Yahoo Finance Rare 50 cent coin worth $40: ‘Looks like a regular coin’
Aussies are being urged to look out for these "extremely hard to find" 50 cent coins.
Coin experts are raising awareness about an ordinary-looking coin that could be lurking in Aussies' spare change. The coins can be worth up to 80 times their face value for one simple reason.
Victorian coin collector Michael McCauley told Aussies to “keep an eye out” for 50 cent coins that were produced in 1985. Only a relatively small number of the coins were minted, making them a rare find.
“They only made one million of these coins in 1985 and it has a recent selling price of $15 to $40 each,” McCauley explained on TikTok.
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The coins featured a new effigy of the late Queen Elizabeth II, designed by Raphael Maklouf, which was the second portrait of the Queen to be featured on Aussie 50 cent coins.
Coin expert Joel Kandiah, who goes by The History of Money online, said the coin was Australia’s “joint rarest 50 cent coin” due to its low mintage of one million.
“This makes up a very small percentage of 50 cent coins minted overall,” Kandiah said.
The South Australian expert said the coins were “extremely hard to find” as a result and put their value between $10 to $30.
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Another rare 50 cent coin
The 1993 50 cent coin is another coin to keep an eye out for as it shares the title for the joint rarest 50 cent coin with the 1985 year.
“Another really good year is the 1993 50 cent coin with the same mintage figure of only 1 million as well,” McCauley said.
The 1993 50 cent coins have recently sold for between $3.50 and $15. They feature the same effigy of Queen Elizabeth II on the obverse.
“I tend to find the 1985’s harder to find. I think that’s because they are a bit older and probably more have been taken out of circulation for collection and things like that,” McCauley said.
“But also some of them might have been lost along the way or damaged. When coins get damaged they usually get sent back to the Mint for destruction.”
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