The Egmore Museum in India will showcase an 1852, $50 gold coin, which is considered to be one of the rarest of the Rare Gold Coins of the United States known at present. The coin has been acquired by Chennai’s Government Museum from Pudukottai’s Government Museum and will be displayed as a part of the Weekly Exhibit Series of the Egmore Museum. The curator of the museum’s Numismatics Section, N Sundararajan said that the coin is believed to form a part of the King of Pudukottai’s private collection. He added that this rare gold is an ingot, which was used as a standard to measure the quality of gold in old days. Today, governments across the world term new ingots as bullion, which are issued by them at frequent intervals of time.

The design on the obverse side of the coin includes an eagle on top of a shield, with the words “Liberty” engraved. In its beak, the eagle holds a tape and in its claws, some arrows. There are no engravings on the reverse side of the coin. It only has some grinding marks.

The weight of the coin is 1.5 troy ounces, which is approximately 84.63 grams of 21.28 karat gold. These coins were minted at Moffat & Co, a private minter, and most of them were melted between 1849 and 1854, when the San Francisco Mint opened. This is the reason why these rare gold coins are valued at $500,000 each. Each of these 1852 gold coins were minted by hand, adding to their value and rarity.

A study was conducted by Raymond E. Lombra, an Economics Professor at Penn State, for Taxation of the House and the Senate’s Joint Committee. The findings of this study, which covered findings of gold purchases spread over a period of 28 years, revealed that rare gold coins provide a ‘better hedge’ than buying any other form of gold. This study has formed the basis for legislation issued by the Congress regarding investment.

5 Benefits of Rare Gold Coins in a Portfolio

Some benefits of purchasing rare gold coins, as highlighted by the study conducted by Professor Raymond E. Lombra, are:

1.    They provide a much better hedge against inflation as compared to that offered by other gold-related buys.

2.    In times when the price of gold comes crashing down, rare gold coins are known to make considerable profits.

3.    Such coins are also found to be beneficial in an inflation scenario, wherein prices of stocks and bonds decrease substantially.

4.    Such coins are known to yield 100% more than what other gold assets yield in their best year.

5.    These coins are also known to achieve a yearly return of over 200%, which is the highest among all gold forms.

Various studies have revealed that genuine rare gold coins are good for wealth preservation purposes in the long run. Time and again, it has been observed that rare gold coins offer a substantial amount of asset protection and capital appreciation, even in times of economic disruption and inflation.

In a study conducted by the GE Private Asset Management’s Chief Investment Officer, a higher return for the past 63 years have been seen for rare gold coins.