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Picked up $10 in machine wrapped Brinks cent rolls yesterday at a TD bank branch. Went through them and only was able to pull 12 cents of keepables. The rest were zincolns. Either I was just super-unlucky and got the vein of someone's dump that Brinks wrapped or Brinks itself is in the game now of pulling copper cents? These weren't 2024 zincolns. All mixed years. I did pull a 2009 and a couple wheat cents too out of the rolls but what a complete killjoy.

Random zinc year box no. Solid zinc box yes.

I will say for zincs do offer a good mix of errors and varieties to look for. But when you want copper it’s a skunk box.

JobIII wrote:Random zinc year box no. Solid zinc box yes.

I will say for zincs do offer a good mix of errors and varieties to look for. But when you want copper it’s a skunk box.

I found it ironic that I pulled a 2009 out of the rolls. Generally only see one maybe a few times a year in good shape. In this area, Maine, I have been spoiled with 20 % to 30% copper yields on Lincoln rolls. There isn't a big commercial copper cent collector on the east coast near Boston is there?

I wouldn't know but wouldn't assume this is anything more than a fluke.

I purposely use cash to get as much change back as I can. I only get 1-2 copper cents for every 20 pennies I get in change.

I stopped getting boxes from my local CU a few years ago because they were all skunks.

JobIII wrote:I wouldn't know but wouldn't assume this is anything more than a fluke.

Yeah. Just kind of impressed if there is someone in these parts or wherever Brinks got their pennies, that is separating the copper. Had to be a big amount too because I would think that the zincolns get churned up with the regular coin dumps in their facility but what do I know.

Grabbed more cent rolls from TD bank yesterday. Of the $10 -ie- 20 rolls of machine wrapped cents, I think I got maybe 40 copper Lincolns out of them. What is that, 4% ? I use to, and not that long ago, maybe a month or two ago, get easily 25% range of copper. I got these rolls from another branch different from my local one. In fact the branch was maybe 8 miles away from the prior one. Maybe the TD bank branches all get the same depot supply of wrapped coins.

Anyway, I'll check again next week and see if I can get more cents from another TD bank branch. If I get mostly skunked again, I am going to think that someone upstream is sorting out the coppers. I think this may be Brinks coin suppliers too. Anyone else here get coins from TD bank? What has been your experiences?

To quickly go from 25% copper to 4% doesn’t seem right, unless someone new has arrived in your area who is a major player. FYI- I usually average about 10-11% copper- no I’m not in your part of the country and I don’t believe in disclosing my whereabouts to a national audience.

Hopefully things will turn around soon for you.

JerrySpringer wrote:

JobIII wrote:I wouldn't know but wouldn't assume this is anything more than a fluke.

Yeah. Just kind of impressed if there is someone in these parts or wherever Brinks got their pennies, that is separating the copper. Had to be a big amount too because I would think that the zincolns get churned up with the regular coin dumps in their facility but what do I know.

Some ppl believe that Brinks and others are removing the Cu pennies from circulation. I have a friend who worked for Brinks for 10 years, he told me they have nothing in place to be able to do this. He left Brinks around 10 years ago, so maybe things have changed since then.

Sorry to hear about the crappy roll!

I always have mixed feelings about my efforts saving the copper pennies. Every time I go to a local flea market, a person has a whole trove of old cents just dumped out on a table, as if a deceased family member had been doing what we are doing, and now he's just selling them off to the highest bidder. I don't think I will ever understand how the US could jump to messing with everyone's gold and silver BITD, but they do nothing about granting ppl the ability to melt their copper.

With 2 data points, not a lot to go on right now. Other credit unions in the area have been supplying me with hand rolled or non-Brinks sourced cent rolls and they were fine. I'll scout out a few more TD banks next week. Maybe do a road trip for the day. I am curious now if this will be permanent here. Maine has always had high percentages of copper in the cents I bought at banks. This might be a heads up that others are getting more serious about sorting and they have capital to do it with. A copper cent is 317% of face value in metal content now.

