If you happen to be interested in sending coins off to the United States to be graded, one of the most difficult commemorative coins to get this right with is the 2012 Remembrance Day, ‘Gold Poppy’. Many people have sent off their coins straight out of a roll to PCGS only to receive them back several months later with ‘Cleaned-UNC details’ and no numerical grade.
At the time of publication, only 605 of these coins had been assigned a grade by PCGS. In comparison, the 2012 'Red Poppy and 2013 'Coronation' each have 2,000 PCGS graded examples.
Furthermore, the top grade achieved by the ‘Gold Poppy’ is 68, and only a single coin has achieved this grade.
The 2012 ‘Gold Poppy’, is far more difficult to find in uncirculated condition than many of the lower minted commemorative $2 coin series.
There are a few reasons why ‘Gold Poppies’ are relatively difficult to find in high grades and also in the condition that PCGS will return them with a numerical grade.
Firstly, in 2012 commemorative $2 coins were new. There were far fewer collectors waiting for a release.
Today, when a release takes place, ‘Noodlers’ across the country rush out to try their luck at finding these coins before they reach circulation.
Furthermore, some of these individuals have relationships with people 'in the know' who inform them when a new release is available for them to collect. These commemorative $2 coins are also typically easy to identify.
The mint also didn't release 'RAM rolls' in 2012. The RAM currently releases 10,000 rolls for each new commemorative $2 coin. Therefore, collectors have 250,000 uncirculated examples when RAM rolls are issued.
Additionally, many of the ‘Gold Poppies’ released in rolls by the security companies were polished before their general release. Eventually, some of these coins were sent to PCGS and returned as ‘UNC DETAILS-Cleaned”.
The above factors mean that the population of ‘Gold Poppies’ gradable in the mint state range by PCGS is fewer than people would expect given their large mintage of 5.8 million.
Unfortunately, I’ve recently seen an increase in the number of fraudulent listings relating to rolls and bags of ‘Gold Poppies’. Once opened, these rolls/bags are filled with circulated coins. There is a logic to this phenomenon. The ‘Gold Poppy’ is easy to find in circulated condition. It is therefore not difficult to amass 25 of them and then sell them on in a deceitful manner.
For this reason, I implore anyone interested in buying a bag or roll of ‘gold poppies’ to purchase them from a reputable dealer.