How long will the copper last?

[cacahg]

I know this has been discussed in the past. I've seen my % drop a little the last few weeks. I've seen this before, but I'm getting more shunk 2011 d boxes. So while sorting today I was wondering how long will the copper last. Big time sorters like The Portland Mint have got to be putting a dent in what's out there. I would like to hear how long you think it will be worth sorting given the melt ban stays in place.

[willy13]

All 2011D? Thats just a fact of sorting, it happens every year... Now a box of 100% zincs of various dates now thats a different story...

[rexmerdinus]

All 2011D? Thats just a fact of sorting, it happens every year... Now a box of 100% zincs of various dates now thats a different story...

I did a box of CWR's the other day that was a little strange--30% of the rolls were typical random mix of dates, zinc and copper. The rest of the rolls were solid dates, like the person collected all the, for example, 1995 pennies he could find and rolled them together. Quite a few rolls of 1982's (mixed--copper and zinc, so I don't think he's a copper sorter). I've seen this guy's rolls before when getting pennies from this bank, but never so many in one go. And no solid rolls of copper dates, unfortunately!

[Ecotic]

Probably a long time, since the only profitable way to sort pennies is if you have machines, a couple of banks, and a high tolerance for the hurdles to come. It's nowhere near as friendly as pulling silver quarters and dimes were back in the 70's. Plus very few people even know about this. I think a more likely scenario for a lowering of copper percentages is just the copper pennies getting "flushed out" of the system by newer pennies, or just a sort of slow attrition from them falling out of pockets and getting forever lost in gutters and parking lots.

[rickygee]

The diminutive answer to that question is: "Until it's gone."

[cacahg]

Ok riddle me this. How long do we have after the melt ban is lifted? Let's just say the price of copper is high

[twentybux]

The diminutive answer to that question is: "Until it's gone."

You took the words right out of my mouth.

[John_doe]

it is dropping, but very slowly. remember that they minted billions of copper cents. it takes some time even with several large operations going. ive been sorting for years, and it has only dropped a few percent in those years. there is still silver in circulation (not much, but trying to make a point) and they stopped making silver in 1970. im saying at least 10-20 years before you have a supply that rivals currently circulating silver supply. this does not mean the premium will not continue to increase. as the supply dwindles there will be more people willing to pay top dollar for it.

[Morsecode]

I'm always surprised when I pull 40 or 50 1972 cents out of a box, some 40 years later.

All we know for sure is that the cu percentage was 100% in December 1981 (ok, 99.99999% if you want to count the '43 steelies)...and it's taken 30 years to knock that down to what?...say a national average of 25%..?

Does that mean a steady attrition rate of 2.5% annually? Probably not. Has the rate of attrition on a yearly basis increased as the total number of cu cents in the wild declines? Maybe so. The question is, I think, if there will come a period of time when the rate of return drops sharply, and never recovers.

[DebtFreeMe]

Part of this apparent drop in the percentages of coppers could be more due to the fact that just so many zincs have been made thus diluting the percentage of coppers you get. I think this may be much more of a factor in the dropping percentages.

This idea is given credence by the fact that the mint totals shown here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Sta ... production show that if you take all the pennies from 1909-1982, and then give the ratio of them as compared to all pennies from 1909-2011, even if no pennies were ever lost, coppers would only make up just under 39% of all pennies... Then start taking away from that all the wheat pennies that have been lost, pulled from circulation, or re-melted by the government, and I think its actually a good sign that we have a national average of about 25% coppers...

Just my thoughts.

[wagsthadog]

Hi there-

I think the penny will be abolished long before all the copper is gone... and if not that, GETTING boxes/bags of pennies for free from banks is the more pressing question...they are all cracking down-times they are-achangin.

wags

[camtender]

Customer return bags I am getting are starting to show customer zinc dumps.

I suspect that the bigger risk is that the banks stop allowing the sale of pennies to us, vs. roll purchases, customer bags, etc...........as copper pennies will be in hands for the rest of our lives.

[OtusLotus]

I don't think that any of us will ever see a complete depletion of the copper pennies.. rather, I think we will see a depletion or withdaw of THE penny first!

[Klark Cent]

maybe by the time the copper percentages get really low, the zincolns themselves will be hoardworthy.

[Engineer]

maybe by the time the copper percentages get really low, the zincolns themselves will be hoardworthy.

Ironically, our hoarding of copper cents might make them less valuable than the zinc...but it will likely take decades for that to happen.

[DCR Jerry]

I think the reason we still find around 25% coppers is that the coppers last a lot longer than the zincs. In searching, many of the new shield cents I encounter are almost unrecognizable from wear and nasty toning.

