Bermuda $50 note and coin sell for more than $1,200 at auction
A Bermuda banknote and a coin used during the 20th century have sold for at least 23 times their original values in an international auction.
A Bermuda-British Administration $50 banknote sold for €1,000, or more than $1,170, in the Crown Currency Live Auction 64.
A Bermuda 1959 silver crown sold for €34 — about $40 — for a coin worth 25p during its time of circulation.
The demonetised currency was sold among more than 1,000 other pieces of decommissioned money from around the world.
The bidding opened on December 1 and concluded the next day, though pre-bidding had started about a week beforehand.
The banknote was in circulation between 1978 and 1982 and had a serial number of 000009, indicating it to be one of the first bills to be printed.
The Paper Money Guaranty, an international paper money grading service, rated it as being of high quality, with only one other banknote surpassing its condition in the service’s Population Report.
It was sold alongside more than 1,000 other banknotes.
The Bermudian silver crown was graded by the Numismatic Guaranty Company, another third-party grading service for coins.
It was listed as being in mint condition, with a grade of 68 out of 70, indicating that it was “very sharply struck” during production and had “minuscule imperfections”.
The crown was one of more than 100 coins at the auction certified by the NGC.
Other top notes included the Surinam 25,000 Gulden banknote from 2000, which sold for €1,300 ($1,528), and a Greek 100 drachma banknote circulated in the late 1800s, which went for €10,000 ($11,756).
The bestselling “top pop” coin considered the highest grade was an Indian rupee minted in 1928 from the princely state of Mewar, which sold for €210, or about $246.