I've quite the copper sorting, which I do miss. Still have my Ryedale if I decide to start up. (LOVE finding wheaties)
ALL the banks around have removed their coin counters and required rolled coin.
I even tried to get them to take around 95 Ikes and they wouldn't do it. I ordered some large dollar wrappers and took them that way.
Even when I did that the tellers was confused if she was able to take them. She called in a manager to ask and he looked at them first. SMH

It's known that Brinks (and therefore probably other commercial wrapping companies) has been pulling copper out of circulation for years now. I'd guess that they only do this in certain territories (knock on wood, but in DC there's still plenty of copper), and it's certainly possible that they sometimes expand their copper sorting machinery into new territories.

https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/cri ... 236181007/

Grabbed another $10 worth of machine wrapped cents at a TD bank branch yesterday. The copper yield was 5%. This is a month after I first noticed the low copper counts. I posted that I would hit the mid 20% range of copper easily with Brinks rolls. Then this. I will check other branches during the summer. Brinks may be pulling the copper, which is very interesting or there is a whale somewhere in New England accumulating copper cents.....

JerrySpringer wrote:Grabbed another $10 worth of machine wrapped cents at a TD bank branch yesterday. The copper yield was 5%. This is a month after I first noticed the low copper counts. I posted that I would hit the mid 20% range of copper easily with Brinks rolls. Then this. I will check other branches during the summer. Brinks may be pulling the copper, which is very interesting or there is a whale somewhere in New England accumulating copper cents.....

If I were you, I would completely stop buying from this branch. I would go to other banks. Also, you might want to request CUSTOMER WRAPPED ROLLS

Silver4face wrote:If I were you, I would completely stop buying from this branch. I would go to other banks. Also, you might want to request CUSTOMER WRAPPED ROLLS

It has been at least 4 branches of TD bank now that have been giving me poor results. Yeah, I am getting rolls from credit unions too and they are much better. Is Brinks selling the copper?

Yes, Brinks is selling the copper: https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/cri ... 236181007/

That article is from 2013 about an incident that happened about 5 years prior. Do you think Brinks is still doing something like that?

TXSTARFIRE wrote:That article is from 2013 about an incident that happened about 5 years prior. Do you think Brinks is still doing something like that?

This was interesting:

"Stephen Fitch, the attorney for Luhrman and Jackson Metals, said Luhrman developed a process for sorting pennies based on their metal content so that he could melt down copper-filled pennies. He started using the process in 2006. But by the end of that year, the U.S. Mint had banned penny and nickel melting, so Luhrman stopped, Fitch said."

Didn't know up until 2006, you could melt cents and nickels legally.

Yeah, the melt ban is fairly recent. If they are still sorting and selling they are not being melted.

TXSTARFIRE wrote:Yeah, the melt ban is fairly recent. If they are still sorting and selling they are not being melted.

My thoughts are somebody may be anticipating a ban lift soon......

I hear the melt ban may be lifted on the 1st of next April.

TXSTARFIRE wrote:Yeah, the melt ban is fairly recent. If they are still sorting and selling they are not being melted.

It would be VERY easy for large companies to melt coins without being caught!

TXSTARFIRE wrote:I hear the melt ban may be lifted on the 1st of next April.

TXSTARFIRE wrote:That article is from 2013 about an incident that happened about 5 years prior. Do you think Brinks is still doing something like that?

The price of copper is even higher now than it was back then, so the economic incentive is certainly there.

We've had plenty of reports (including the original poster of this thread) of people receiving circulated machine-wrapped penny boxes from their bank, only to find that they contain between 0%-1% copper pennies.

So, we have the motive, reports from community members, and public admissions that it has occurred in the past, and I feel comfortable saying it's still happening. I suppose the 100% post-1982 circulated boxes could be explained by some other phenomenon, but I think it's more likely that some regional branches of certain wrapping companies have a side hustle going on.