News – FMV Gold

Why Gold Prices Differ Between Dealers for the Same Coin

Open two browser tabs, drop the same one-ounce gold coin into both carts, and the totals will not match. Neither seller is doing anything improper. The metal is identical, the weight is identical, and the spot quote feeding both pages came out of the same wholesale market seconds ago. Gold prices differ between dealers because […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 13, 2026

New Issues & Mint News

What Are the 2026 Semiquincentennial Coins? A Full Guide

Pull a handful of change out of your pocket this month and look at the dates. If a dime, a quarter, or a half dollar reads “1776 ~ 2026” instead of a single year, you are holding a piece of the broadest circulating redesign the U.S. Mint has attempted since the Bicentennial. Nearly every denomination […]

Thomas Albrecht Sep 13, 2026

Silver Coins

Are Franklin Half Dollars a Good Investment?

Half dollars stopped being pocket change a long time ago, so when one turns up in a coffee can of old coins it gets a second look. If it shows Benjamin Franklin on the front and the Liberty Bell on the back, it is ninety percent silver and it left a mint between 1948 and […]

Grace Whitfield Sep 12, 2026

U.S. Coins

The History of the U.S. Nickel, From 1866 to Today

The five-cent piece is the plainest thing in an American pocket. No silver, no gold, no eagle on the back, just a president and his house. It is also the only denomination still circulating in essentially the metal Congress gave it in 1866, and the one lawmakers are arguing over right now. The history of […]

Ruth Calloway Sep 12, 2026

Bullion vs. Numismatic Insight

Silver Eagle Key Dates: When Bullion Turns Numismatic

Most American Silver Eagles are worth the silver inside them plus a modest premium for being a coin the whole market recognizes on sight. That is the entire story for the overwhelming majority of the hundreds of millions struck since 1986, and there is nothing wrong with it. A one ounce government bullion coin is […]

Margaret Ellison Sep 12, 2026

The Week in Metals

The Week in Metals: Gold’s Third Straight Weekly Loss as Fed Hike Odds Reach 90 Percent

The inflation reports came in hot, the bond market believed them, and gold spent the trading week that ended Friday, September 11 being sold ahead of a Federal Reserve meeting that now looks likely to deliver a rate increase. Producer prices on Thursday and consumer prices on Friday each printed a tenth above forecast, the […]

FMV Market Desk Sep 12, 2026

Macro Environment & Strategy

Is There a Best Time of Year to Buy Gold?

Gold opened Friday, September 11, 2026 at $4,359.40 an ounce, down roughly 1.1% from the previous close and the lowest the metal had traded since August 6. Ask around for a reason and you will get several. The August CPI report was due, expected to show consumer prices up 3.4% from a year earlier. Futures […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 11, 2026

Gold Coins

Are $10 Indian Head Gold Eagles a Good Investment?

Type “gold eagle” into a search box today and you will mostly get the modern one-ounce bullion coin the U.S. Mint has struck since 1986. That is a perfectly good coin, and we have written about it. But the eagle as a denomination is much older. It goes back to 1795, it was worth ten […]

Samuel Hart Sep 11, 2026

Market Updates & Premiums

Why Are Silver Premiums Higher Than Gold Premiums?

Buy a one-ounce gold coin and a one-ounce silver coin on the same afternoon, and something odd turns up on the receipt. The gold coin costs a few percent more than the metal inside it. The silver coin can cost fifteen or twenty percent more, and in a busy market a good deal more than […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 10, 2026

Products & Formats (Coins, Bars, Rounds, Vaulted)

Proof vs Bullion Coins: What the Mint’s Finishes Mean

Three American Silver Eagles can sit side by side on the same desk, each holding exactly one troy ounce of .999 silver, each struck at a United States Mint facility, and each carrying a very different asking price. The metal in them is identical. What separates them is the finish: how the blank was prepared, […]

Priya Anand Sep 10, 2026

New Issues & Mint News

What Is the American Palladium Eagle? A 5,000-Coin Sellout

The order window opened at noon Eastern on September 3. About eight minutes later, the U.S. Mint’s newest precious metals coin was unavailable. Buyers took 4,778 of the 5,000 authorized 2026-W American Eagle palladium coins, roughly 96 percent of the entire issue, and the Mint’s sales report published on September 9 confirmed the count. Palladium […]

Thomas Albrecht Sep 9, 2026

Silver Coins

Are Standing Liberty Quarters a Good Investment?

Reach into a bag of 90 percent junk silver and sooner or later you will pull out a quarter with a striding figure on one side, an eagle in flight on the other, and a smooth blank step where the date ought to be. Dealers sort those into their own pile without much comment. The […]

Grace Whitfield Sep 9, 2026

U.S. Coins

When Did the U.S. Stop Making Silver Coins?

Ask a room of coin buyers when American money stopped being silver and you will get three answers, all partly right. The dime and quarter went first, the half dollar hung on five more years in a watered-down form, and the silver dollar had quietly stopped circulating long before either. The line most holders use […]

Ruth Calloway Sep 9, 2026

Macro Environment & Strategy

Quantitative Easing and Gold Prices: What Actually Happened

The Federal Reserve spent three and a half years shrinking its balance sheet, then quietly stopped. Runoff ended on December 1, 2025. Since early January 2026 the System Open Market Account has been buying Treasury bills again, close to $250 billion of them by the start of July, and total assets stood at $6.74 trillion […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 8, 2026

Gold Coins

Are Krugerrands a Good Investment? A Buyer’s Profile

Almost every American who owns gold has handled a Krugerrand at some point, or been offered one, and a fair number are not quite sure what they are holding. The coin carries no dollar figure, no ounce marking that matches its weight on a scale, and a portrait of a nineteenth century Boer statesman most […]