[Klark Cent]

that makes sense.

[creshka46]

I don't think that any of us will ever see a complete depletion of the copper pennies.. rather, I think we will see a depletion or withdaw of THE penny first!

I agree. I've read that estimates of total pennies currently in circulation are 140-200 billion. If we figure a conservative estimate of 20% copper based on our results, then there are about 30-40 billion copper pennies left. For figuring out how fast they are being removed, I referrenced another thread here where it was quoted from an article that brinks is pulling 3,000,000 coppers per day. That impies that they are sorting through about 3 billion total pennies per year and pulling 600 mil (if we assume 20%).

So in estimating total pulled per year, let's be conservative and assume that brinks and 2 or 3 of it's competitors are all pulling copper as well as all us hand sorters, meaning that in total, 15bil cents per year are being sorted for the purpose of removing copper. I ran those numbers on a spreadsheet and here are the results:

Total current pennies 140,000 (in millions)
Current percentage 20%
Total copper pennies- 2012 28,000 (in millions)
Total # sorted per year 15,000 (in millions)

Copper pulled* ending %* Copper left in circ
Year 1 3,000 18.25% 25,000
Year 2 2,737 16.58% 22,263
Year 3 2,487 15.01% 19,776
Year 4 2,251 13.53% 17,525
Year 5 2,029 12.15% 15,495
Year 6 1,823 10.88% 13,672
Year 7 1,632 9.71% 12,040
Year 8 1,456 8.63% 10,584
Year 9 1,295 7.66% 9,289
Year 10 1,149 6.78% 8,140

Here's a less conservative estimate, this is the most optimistic scenario I can forsee:

Total current pennies 200,000 (in millions)
Current percentage 25%
Total copper pennies- 2012 50,000 (in millions)
Total # sorted per year 10,000 (in millions)

Copper pulled* ending %* Copper left in circ
Year 1 2,500 24.05% 47,500
Year 2 2,405 23.11% 45,095
Year 3 2,311 22.19% 42,784
Year 4 2,219 21.29% 40,564
Year 5 2,129 20.40% 38,436
Year 6 2,040 19.53% 36,396
Year 7 1,953 18.67% 34,443
Year 8 1,867 17.84% 32,576
Year 9 1,784 17.03% 30,792
Year 10 1,703 16.24% 29,088

So basically, my belief is that 10 years from right now, our yields will still be somewhere between 6% and 16%. That is assuming that the penny is still around and that no new players enter the game (like the US gov beginning an Alloy Recovery Program like in Canada)

Reference (see tractorman's long quoted post about 4/5 of the way down page 1)
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=9826

[Common Cents]

The most imminent challenge for our hobby will be a Canada-like abolition of the penny. That could happen real soon. The mint sucks all the circulating pennies back into its coffers, and banks will no longer distribute them. The times they are a changin' as the great Dylan said.

The other factor that people haven't considered is the unprecedented levels of 'quantitative easing' (money printing) that has occurred in recent years. The inflation has yet to really accelerate, but it will at some point in the near future. Copper could be selling for $10/lb in a few years. Copper pennies would be worth around 7X face value or better at that point. This would GREATLY accelerate the depletion of CU.

Banks are already staring to get pretty stingy with supplying us. It's only going to get worse. Soon they will be charging premiums in the form of fees to get your supply. As inflation continues to grow, it leads to production cost increases for CU miners which also fuel price increases. Which again fuels more incentive to search for CU. And the more people searching for CU, the less banks will cooperate.

I'm happy for the continued open window, but I have no illusions that it will stay this way for much longer. I say a national average of 10% CU is a lot closer than many of you think.

Get while the gettin's good, my friends!

[midiglass]

I am getting an average of $5-6.00 per $25.00 Bank box and in that I still get as many as 10 Wheaties,
So I imagine the copper will be around for a while, now how long will it be worthwhile to sort these boxes
is a different story, I would anticipate 5 years it wont be worthwhile after that but then again that is just a guess.

[Tribal Warrior]

How many is the Portland mint running per day? Or are they simply purchasers?

[everything]

I saw a brinks truck leaving my dump bank today.

[Tribal Warrior]

Does Brinks and Garda go to same vaults? jw

[Silver4face]

BUMP!!!! Plenty of copper still out there. But how much of it is copper that got RETURNED to circulation? Fortunately we still do not have an alloy recovery program. If you fear an upcoming alloy recovery program, then buy lots of rolls!

[cwgii]

Lol how did you find this ancient artifact.

Last year,out of desperation for room for storage,I turned in a bunch of,,, Uglies.