Why are some coins more valuable than others? (Coin Collections; appearently certain serial numbers written on € bills also influence its actual value)
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It’s just a function of how desirable they are. If there are lots of people who want a coin and not very many of that coin available, the price goes up. Conversely if there’s a lot of a coin and not much demand, the price goes down.
Because people are willing to pay more. Thats the underlying function of anythings price. Its not the materials, nor the man hours, its what price you can put it at to have enough people buy it.
Some people are willing to pay extra for certain things so thats what makes them cost extra.
The value of something is based on how many of that item there is, and how many people want to own it (and how much they are willing to pay).
People generally collect a ‘set’ of something – so someone collecting coins may start by collecting coins from a particular country (perhaps a full set of denominations from a particular time period, then sets from different time periods, or a particular type of coin with a date stamp from every year, coins with different variations on the artwork or any of the infinite amount of different themes people can have.
The problem is that not all items are available in the same amount – in one year they may have produced far more or far fewer of a particular type of coin, so if someone wanted to collect a coin from every year, they may be able to easily find coins from years they made lots in, and far harder to find coins from years they made less.
This means that if you want to buy a coin from a dealer, the harder to find coins will be more expensive, as there are less coins to go around.
This is even more noticeable when you consider certain coins that were made in very limited numbers – things like coins that were made with an error or flaw that were quickly corrected and only a few were ever released into circulation. If there were only a few coins made like this, but a lot of collectors would like to own one, that means they will be more valuable as some people will be willing to pay more than everyone else to ensure they can get one.
It is worth noting that this isn’t specific to coins, but any item people collect (which can be virtually anything) – if someone collects s certain type of video game, some will be rare and expensive while others cheap and plentiful, or for someone collecting Matchbox cars or Barbie dolls, an old, rare version will be worth more than a mass produced modern one you can buy in a shop, and one still boxed in perfect condition will be worth more than one that had been opened and played with.
It helps that collectors see coins as sets. This can vary– you might try to collect all coins of the same denomination from one mint, one coin per year. Or you might try to collect every coin issued during a given war, or during your great-grandfather’s life. Or perhaps you collect coins from any time or mint that have an error but were released to circulation anyway. Another set might be every design for a given type of coin issued by a particular government, and so on.
Most collectors collect a lot of different ‘sets’, especially if they are a serious collector.
The desire to complete their sets means they are willing to go to sometimes great lengths to acquire a coin they don’t yet have. This also gives the rarer coins value, sometimes very significant value. It has nothing to do with how many peanuts you could buy with the coin, but rather with how much the collector wants that coin in their set.
There is a comedy/adventure movie called “Big Year” about the mindset of obsessive collecting, no idea if it is available in your country. It has to do with birds instead of coins, but the mindset is the same in both cases. There is no end to which someone won’t go to make it happen. I also found a TED Talk that about obsessive collecting a little bit if you’re into TED Talks: [https://youtu.be/AGgq5FdaaA8](https://youtu.be/AGgq5FdaaA8)
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