Max Hockley

00:02 so max Hockley we're so happy to have 00:05 you as our second guest on the everyday 00:07 enthusiast series you are a coin 00:08 collector a numismatist a word I'm so 00:12 figuring out in a youtube host with 00:14 70,000 subscribers more than that I 00:16 think 72 last time I checked it's like I 00:18 remember I checked on Friday and I just 00:20 checked a couple days I'm like okay wow 00:21 he has more subscribers just within a 00:23 couple days that's kind of crazy but we 00:25 met you back at the National money show 00:27 in Atlanta right yeah yeah and so was 00:30 that your first time attending that joke 00:32 it was my first time attending that show 00:34 I originally was from New York and I do 00:37 business in Atlanta I went to business 00:38 school in Atlanta and I still have a 00:40 company there so I'm frequently there 00:42 first time ever going to that show and 00:45 it was really fun 00:46 had a lot of interesting experiences and 00:49 you were there doing videos for your 00:51 channel right like filming concept were 00:52 you talking to vendors and seeing their 00:54 collections and stuff yeah I mean 00:57 basically my my goal of the show was 00:59 just to go from vendor to vendor and ask 01:02 them if they would share the most 01:03 unusual or unique piece that they had 01:06 with my audience because a lot of my 01:09 audience they're young kids that are 01:11 just getting into it or they're people 01:13 that live anywhere in the world whether 01:16 it's Nebraska or the Philippines they 01:19 don't necessarily have a coin store 01:20 right near them so it would be nice to 01:22 sort of be able to get them exposed to 01:24 things they wouldn't see otherwise when 01:26 you went to that show was there like a 01:28 specific coin that you really wanted to 01:30 like get your eyes on or was it just 01:32 kind of like a free-for-all like 01:33 whatever you see there you guys see or 01:34 was there something you really had your 01:36 heart set on for that event well no it 01:39 was it was totally up in the air and I 01:42 was excited about that because I also 01:43 want them to discover things and when 01:45 you go to a coin show you really have no 01:47 clue what you'll find I mean some of the 01:49 highlights in the video that I produced 01:51 with from that event included coins that 01:55 were made out of a rubber which were 01:57 kind of experimental from the late 1800s 02:00 super interesting and all sorts of other 02:02 very unusual and unique Bank node's 02:05 coins and even gold and silver bullion 02:07 because you're not just a quite like you 02:10 you also collect like currency and paper 02:12 bills and stuff like that 02:13 yeah I'm traditionally more of a coin 02:16 collector but I have been dipping my 02:18 toes more recently into paper money as 02:21 well 02:22 and I'm kind of hooked because it is a 02:24 bigger canvas for the art and I'm more 02:27 I'm very into all of this because of the 02:31 aesthetic beauty in addition to sort of 02:32 the the financial side a wrapper coin 02:36 Wow and I'm so like obviously that would 02:39 be before the you know use of metals but 02:42 those kind of you know materials being 02:45 used for coins like what is the weirdest 02:47 material you've seen other than maybe 02:49 rubber that's been used for you know 02:51 coin or money or currency is there 02:54 anything that's like a even weirder 02:56 material than rubber yes definitely so I 03:00 mean in terms of stuff like that there's 03:02 always experimentation going on 03:04 especially in the earlier days with 03:06 different types of materials because 03:08 materials are scarce even more modern 03:11 during World War two the most famous 03:12 example of experimentation with money 03:16 materials was during World War Two the 03:18 pennies in 1943 instead of copper which 03:22 was needed for the war effort 03:23 they were swapped out for steel so there 03:25 are steel cents and they're basically 03:27 gray looking instead of the copper that 03:29 were familiar with but I would say in 03:32 terms of the most unusual thing I've 03:34 seen this is on a more modern 03:36 commemorative coin and it was more done 03:38 as art but there was actually Venetian 03:41 glass that was embedded into the coin as 03:44 a little miniature piece of art within a 03:46 silver coin what was it commemorating or 03:49 was it just was it from the US Mint or 03:52 is it just a coin that a company put out 03:54 camera Morita de bent I'm blanking on 03:58 what country was from it was a foreign 04:00 commemorative coin and I believe it was 04:02 celebrating the art of that particular 04:04 artist Oh so for the National money show 04:09 we're just have a couple minutes ago the 04:11 probably done your well below the median 04:13 age of these shows and it seems very 04:15 very important to coin collectors to 04:18 pass this passion on to the next 04:20 generation you know a very analog 04:23 