Penny Dreadful - Currency Discussion

[Touring Mars]

I got a Sherlock 50p yesterday.

I got one in my change of Saturday evening - it totally made my day.

Unfortunately it has put me in something of a quandary as a Japanese friend of mine is obsessed with Sherlock Holmes and has just come back from a trip to London where he visited Baker Street for the first time. I should ask him if he has the Sherlock 50p and offer it to him if he hasn't already got one...

 

[Liquid]

@Touring Mars I went through my coin collection collating the 50ps I have:

Britannia x11 (9 of which are 1997)
New Shield x3
100 years of Girlguiding x2
150 years of Public Libraries
Battle of Britain
2012 Olympics - Football & Offside
100th anniversary of the birth of Christopher Ironside
Victoria Cross
Victoria Cross Heroic Acts
Beatrix Potter

So 9/24 are 1997 Britannias, not quite the 60% estimate but at 38% still quite large representation... of coins I have intentionally kept.

That's not including the old, thicker 50ps but I swear I have more tucked away somewhere though because at one point I had four of the Dictionary 50ps.

 

[LancerEvo7]

I have a small lot of foreign change on the way, has two Britannia 50ps (one is 1997 and I'm going to make the safe assumption that the other is too) and this Victoria Cross one:

 

[Liquid]

@LancerEvo7 That is the VC Heroic Actions 50p. There is another with just the VC itself as the design.

 

[LancerEvo7]

@LancerEvo7 That is the VC Heroic Actions 50p. There is another with just the VC itself as the design.

Thanks for that, most references I've used just list them as 'Victoria Cross' and 'Soldier.' Always wondered if there was a specific name for the Soldier one.

 

[Pupik]

The penny is being Pluto'd: As of today, the US one cent piece will soon become history.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-treasury-unveils-plan-end-production-penny-coin-2025-05-22/

No word on how much longer it will be accepted; I have a few hundred of them and not sure whether just yet to spend them or cash them in. I make only a few cash transactions per year, so I see no point in hoarding them.

 

[Blitz24]

The penny is being Pluto'd: As of today, the US one cent piece will soon become history.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-treasury-unveils-plan-end-production-penny-coin-2025-05-22/

No word on how much longer it will be accepted; I have a few hundred of them and not sure whether just yet to spend them or cash them in. I make only a few cash transactions per year, so I see no point in hoarding them.

So does this also mean that any prices ending in something other than 0 or 5 will be changed to that?

 

[Liquid]

So does this also mean that any prices ending in something other than 0 or 5 will be changed to that?

In countries where the smallest coins have been withdrawn, prices are often still in multiples of 1 but if paid with cash you must pay rounded up to the nearest 5 or 10, which I find outstandingly unfair.

Card payments should eliminate such theft but as you mention, it's an excuse for prices to be increased anyway. Even if it's only a few tiny cents, add that up over a large economy of scale and several, several transactions...

 

[Blood Eagle]

The penny is being Pluto'd: As of today, the US one cent piece will soon become history.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-treasury-unveils-plan-end-production-penny-coin-2025-05-22/

No word on how much longer it will be accepted; I have a few hundred of them and not sure whether just yet to spend them or cash them in. I make only a few cash transactions per year, so I see no point in hoarding them.

Keep them because they may have intrinsic value one day. Same with pre 1965 US dimes, quarters and half dollars when they used to be 90% silver. Now they are clad which is what you make house keys with. Takes about $1.40 of face value on a 90% piece to equal 1 troy ounce of silver. What's silver used in? Cell phones, solar panels, EVs, TVs, military weaponry etc. It's in everything. The 90% US coins are worth about 23x face value for silver content alone for melt value but they also have intrinsic value. If they are going to ditch the penny maybe it's time to hoard them and keep them around since fiat has no intrinsic value besides the perception it's actually worth something. Maybe a collectors item one day.