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The E-Sylum: Volume 22, Number 8, February 24, 2019, Article 37

U.S. MINT ENDS PRODUCTION OF 90% SILVER COINS

A February 20, 2019 article by Mike Unser on CoinNews.net highlights a change from the U.S. Mint that you might not have heard about. -Editor

2018-America-the-Beautiful-Quarters-Silver-Proof-Set Say goodbye to the 90/10 mix of silver coins from the United States Mint. The agency is now producing silver coinage to 99.9% purity.

The increased silver composition will be used for dimes, quarters, half-dollars, and commemorative dollars.

"In 2019, any previous 90/10 silver denominations have moved to 99.9% silver, including Silver Proof Half Dollars, Silver Proof Quarters, Silver Proof Dimes, and Silver Proof and Uncirculated $1 Commemoratives," U.S. Mint spokesman Michael White told CoinNews on Tuesday, Feb. 19. "All other coin compositions remain the same."

The 90% silver and 10% copper ratio is often referred to as "coin silver." The mix was a mainstay of U.S. circulating coins from the early 1800's until the Coinage Act of 1965 became law. Its use returned in 1982 for modern commemorative coins and in 1992 with the introduction of annual silver proof sets.

Actually, until President Obama signed the FAST Act in December 2015 which replaced the traditional 90/10 language with "not less than 90 percent silver," the U.S. Mint by law had to produce silver coins for numismatic products like the annual sets in 90 percent silver.

See the complete article online for more information. This isn't just a marketing decision - there are a number of benefits in the manufacturing process, including greatly increased die life, greatly reduced die cleaning time, less scrap and fewer customer returns. Interesting.

Old traditions die hard (no pun intended), but after over 200 years U.S. silver coins will no longer be made of coin silver. I did not find a definition of "coin silver" in the Newman Numismatic Portal dictionary, so here's what Merriam-Webster says. -Editor

coin silver noun
Definition of coin silver

: silver of the fineness legalized for coins (such as .900 fine in the U.S., .500 fine for Great Britain since 1920)

To read the complete dictionary entry, see: coin silver To read the complete article, see:
U.S. Mint Ends Production of 90% Silver Coins (http://www.coinnews.net/2019/02/20/u-s-mint-ends-production-of-90-silver-coins/)

Here's a link to Coin World's coverage. -Editor

To read the complete article, see:
U.S. Mint replaces 90 percent silver alloy with .999 fine silver (https://www.coinworld.com/news/us-coins/2019/02/us-mint-drops-90-percent-silver-composition.html)

THE BOOK BAZARRE

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Wayne Homren, Editor

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The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org.

To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com

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