The Royal Mint has revealed the rarest 50p currently in UK circulation that has an asking price on eBay of £5,000.
The UK’s official coin maker has named His Majesty King Charles III’s 50p coin depicting an Atlantic Salmon as the rarest 50p, knocking the highly collectable 2009 Kew Gardens 50p off the top spot for the first time. A total of 200,000 coins featuring the Atlantic salmon were released to UK banks and post offices in 2013, compared to 210,000 of the famous Kew Gardens coin now 16 years ago. As such, the Atlantic salmon has the lowest mintage of any circulating 50p coin making it the rarest and most coveted by collectors.
The coin’s design – which features a leaping salmon on one side and a portrait of King Charles III on the reverse – highlights His Majesty’s passion for conservation and the natural world, and in November 2023 it became the first of eight new designs representing flora and fauna to enter circulation.
Wild populations of Atlantic salmon are affected by environmental factors like river pollution, habitat loss, overfishing and river heating due to lack of tree cover and climate change, but the fish can also be found in clean rivers in Scotland, Wales, and North and South West England.
Announcing the mintage figures in October last year, Rebecca Morgan, Director of Commemorative Coin at The Royal Mint, said: “The releasing of mintage figures is an eagerly anticipated event among the coin collecting community – and this year is particularly exciting as we reveal the Atlantic Salmon as the rarest 50p in circulation.
“For the first time in 15 years, the highly collectable Kew Gardens 50p loses its top spot as the rarest in circulation with the Atlantic Salmon 50p splashing its way to number one.
“2023 marked pivotal changes for the nation’s coinage, including the introduction of coins celebrating King Charles III’s coronation entering circulation. Finding these special designs, like the Atlantic Salmon, in your change is a win for all collectors.”
The Royal Mint says finding a rare 50p coin like the Atlantic salmon can be as simple as just checking your change. But if you aren’t lucky enough to stumble across one, it’s possible to track rare coins down online.
Ebay is a good place to start and the website currently has listings of the rare Atlantic salmon 50p for an eye-watering £5,086.72. Other listings price the coin at £3,000 and £2,000, but just because it’s priced this high doesn’t necessarily mean it is worth this much.
There are much cheaper listings as well, with bids for the 50p starting at just £1.75. While this might not sound like much, it’s still more than double the coin’s value.
Of course, if you don’t want to buy the coin you can join a coin-swap community on Facebook instead where you can chat to other collectors for tips about where to track down rare coins, and you may even find someone who is willing to do you a trade.
