London tube train £2 coins

The new £2 commemorative coins featuring the London underground designs have been available in limited numbers in change to lucky travellers on the tube for about a month now but so far I haven't noticed any this far north!!

I have to say from the Royal Mint photos (below) they are certainly on my desire list!

Designed by Edwina Ellis

Designed by Edward Barber & Jay Osgerby

They are definitely more striking than the other 2013 edition of the £2 coin which commemorates the 350th anniversary of Charles II's first guinea coin. The three coins nicely contrast each other though - the underground editions are much more contemporary in appearance while it would be hard to make a grander looking edition than the photo on the Royal Mint website (below) of the Guinea edition

Designed by Anthony Smith

Consequently, I expect the former two coins will be rapidly taken out of circulation by amateur collectors while the Guinea coin might be less immediately obvious to the novice as it is far less distinctive. I'm certainly planning on collecting the set of 3 though and I think this would be a neat little collection for other amateur collectors to gather from circulation.

Death of the Penny?

The end of the penny??

Once again there seems to be talk of ditching the one penny piece in Britain. This time it has been sparked off by the Canadian mint ceasing production of their equivalent - the 1 cent. It got me thinking: initially, my reaction to this news was downbeat - after all what numismatic good can come of losing a coin type?
After some thought though, I am coming round to the idea for a couple of reasons - firstly, it is hard to think of anything we can actually buy with them. Logically if the point of currency is to make purchases and if it is impossible to buy anything for a coin anymore then it is redundant surely?
Secondly, I thought about the coin - it is pretty boring really! I know it has a long history and has survived many re-coinage programmes for centuries - but these old coins will still be there! The new ones - well, they are pretty unexciting really!
I'm sure this is going to be a controversial opinion and I would be interested to hear YOUR thoughts on it but to me at least, it kind of makes sense!