Every year, Krause Publications takes on the monumental task of reviewing and updating information about hundreds of thousands of coins minted worldwide in the last few centuries. With the collaboration of experts on foreign coins and mints from around the world, KP has made the Standard Catalog of World Coins the “bible” that most coin dealers and collectors use for reference.
When dealing with projects of such magnitude and complexity, errors and inaccuracies are hard to avoid completely. The 36th Edition, 2009 Standard Catalog of World Coins, recently released, is no exception. When analyzing Cuban coin listings in this latest edition, we noticed that some of the inaccuracies from previous editions were not corrected in this new one. Below is a summary of some of the most relevant errors we found in the 2009 catalog (36th edition).
Not surprisingly, First Republic (1915-1961) coinage data was found to be more precise and updated that later coinage. Not only multiple comprehensive studies have been published describing First Republic coinage, but these coins were all struck at the Philadelphia mint, and mint records as well as official Cuban records have been available for reference and for comparison over the years. However, one coin listed caught our attention: a 1943 copper-nickel (Cu-Ni) 5 centavos listed as KM# 11.3. We have never heard about such a coin, and have not seen it at auction or for sale. Furthermore, a 1943 Cu-Ni 5 centavos is not listed in any of the publications by the “Banco Nacional de Cuba”, “Museo Numismatico” or “Casa de la Moneda de Cuba”. All the 1943 centavos we have seen are brass coins as those listed as KM 11.3a. We would love to hear what you know or think about this coin. Please post your comments below.
Also in the First Republic coin listings, we noticed the mintage figures for the 1915 20 Centavos are missing. Although it may not be possible to know how many of each of the four varieties were struck, we know that the total mintage was 7,915,000, which includes the High Relief Fine Reeding, High Relief Coarse Reeding, Low Relief Fine Reeding and Low Relief Coarse Reeding varieties.
The other inaccuracies are found mainly in the price guide, which should be used only as a general guide since it does not reflect recent auction sales and/or changes in bullion market value fluctuations. For instance, the 1915 gold proof Peso is lists for $1,750, but in the last three years it has sold for $2,530 to $5,750. We would love to buy one at list price, but that’s unlikely in today’s market. We regularly update our online price guide with results from major numismatic auctions. We hope you find it useful and welcome your comments on how to improve it.
The second part of this posting will cover the inaccuracies that we have found in the “Second Republic” (1962-present) coin listings, which are far more abundant.
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