Half dollar (Here with Kennedy as motive):
In the first half of the 20th century, the half-dollar was still of great importance for payment transactions.
Half a dollar is equal to 50 cents. The 50-cent coin is one of the coins with the largest mintage in the USA. Since 1964, the heraldic eagles of the states have been imprinted on one side and President Kennedy on the other. With the end of the era of coin-operated vending machines for drinks or chewing gum, as well as one-armed bandits, the circulation of coins as a whole has sharply decreased. Card payments are becoming more popular worldwide and are displacing coins and bills more and more from the everyday life of many Americans. From today’s point of view, some of the coins from that time have a much higher value than the actual face value.
A few months after the assassination of J.F. Kennedy, the first coins were minted with his likeness. At that time, in 1964, the first coinage consisted of 90 percent pure silver and weighed 12.5 grams per piece. This information also applies to many of the half-dollar coins from various previous series. Since silver prices rose relatively quickly, the silver content was reduced to 40 percent in the first step between 1965 and 1970. Finally, from the year 1971, silver in the half-dollar coins was completely dispensed with. Since then, the coin has been made of a copper-containing alloy, like many other coins of the United States of America.
So, older of these coins have a special value. On the one hand, especially the well-preserved coins are interesting for collectors or coin lovers. Misprints and especially rarely minted editions can easily be worth several hundred dollars apiece in expert collectors’ circles. On the other hand, the production of the coins up to 1970 has a further advantage from the current point of view, since a high proportion of pure silver has been used for coin production. At the current silver prices, therefore, for coins that are completely uninteresting to collectors, the pure material value can easily exceed the face value of the coin many times over. According to the current world market prices for silver, a half-dollar coin from the period before 1971 has a silver value of up to 10 US dollars per coin. Even worn or damaged coins can therefore have a much higher value than the issue price was at the time.