Samuel Hart Sep 8, 2026

Collecting Tips

How to Clean Coins Without Destroying Their Value

Somebody hands you a cigar box of dark silver dollars from a grandparent’s dresser, and the impulse arrives before the thought does: make them look like money again. Every coin shop in America has watched that impulse walk through the door about an hour too late. The blunt version is that most cleaning takes value […]

Ruth Calloway Sep 7, 2026

Market Updates & Premiums

Why Coin Premiums Change When Gold and Silver Move

Anyone who has watched a dealer’s order page for a few months has noticed something strange. Spot climbs hard, and the finished coin costs less over metal than it did before. Spot collapses, and the coin stubbornly refuses to get cheap. The metal is doing one thing. The coin is doing something else entirely. That […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 7, 2026

Pricing, Guides & Market Reports

How to Read Coin Auction Prices Realized

Auction archives are the closest thing the coin market has to a public transaction record. Anyone can look up what a particular date and grade brought last spring, in what holder, and how hard the bidding ran. That transparency is genuinely useful, and it is also easy to misread. The number printed next to a […]

Priya Anand Sep 6, 2026

New Issues & Mint News

The Gold Donald Trump Coin With No Gold

Editor’s Note A gold-colored U.S. dollar just created the kind of collector frenzy that makes headlines, with one small catch: there isn’t any gold in it. That’s not a scandal. But it is a perfect lesson in the difference between collectible value, precious-metal value, and marketing value, three things buyers had better learn not to […]

Thomas Albrecht Sep 6, 2026

Bullion vs. Numismatic Insight

Are Graded Bullion Coins Worth the Premium?

Walk any bullion show or scroll any listing site and you will see the same coin twice. There is the plain American Silver Eagle, sold loose in a plastic flip, priced a hair above the value of its ounce of silver. Then there is the identical year and design sealed in a hard plastic holder, […]

Margaret Ellison Sep 5, 2026

The Week in Metals

The Week in Metals: gold travels $226 and lands back where it started

Four sessions, a $226 range in gold, and almost nothing to show for it. That is the honest summary of the trading week that ended Friday, September 4. Gold was sold hard on Tuesday and Wednesday in a rate-hike scare, bought back just as hard on Thursday after one Fed governor changed the arithmetic, then […]

FMV Market Desk Sep 5, 2026

Silver Coins

Are Walking Liberty Half Dollars a Good Investment?

Ask a longtime coin dealer to name the most beautiful silver coin the United States ever put into circulation, and a good many will reach for the Walking Liberty half dollar before you finish the question. Struck from 1916 through 1947, it carries Adolph A. Weinman’s striding Liberty on the obverse and a mountaintop eagle […]

Grace Whitfield Sep 4, 2026

U.S. Coins

The History of the U.S. Penny, From 1793 to 2025

On November 12, 2025, at the Philadelphia Mint, U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach pressed the last circulating one-cent coin the United States will make. It closed a run of 232 years, longer than any other American coin has managed. The penny outlived the half cent, the trime, the twenty-cent piece, and every circulating gold coin, yet […]

Ruth Calloway Sep 3, 2026

Macro Environment & Strategy

The Gold-to-Oil Ratio and the Dow-to-Gold Ratio, Explained

A single number, the price of gold, tells you less than it seems. Gold at roughly $4,450 an ounce in early September 2026 sounds like a lot, and it is a record in dollar terms, but a dollar is a moving yardstick. To judge whether metal is dear or cheap against the rest of the […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 3, 2026

Gold Coins

Are Indian Head Quarter Eagles a Good Investment?

Most pre-1933 United States gold coins wear their designs proudly on the surface, the way a Saint-Gaudens double eagle does. The little $2.50 Indian Head quarter eagle does the opposite. Its portrait and its eagle sit below the field, sunk into the metal rather than raised above it. Hold one at an angle and the […]

Samuel Hart Sep 3, 2026

Products & Formats (Coins, Bars, Rounds, Vaulted)

What Bullion Packaging Tells You: Cards, Tubes, and Boxes

Buy a one-ounce gold bar and you rarely just get the bar. It arrives sealed inside a credit-card-sized plastic holder printed with numbers and a signature. Buy a tube of silver coins and it comes in a capped plastic cylinder; buy in bulk and the whole thing shows up strapped inside a sealed box the […]

Priya Anand Sep 2, 2026

Market Updates & Premiums

Which Gold and Silver Coins Are Easiest to Sell?

Most buying guides stop at the purchase. You compare premiums, pick a coin, and the story ends when the package arrives. But every ounce you buy is half of a round trip. Sooner or later, you or your heirs will sell, and the form you chose years earlier decides how fast that happens and how […]

Daniel Reyes Sep 2, 2026

New Issues & Mint News

The America the Beautiful Quarters Program: A Retrospective

For twelve years, the loose change in American pockets carried a rotating gallery of national parks, forests, and historic sites. The America the Beautiful quarters program ran from 2010 through 2021, and by the time it wrapped up it had put 56 different reverse designs into circulation, one for every state, the District of Columbia, […]

Thomas Albrecht Sep 1, 2026

Silver Coins

Are Mercury Dimes a Good Investment? A Buyer’s Profile

Pull a tray of Mercury dimes across a coin show table and something happens: people who never look twice at a modern quarter slow down. The little silver dime with the winged head is one of the most admired designs the United States ever put into pocket change, and it circulated by the billions from […]

Grace Whitfield Aug 31, 2026

Collecting Tips

How to Insure a Gold and Silver Collection

The stack in your safe is real money. Your homeowners policy does not see it that way. To most standard policies, a shelf of gold and silver counts as loose change, capped at a figure that would not replace a single ounce. That gap is quiet until the day you file a claim, and by […]

Ruth Calloway Aug 31, 2026