MALAYSIA 1976 1SEN COPPER

Obverse

It was another record sale for the 1976 1sen with an error planchet that made of copper. It was recently auctioned on Ebay US with a realized price of USD2975.00 or RM9371.25 (exchange rate 3.15 = USD1.00) on the 10th November 2013 with 29bids.

Reverse

 

 

NGC population report

 

There were only four pieces achieved the highest grade of MS66 RD (Red) according to the NGC population report thus far.

On 27th March 2013, the exact same coin but with one rung lower of MS65 RD (Red) graded by PCGS was auctioned by Singapore Monetarium Auctions with a realized price of SGD3017.30 or RM7694.11 (exchange rate 2.55 = SGD1.00) inclusive of buyer's premium and GST in Singapore.

 

According to Steven Tan's catalogue it was stated that there were no more than 100pcs minted.

 

Steven Tan catalogue

 

So what's so special about this 1sen 1976 copper coin ? It was an error planchet material used. The correct metal should be copper-clad-steel.

 

FYI, the 1sen coin was minted from 1967 to 1973 using copper but then it was changed to a different material with less expensive metal "copper-clad-steel". Because the cost of raw commodity - copper went up hence making a one cent coin more expensive than the price of 1sen. So in the year 1973 half of the entire mintage of 21,400.385 million pieces of 1sen coins were made by copper-clad-steel and copper.

 

For those "layman" who want to search for this 1976 1sen copper just use a magnet. The copper-clad-steel 1sen coin are attracted to magnet whereas the copper 1sen are NOT attracted to magnet.

 

Happy hunting !