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Hey...I have a friend of mine who is unemployed and needs some cash; he asked me if I would be interested in any of his US Commemoratives type coins (Clad, Silver & Gold). I said that I would help him out a bit. However, this is more of a niche market. I know that, in general, they go back to about the 1890s, starting with I think the Colombia Fair or something (sorry, I haven't done all my research yet). I'm pretty sure his stuff would be only from the last 50 years, so let's stick with that for the most part.

So....a good question for the forum. Here we go...

1. In your opinion, what are considered the most fluid USA Commemorative type coins (stuff that moves fairly well and is recognizable by most coin shops, coin show dealers and maybe the public folks that are in-the-know). Please list, say, clad, silver, gold, multiple-coin sets (ie Olympics), and then the top 3 items of each etc. I am not concerned with specific denominations; just stick with the basics here. You can even throw in a short story or perhaps your reasoning behind why you think the particular coin is that fluid. I recall the recent posts about European gold coins and some folks had some good knowledge of that market. Hopefully, we can cover Commemoratives in a similar light and help everybody out at the same time. If the thread becomes popular, we could even move it elsewhere or make it a 'sticky' somewhere on the forum.

2. What are the most desired Commemorative type coins, based on high popularity/demand/rarity etc? Same question applies as above, ie clad,silver,gold, multiple-coin sets etc.

There are some good knowledgeable folks on this forum, so I look forward to your responses.

Not an expert by far on commemoratives but from what I have seen high end (MS) low mintage classic commemortive coins are the most desired. Some of the best include The Panama-Pacific 4 piece set and the Lafayette half, both which are very rare. I personally would stay away from clad or modern commemoratives if you have the budget for classic ones.

It is a niche market but there are those who collect complete sets of these and want MS coins in their collection.

You might want to check out the commemorative thread over on the coin community website as there is a lot of good knowledge on there about these.

this is kind of an open ended question, I think you will get more answers by listing what he has and asking for info and prices on them.

Most aren't worth much more than the 90% silver/gold in them. But there are exceptions of course.

I read some pretty good reviews about this book:
Modern Commemorative Coins: Invest Today - Profit Tomorrow
by Eric Jordan
http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Commemorative-Coins-Invest-Tomorrow/dp/1440212899/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297973005&sr=8-1

I've been through it once, and it has all the information on modern commems you need.

Unless you are into numismatics I would just know the general value of them and take them to the coin shop. If the dealer offers to pay less than spot than you can buy them from your friend above what the dealer would pay. Of course you need to have some tact about this in front of the dealer, but if you aren't super interested in these than thats probably the best way to do it.

OK, thanks highroller for the advice.