Anyone seen/have one of these APMEX bitcoin barcode rounds?

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Howdy, Collectibles section folks!  I know I'm not part of the clique here, but I bought a neat-o .999 silver bitcoin round from APMEX (plated in 24K gold for reasons I don't understand; they really did gild the lilly here) and searched this section to see if there was anything about it but could find nothing.

I collect silver, love bitcoin, and this round has the neat feature of having a QR code that takes you to preev.com so you can check the price.  That's a nice touch considering most of the crypto rounds I've seen on various silver dealers are kind of generic in their design (though some of them are quite attractive).  I'm not going to blabber away on the details, because the link above will take you to APMEX listing.  I thought I'd share some pics of the actual round in case any of you are curious about what it really looks like.

BTW, that wax seal represents the castle I'm currently fantasizing about very publicly and perhaps a bit too openly in a country where one could live in a mini-commune off the proceeds of signature campaigns.  Don't ask; the insomnia is pretty bad.  The castle in the wax is not to scale.









So there ya go, a pretty cool 24K-plated .999 silver bitcoin-themed round, shipped bagged in a capsule with a certificate of authenticity and the number of your particular coin.  As you can see, it's a limited run of 3000.  From what I can tell, these aren't very popular since they've been available for quite some time.  The good stuff always sells out like a lightning strike, and I'm somewhat puzzled that these rounds haven't.

Any input would be appreciated.  Do I have overpriced crap or an overlooked gem?

[1715184441]

1715184441

[1715184441]

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[MoparMiningLLC]

I did not buy the gold one - but I do have  the regular silver one.

https://www.apmex.com/product/157878/1-oz-silver-proof-round-bitcoin-value-conversion-qr-code

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I did not buy the gold one - but I do have  the regular silver one.

Ah yes!  It slipped my mind: before I bought the round I'd seen the silver one available and passed on it.  I would have preferred it, since I'm not a big fan of gold-plated anything, especially silver coins.  It just seems icky to me as well as an unnecessary in a way that strikes me as akin to a natural beauty like Jennifer Lawrence wearing pancake makeup for the red carpet walk.

Did you take your coin out of the baggie?  Just curious.

[MoparMiningLLC]

I did not buy the gold one - but I do have  the regular silver one.

Ah yes!  It slipped my mind: before I bought the round I'd seen the silver one available and passed on it.  I would have preferred it, since I'm not a big fan of gold-plated anything, especially silver coins.  It just seems icky to me as well as an unnecessary in a way that strikes me as akin to a natural beauty like Jennifer Lawrence wearing pancake makeup for the red carpet walk.

Did you take your coin out of the baggie?  Just curious.

yes its it airtite

[ChiBitCTy]

This is a cool round, I imagine many here have one or a few of these. Anonymous Mint makes quite a few physical bitcoin and cryptocurrency coins. My very first bitcoin coins came from the anonymous mint. They are pure cooper rounds somewhat similar to these, just with different backsides. This is a cool coin and not a bad purchase at all.

[Cryptogreatdane]

Love these coins. They realized early in order to be successful you need to limit mintage. Ive seen these coins roughly double in value. Anonymous coins that have sold out in some cases sell for 5x like the 5oz colorized bitcoin coin. Back in 2012 after the first MJB copper came out the second coin the AOCS came. It featured the first QR. You can tell originals from the thick rim. The julie L version was derived from this.

[Cryptogreatdane]

Love these coins. They realized early in order to be successful you need to limit mintage. Ive seen these coins roughly double in value. Anonymous coins that have sold out in some cases sell for 5x like the 5oz colorized bitcoin coin. Back in 2012 after the first MJB copper came out the second coin the AOCS came. It featured the first QR. You can tell originals from the thick rim. The julie L version was derived from this.

  Heres the link to the anonymous bitcoin page. It features all their coins. Although you cant buy from them only distributors JM bullion and Apmex. Their probably pretty close to being at their mintage totals.

     http://www.anonymousmint.com/1-oz-silver-bitcoin.html

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Love these coins. They realized early in order to be successful you need to limit mintage. Ive seen these coins roughly double in value. Anonymous coins that have sold out in some cases sell for 5x like the 5oz colorized bitcoin coin. Back in 2012 after the first MJB copper came out the second coin the AOCS came. It featured the first QR. You can tell originals from the thick rim. The julie L version was derived from this.

Ah, thank you for that bit of historical info--I was just wandering around Youtube and happened to do a search for bitcoin silver rounds and saw videos like this one from Jan. 2018 that shows pretty much the same coin that's currently being offered on APMEX.  So ultimately unless there are variations among releases, there's really no scarcity behind the whole "limited edition" thing.  They can make a run of 2000 coins and have them all numbered, but what difference does it make if they're just going to release the same coin again?

I'll check out Anonymous Mint's website to see if I can figure out what's what.

[Cryptogreatdane]

Love these coins. They realized early in order to be successful you need to limit mintage. Ive seen these coins roughly double in value. Anonymous coins that have sold out in some cases sell for 5x like the 5oz colorized bitcoin coin. Back in 2012 after the first MJB copper came out the second coin the AOCS came. It featured the first QR. You can tell originals from the thick rim. The julie L version was derived from this.

