Topic: Ron Paul
Q and A with ebay sellers of NORFED coins and certificates I went to ebay and did some Q and A with the sellers who had NORFED items up for auction on ebay to gage their response to the federal raid.by Michael McDonnough
(Libertarian)
Monday, November 19, 2007
I did a little leading questioning of sellers on ebay that had NORFED items for sale up on auction and here is some of that Q&A for my readers.
Questions to seller of warehouse receipts:
Do you expect that with the current raid on NORFED by the FBI and the confiscation of all of their money, computers, and paper records that it might change the value of your warehouse receipt?
Do you have any concerns over its creditability at this point given the seizure of all of the NORFED warehouse records?
1. Seller Answer: Most of the people that purchase these notes are those that just like the looks and want to have them for their own pleasure. It might make the value of my notes go up since there will be less. Supply and Demand.
2. Seller Answer: It is definately too early to tell. I am not sure of the outcome at this time. I had no problem with the credibility of Norfed and its products before the fed raid. I am certain that the raid will have some effect on the value of these certificates. I'm just not sure if it will be for the better or the worse. I do know that as a collectible it will have value as an example of 21st century competition to the global money monopolist
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Question to sellers of coins,
Do you expect that with the current raid on NORFED by the FBI and the confiscation of all of their money, computers, and paper records might change the value of your auction item?
Do you have any concerns over its being called illegal to posses or trade as claimed in some news articles and the seizure of all of the NORFED warehouse records? http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jZHepUhX3cYLnSqZV2tm_byrun3AD8SUTRH80
1. Seller Answer: Market economics infers that the reduction of supply in a good (e.g. the Government destroying a business that is a sole supplier of a good) causes an increase in price of that good. I expect the price of all Copper, Silver, Gold and Platinum Liberties will increase in value above and beyond their bullion value due to the US Government action. The US Mint warning only mentions 18 USC Sec. 486 which criminalizes use of coins other than US legal tender as "current money." The Ron Paul dollars have always sold at a vast premium to either their silver or face value. Furthermore, if you read the seizure warrant for the raid, available at
http://www.libertydollar.org/ld/legal/raid.htm, you will see that Ron Paul Dollars are never mentioned. IANAL, but I do not believe that Ron Paul Dollars, as made and marketed by Liberty Services, is illegal to own or possess, but it illegal to try and pass off as US coin. I am not selling a now-worthless Liberty Dollar Certificate, but the actual silver round. It was not confiscated as part of the raid on Liberty Services. Thank you for your concern.
2. Seller Answer: No, no concerns. You have to remember that this is a silver coin and it is being sold as a silver coin, a collectors item. This is not a currency neither a legal tender (description has been taken from their website, but it is being corrected to reflect what exactly it is). As a collectors tem prices should go up... thanks
3. Seller Answer: Ok, well first of all it is not illegal to posses Liberty Dollars. Second, it is NOT illegal to trade Liberty Dollars or LDs. The only action that could be considered illegal is the same that I point out in the auction. This is not considered "legal US tender" and trying to use it as such could be considered fraudulent activity. As long as you realize that 20 LDs does not equal 20 US Dollars then you are fine. Some retailers however DO accept LDs and they do so on a barter system and that IS completely legal.
4. Seller Answer: LDs hold perfectly legitimate value because they are made of pure precious metals. Honestly the fact that the mint has been shut down by the FBI and my never start up again makes those that are in existence MUCH MORE valuable. One of these coins like I'm selling just went for $550 USD compared to the original cost of $25 just a few months ago.
Any more questions?
5. Seller Answer: I dont hold any warehouse reciepts. I only have copper and silver coins which I sell like I would any other coin. People buy it for its collector value, nothing else. Im not interested much in what Norfed is about. Their products are extremely popular among my customers.
6. Seller Answer: No. They are simply silver 1 oz. rounds. They happen to feature and commemorate Ron Paul. They happen to be in fairly limited quantity. They happen to have a collector value due to their quantity, their commemoration and their connection to a potentially memorable event. There are many other 1 oz. silver rounds all over the place. I have commemorative Presidential and Revolutionary War silver rounds and bars, etc. I have no reason to believe it could be possible to "outlaw" the possession of one kind of 1 oz. silver round and not all others. If possession of any and all silver becomes illegal, we have a lot more to be concerned about. -----------------------------------------------------------------
Looks like all the responding sellers agree that the federal raid on NORFED will only help the price of existing coins and perhaps even the bills since the supply and demand forces are well at work and are likely to only go up in value. While not all of the press has been good for Ron Paul the wide spread nature of the news is certainly good for name recognition.
Perhaps that is why the big MSM outfits keep reposting their articles to keep the content fresh for the google news search. I have noticed this trend in the Washington Post and New York Times articles on the subject. It seem like they are reposted every day so that they show up as new stories. It just keeps making the value of the existing coins go up. I will hold mine for a while I think.
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The views expressed in this
article are those of Michael McDonnough only and do not represent
the views of Nolan Chart, LLC or its affiliates. Michael McDonnough is
solely responsible for the contents of this article and is not an
employee or otherwise affiliated with Nolan Chart, LLC in his/her role as a columnist.
The liberty dollar has been around since 1998... it is used by merchants, but ever since the mint "warning" last year it has been less popular. Plus, getting people to accept that money made of silvedr is more valuable than money made of paper is not the slam dunk one would expect it to be.
As a consequence of the raid, Liberty Dollars are very scarce. On ebay the Ron Paul Libertys are going for $300-$500 each! Many people are scrambling to get Liberty Dollar Certificates so that they can join the class action lawsuit (as the silver backing the certificates were confiscated in the raid.) The store that sells collectable Libertys (going back to 1999) is having a liquidation sale- http://www.LibertyDollarUSA.com And with no more being minted until the end of any legal proceedings, it may be quite awhile before the prices of Libertys come back down. Even common Libertys are going on ebay for $40-$50!
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