Speaking of Trillion Dollar Coins...

You may be aware of a recent semi-serious proposal for the Administration to get around the looming debt ceiling by coining a platinum coin labeled $1,000,000,000,000 (it has to be a pretty big coin for all that to fit), deposit in the Federal treasury, presumably under heavy guard (a dragon might be enough) and to continue to spend money like a drunken sailor, with apologies to drunken sailors, who at least spend their own money.  The trick "works" only if the coin is platinum, because laws allowing the platinum coinage for collectors are slightly different than those for gold and silver, the other bullion metals. The administration has just recently ruled out the maneuver as way to deal with the debt bomb.

Possibly as a result of all the publicity around the as yet hypothetical trillion dollar coin, and having a bit of spare time at hand, Georgia and I decided to dig into our coin collection, which has been collecting tarnish for the last 50 years or so, while being shipped around the country.  My portion of the collection dates back to my early years; my mother's father Charles was a banker, and often sent me odd foreign coins, and at some point my father and I started to organize the collection, with American coins going into the familiar blue books, and foreign coins being either loose or pinned into a card with a transparent sleeve (approximately equal numbers, I think).  I lost interest in it somewhere before high school.  Georgia also received a number of the "blue books" from her mother, as well as a random collection of "wheat back" pennies.  Finally, at some point in the last 30 years, a beloved aunt and uncle, Marie and Ace, dumped an envelope of random foreign coins on us, rather than give them to their own kids who lived inconveniently far away.

My first task was to try to find anything of value, and I set out on that path by looking for coins with enough silver in them that they might have bullion value.  It turned out, in addition to the old silver US dimes, quarters and half dollars, that we had a few more foreign coins made of silver that would retain the bullion value in addition to the whatever numismatic value they have.  While I didn't suddenly find any new major addition to our retirement, I did find some interesting specimens. A few examples below (Click to embiggen):

From left to right and top to bottom:

1) Austria Maria Theresa Thaler Trade Coinage Restrike 1780:  "The original Theresa Thalers were issued in the Austrian State of Burgau in 1780. The originals look essentially identical to your restruck coin except for a few minor variations. But, starting in 1781, the exact same coin, even with the exact same date, was struck by Austrian and other mints and this continues to this day. The coins are used as 'Trade Coinage' in locations where local coins are not available. One of my catalogs estimates that 800 million of these coins have been struck." 83.3% silver.  The word dollar derives from the thaler.

2) 1868 Un Sol from Peru. A lovely coin. 25 grams and 90% silver, with a patina that enhances the visibility of the designs.

3) Your guess is as good or better than mine.  I can't read anything, on either side. But it is clearly about 30 grams of decent silver.

4) 1957 Mexican Hidalgo 5 Peso:  Only 72% silver.  From the period prior to the immense devaluation of the peso in 1993, in which 1000 "old" pesos became one "new" peso.  Silver is still silver.

5) 1962 Mexican Un (one) Peso:  Nearly as big as the 5 Peso above, it only contains 10% silver.  Like a lot of Mexican products, it's not as good as it looks.  I once bought a 12 string guitar in Ensenada that didn't even make it home to Oregon.

6) 1921 Philippine 10 Centavos: Basically a silver dime from the Philippine Islands.  At the time the islands were a "protectorate" of the United States, and their coins were minted in the U.S.  Two grams of 75% silver.

7) 1860 French 20 Cent:  "The decimal "franc" was established as the national currency by the French Revolutionary Convention in 1795 as a decimal unit (1 franc = 10 decimes = 100 centimes) of 4.5 g of fine silver. This was slightly less than the livre of 4.505 g but the franc was set in 1796 at 1.0125 livres (1 livre, 3 deniers), reflecting in part the past minting of sub-standard coins."  1 gram of 90% silver.  Also the smallest coin in the lot.

8) 1927 Mexican 10 Centavos: 2 grams of 72% silver.  An old Mexican dime.

9) 1939 Irish Florin (2 Shillings):  Interesting in that it has a goldish cast.  References say it is 75% silver and 25% copper.

10) 1944 Philippine 50 Centavos.  I threw you a curve here by showing the back side, which says the United States.  The Philippines were granted independence in 1946, after WWII.  The front side has the same lady as the 1921 Philippine 10 centavos above.  This coin is in gorgeous shape, with no wear and most of it's original shine.  It might become a nice piece of jewelry.  Also 75% silver.