Ah, thank you for that bit of historical info--I was just wandering around Youtube and happened to do a search for bitcoin silver rounds and saw videos like this one from Jan. 2018 that shows pretty much the same coin that's currently being offered on APMEX.  So ultimately unless there are variations among releases, there's really no scarcity behind the whole "limited edition" thing.  They can make a run of 2000 coins and have them all numbered, but what difference does it make if they're just going to release the same coin again?

I'll check out Anonymous Mint's website to see if I can figure out what's what.

   I think AM is sticking to their mint numbers, at least i hope they are. The thing is they only release a couple hundred at a time. They've been doing this for years but the mintage number is going up. You also have 4 types their selling silver, antique, copper and gold plated. I think eventually they will stop when hit the mint #. I think its a good investment and will be better when their sold out. I sell these all the time for double to triple. As well as the owl and guardian versions

[The Sceptical Chymist]

   I think AM is sticking to their mint numbers, at least i hope they are. The thing is they only release a couple hundred at a time. They've been doing this for years but the mintage number is going up. You also have 4 types their selling silver, antique, copper and gold plated. I think eventually they will stop when hit the mint #. I think its a good investment and will be better when their sold out. I sell these all the time for double to triple. As well as the owl and guardian versions

Hmm.  Well take a look at this video, which is also from 2018.  At 2:54 into the vid, you can see the numbers on the certificates, and for the silver barcode one, he's got 1710/3000.  The one without the QR code is 563/3000.

In the original vid I linked to, from January 2018, if you freeze it at 2:01 he's got the standard silver coin with the QR code and has #279/3000.  It's almost funny listening him talk about his sense of FOMO.

And then there's this video from last month showing a guy unboxing five of the gilded coins with the QR code, and he's got #'s 554,556,567,575, and 578.  I haven't checked Anonymous Mint's site yet, but I'm wondering how long the gilded series has been running for.

And APMEX has got the regular silver edition with the QR code back on pre-sale, so my mind doth boggle at this.

[Cryptogreatdane]

   I think AM is sticking to their mint numbers, at least i hope they are. The thing is they only release a couple hundred at a time. They've been doing this for years but the mintage number is going up. You also have 4 types their selling silver, antique, copper and gold plated. I think eventually they will stop when hit the mint #. I think its a good investment and will be better when their sold out. I sell these all the time for double to triple. As well as the owl and guardian versions

Hmm.  Well take a look at this video, which is also from 2018.  At 2:54 into the vid, you can see the numbers on the certificates, and for the silver barcode one, he's got 1710/3000.  The one without the QR code is 563/3000.

In the original vid I linked to, from January 2018, if you freeze it at 2:01 he's got the standard silver coin with the QR code and has #279/3000.  It's almost funny listening him talk about his sense of FOMO.

And then there's this video from last month showing a guy unboxing five of the gilded coins with the QR code, and he's got #'s 554,556,567,575, and 578.  I haven't checked Anonymous Mint's site yet, but I'm wondering how long the gilded series has been running for.

And APMEX has got the regular silver edition with the QR code back on pre-sale, so my mind doth boggle at this.

I will say this I buy all these on Jm bullion and in the last 3 years they havent sold any QR code ones or the colorized 5 oz. All i see now are owl, guardian, and icon showing up sporatically. Id like to give AM the benefit of the doubt that their not duplicating mintage numbers. These coins are really nice. Some of the first coins I started collecting.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

Well, the non-gilded version of these coins became available on APMEX recently and I bought two of them, and this is a screenshot of their description:



Notice the "Certificate of Authenticity" part, which is also shown in the item link here.  Here's what I received (I folded over the flap to cover up the barcode on the top bag):



Obviously there's no CoA to be found anywhere as there was with the gilded rounds.  I'm not sure if this is one of APMEX's typical fuckups or if Anonymous Mint stopped printing them or what, but I'm reluctant to return these.  They are high-numbered, i.e., getting close to the 3000 mark, so that's kind of consistent with the mint producing them in intervals and not all at once.  I'm disappointed about the lack of CoA but more so with APMEX for even including that in their description if they knew they didn't exist.

I would write a review on their website, but I've tried leaving a negative review before and it didn't make it past the censors--hence my "review" here. 

[Suzuki Matt]

These are nice coins. IDK why I havent bought the silver ones. I have the 3 coin copper set with the Silk Road (my fav) coin. But I really like AM and probably should pick up a few silver ones. 

[The Sceptical Chymist]

These are nice coins. IDK why I havent bought the silver ones. I have the 3 coin copper set with the Silk Road (my fav) coin. But I really like AM and probably should pick up a few silver ones.  

They are nice indeed, and I think the novelty of having a QR code leading to preev.com is an interesting bonus to what could otherwise be just a generic BTC silver round (even though it's supposedly a limited edition run of 3000, that's not something I usually get excited about).  

I wouldn't discourage anyone from picking one up; it's just that APMEX has got some problems--and this is just one of a few that I've found in my dealings with them.  I've gotten clad quarters in silver quarter rolls and stuff like that which should not happen if there's any sort of quality control (or proper oversight of employees; I can't for the life of me figure out how a clad quarter got into a silver roll--twice).

Going by the numbers I got on my rounds, and assuming they're being minted and distributed in numerical order, this series will likely be coming to an end fairly shortly if people keep buying them.  I know people want to remain anonymous, and I respect that, but I'd love to know what numbers others have if they bought these, kind of like a population report.