Over ten years on from switching to the Euro, collectors are now saying that some of the more scarcely produced Irish currency from before the switch could fetch a pretty penny. Coins from as recent as the 1980s and 1990s are valued at thousands of euros today.
Despite the fact that Ireland officially joining the Euro over ten years ago, there is still up to “€300m worth of punts are still unclaimed for” according to the Central Bank of Ireland. While many of the unclaimed coins and notes probably haven’t changed much in value, some of the more rare pieces have skyrocketed in price today.
For example, the 1985 copper-colored 20p piece that depicts a horse could be worth at least €10,000 in auction. Similarly, the 1992 10p coin could bring in between €5,000 and €10,000. Both of these coins were only produced in very small quantities, making them rare today.
"It's their very scarcity that makes them so collectable," says Mike Kelly, one of Ireland's foremost coin collectors and numismatic experts, speaking to the Irish Independent. "The fact that anomalies like those coins exist gets collectors really excited.”