Silver Coins that are Difficult to Counterfeit

argali

argali

New Member
Hi all, I'm a newbie here,
I live in Indonesia, and as far as I know there is NO silver coins dealer in my country. So, I bought all of my silver coins and rounds online, mostly from ebay. The problem with buying silver coins from ebay is that I cannot tell whether the coins are genuine or not. So, I usually buy silver coins (and rounds) that are, in my opinion, difficult to counterfeit.

Imho, the silver coins (and rounds) that are difficult to duplicate are as follows:
1. Silver Maple Leaf with its radial lines (2014 and afterwards)
2. Australian Kangaroo 2016, 2017, 2018 with its micro-engraved letter "A"
3. Sunshine Minting rounds with its VALID word (you need Sunshine Minting Decoder Lens to see it)

Is there any other silver coin(s) that you guys think difficult to counterfeit?
I know that American Silver Eagle is not that difficult to counterfeit, since I saw a video on youtube that shows a guy with a genuine and counterfeit Silver Eagle, and the counterfeit looks very similar to the genuine one.

Would you care to share your list of silver coins (and rounds) that, in your opinion, are difficult to counterfeit, and the ones that are relatively easy to duplicate?

Thank you in advance
 
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Buy from reputable sellers with good feedback. eBay isn’t that bad, as long as you stay away from “too good to be true” bargains.

Also surely there must be precious metal dealers in Indonesia
 
Ipv6Ready said:
Also surely there must be precious metal dealers in Indonesia
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Thanks for your reply

yes, there is some precious metal dealers in Indonesia, but they mostly sell gold bars. Sometimes they sell silver bars (250 grams and above), but not silver coins. I prefer silver coins (1 oz or 30 grams and below) to large silver bars (250 grams and above).
 
There are no certain coins or items that are tougher to counterfeit. If there is $ to be made, there will be fakes. Anything that sells for a high price and/or sells huge volume will be subject to counterfeits. That could be $20 Nike hats that sell tens of thousands, a gold bar that there are only 100 of in the world, the leading brand of anabolic steroid tablets, or common brand of little diamond earrings. Any of those are potentially worth counterfeiting... especially the ones that have a fairly high price and also a high volume sold.

I agree with buying from known reputable dealers and bullion shops as your #1 defense.

...with any silver order, it is good and cheap to weigh the coins on a digital gram scale, ping them together to hear the ringing of silver, and to do the neodyne magnet slide test. That will cost you maybe $5 for the digital scale and $1 for the magnet. It will also weed out 99% of fakes, and you can use it forever. There are more sophisticated methods to evaluate your silver for authenticity, but I feel they aren't viable for most common collectors and investors since you start cutting into your slim profit margins pretty fast.
 
A reliable source of silver is real currency such as pre decimal Australian silver. A fake one of these is very rare.
 
GoldenEye said:
A reliable source of silver is real currency such as pre decimal Australian silver. A fake one of these is very rare.
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And usually worth more to a collector than the silver value.

The Silver Maple is a decent coin to collect though, it depends on whether you are going to get bored of looking at the same coin and want a bit of variety, or just want to keep them in a safe and never look at them until you go to sell.
 
Jislizard said:
And usually worth more to a collector than the silver value.

The Silver Maple is a decent coin to collect though, it depends on whether you are going to get bored of looking at the same coin and want a bit of variety
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yeah, that is so true. My collections are mostly Silver Maple Leaf, and I'm kind of a bit bored with Maples. I have several Kookaburras and Koalas, but the latest designs, in my opinion, are not so attractive.
I love Pandas, on the other hand, but they say that all counterfeit coins are from China. So there's a great chance that there are a lot of fake Pandas out there.
 
argali said:
...they say that all counterfeit coins are from China. So there's a great chance that there are a lot of fake Pandas out there.
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That is simply because nearly everything manufactured in China nowdays... real or fake. If US silver eagles or Aussie minted kangaroos weren't fakes that were made there, China probably still sold the mint their equipment or raw silver. Lol. I get a kick of people in the USA who want "real" brand name tee shirts or electronics or shoes, "not those fakes made in China or Korea." Well, where do they think the "real" brand name ones were also made?

Again, be more wary of sellers with questionable feedback or unknown reputation than you are of any one coin type. They can all be faked (although the higher volume and higher premium ones are more likely).

...This video is a good summary of the easy testing stuff you or anyone can do at home on their silver coins (remember pandas weigh 30grams not 31.1g like 1oz coins):

 
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Maybe you can get the precious metal verifier from ebay. I bought one and already detected a gold coin that is not pure - luckily it was a face to face meetup.
 
argali said:
Thanks for your reply

yes, there is some precious metal dealers in Indonesia, but they mostly sell gold bars. Sometimes they sell silver bars (250 grams and above), but not silver coins. I prefer silver coins (1 oz or 30 grams and below) to large silver bars (250 grams and above).
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do you have any link ?
1000-gram-hmv-silver-bar.jpg
 
It's only a matter of time that the counterfeiters will be able to produce high quality fakes of all those products you noted which have so-called "anti-counterfeit" technology. The real question is, are they willing to produce that material when the silver spot price remains so low? I don't know because I don't know the cost to them to produce such fakes....the counterfeiters may stand to make more return by faking higher premium products.

But if PM prices ever move significantly higher, that'd be more of an incentive for them to reproduce imitations of cheaper bullion regardless of whether the product is minted with so-called "anti-counterfeit" technology.
 
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