coin is currently on display at the Perth Mint and serves as an “attraction” for Mint visitors. There have been no discussions on selling the coin as far as I am aware of. The way I figure it, the bullion value of the coin alone is: 1 metric ton = 32,150.7466 troy ounces times $1,725.90 per troy ounce = $55,488,973.56.

Link to comment
Share on other sites