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eBay frenzy as undated 20p sells for £8k
On Monday, TotallyMoney.com reported on an exceptionally unusual mistake that had occurred at the Royal Mint, allowing thousands of 20 pence pieces to enter circulation without a date on either side – a mistake that hadn’t occurred in over 300 years. The news came to light when collectable coin firm, the London Mint Office, offered £50 for any finders who chose to send the coin on to them.
But since then, a bidding war has erupted on auction site eBay, with some collectors willing to pay thousands of pounds to get their hands of the rare ‘mule’ coins.
Now, one lucky finder as ‘7588oliver’ has just bagged himself £8,000. The coin was listed with a starting price of £4,000 at 8pm on Monday evening. By 2pm the following day, an unidentified bidder stepped in to scoop the coin for the ‘Buy it Now’ price of £8,000.
Another seller in Blyth, Northumberland scooped £5,800 on Monday after the story of the mix up hit the headlines. Listed since Friday 19th June with a starting price of 99p, the coin had received only three bids before Monday 29th, bringing the price up to less than £20. But as the news of the Royal Mint blunder spread, a bidding frenzy on the final day of the auction saw 22 more bidders place over 70 bids to bring the auction to a close at £5,800.
Since the successful sale prices have started to rise, one seller in Carlisle has listed his coin for a ‘Buy it Now’ price of £1,200,000 and pledged to donate 70% of the final sale price to charity. Prospective buyers are also invited to make an offer if they would prefer to spend a little less than 6,000,000 times the coin’s official monetary value. Meanwhile, a seller in Northwich is asking for £920,995 while another in Benfleet wants a mere £350,000.
However, coin collectors looking to get their hands on the rare coins should look out for scams that offer coins with ‘no date on the queen’s side’. Unlike the undated coin pictured, coins with the date on only one side are perfectly normal and consequently worth precisely 20 pence.