It might be clear for people like us who have handled Casascius coins and been around them for years...but for the novice newbie and yes some experienced collectors they can be fooled.
I know for a fact at least one person that bid on it that thought it was genuine because he didnt look hard enough. So yes sometimes the experienced user can make the mistake of thinking it is genuine.
Just because the color is not the same can be blamed on the patina build up thru time too
I've got one that never attempted to pass itself off as a real one. It's pretty similar to that one pictured. In both cases their castings are much more sharply delineated than the real thing.
It's not too huge a leap for a forger to do something to address that and then it's going to be tricky.
Yes its just a matter of time before they nail this. Same goes for loaded cas coins with holo. Provenance and proof is going to be key in the event these things do happen when it will be impossible to distinguish the genuine from the fake coin.
First off great job with this thread, it is important to have this information out there and there have been many useful posts and discussion.
Regarding the future, I am not too concerned. My reasons for a lack of concern:
1) The bulk of my physicals are loaded Casascius Silver Singles. I believe by the time I am ready to sell them btc will be over 100K USD/BTC.
2) There are many coins which trade in the major auction houses (Stacks & Heritage) for 100k USD plus every week (have a look). Pretty much zero fakes ever get thru as the money involved is high enough that experts can make 100's of thousands of dollars per year. For this reason you get very intelligent people dedicating their lives to becoming experts at authenticating very smalll subsets. We will have experts at this when the coins are worth over 100k. Fakes will be near impossible, as they are today with high value US coins like the 1794 Dollar. People successfully fake $500 Morgan Dollars today and sell them on ebay, but no one gets away with faking a coin worth 100k.
In summary, it is very rare a coin worth over 100k USD is successfully counterfeited and sold thru any major auction house and in 5-20 years Casascius 1.0 btc will be worth over 100k USD imo. The downfall is, the buyer's will pay a 20% premium to the auction houses.
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