interest in this digital world and 04:26 obviously you with your YouTube 04:27 channel you're trying to you know pass 04:29 that on to the next generation have you 04:31 guys seen any progress with that have 04:33 you seen that growing in popularity over 04:34 the past few years definitely I would 04:38 say that when I first joined YouTube I 04:40 actually defined YouTube in 2011 and 04:42 posts my first video about coins and it 04:45 was a completely different world online 04:47 then I mean there were almost no 04:50 youtubers or creators in general that 04:53 were making content about coins there 04:55 was very little on the internet about 04:57 coins that was produced by anybody under 04:59 the age of 50 and now I mean I am one of 05:02 the bigger coin collecting channels on 05:04 YouTube but there are still a few others 05:06 that are larger than me and there are a 05:08 few that are in the hundreds of 05:09 thousands of subscribers which sort of 05:11 just shows that there are a lot of 05:13 people out there that are interested in 05:14 this that you may not see in real life 05:17 that coin stores or coin shows but your 05:20 spining them online and that's kind of 05:22 what my goal is with my channel which is 05:24 to I always say my goal and mission of 05:27 the channel is to inform educate and 05:29 entertain people about coin collecting 05:31 and precious metals investing I also do 05:33 some personal finance stuff but the idea 05:36 is with inform I want people who are not 05:39 necessarily interested in coins just to 05:41 know about it to know that it's out 05:42 there and to know that there's some 05:43 value in it the educate side is for 05:46 people that are interested I want to 05:48 provide them with information that they 05:50 might not be able to get because they 05:52 live in a rural town that doesn't have 05:54 any resources for coin collectors or 05:56 they live in a different country I 05:58 actually have a surprising number of 05:59 subscribers that live in the Philippines 06:01 and if they want to learn about American 06:03 coinage there's not that much resources 06:05 over there and then in terms of 06:07 entertainment I mean it is a YouTube 06:09 channel so the goal is I want people to 06:12 enjoy themselves and make the Hobby 06:13 fought so I want more people to be 06:16 interested in it to be aware of it to 06:18 have fun doing it and grow the hobby now 06:23 so for you in particular how did this 06:25 hobby begin for you like was there a 06:27 relative and passed this on to you or 06:29 how did this spark for you so there's 06:32 sort of like two phases of the silver 06:35 picker creation story one is when I was 06:39 a little kid 06:40 I was very interested in collecting in 06:42 general I kind of collected everything I 06:44 collected you know seashells I collected 06:48 pocket knives when I got a little bit 06:49 older I collected books all sorts of 06:52 stuff and when I was a little kid my dad 06:54 pulled out the coin collection that he 06:57 had from when he was a kid and started 06:59 showing it to me and he wanted to teach 07:00 me more about geography and history and 07:03 all sorts of other things that you learn 07:05 from foreign coins especially and I got 07:08 really into it but as like many hobbies 07:11 of kids do they it just sort of fell by 07:13 the wayside by the time I got to 07:15 certainly by the time I got to high 07:16 school but probably even before that and 07:18 it wasn't until years later when I was 07:21 in college that I got back into it and 07:23 the story is kind of ridiculous 07:25 I had a an eccentric friend let's put it 07:29 that way who I lived it and he comes in 07:31 one Sunday evening while the rest of us 07:33 are sitting and watching TV and he 07:35 throws a wad of hundreds down on the 07:38 table now we're like a bunch of broke 07:40 college students and we go what the heck 07:42 is going on and you know eventually you 07:46 know we try not to give him the we 07:48 probably try not to like feed into his 07:50 into his ego and ask him about it but 07:52 eventually curiosity got the better of 07:54 this and we said okay what is going on 07:57 and this was in around 2010-2011 when 08:01 gold and silver were kind of at their 08:03 peak and he said that he started 08:04 learning about gold silver and coins and 08:06 started going to garage sales and buying 08:09 up all the jewelry that was sitting 08:11 there you know 50 cents apiece finding 08:13 the ones that were actual real gold and 08:15 reselling them for literally thousands 08:17 of dollars so I said you got to teach me 08:21 how to do this and with a little bit of 08:23 cajoling and and a couple of three pies 08:25 of pizza he taught me how to do it and 08:28 instead of getting like a normal summer 08:30 job or an internship that my friends 08:32 were doing I hit the garage sale and 08:34 FreeMarkets circuit that summer and I 08:36 made a lot more than any of my friends 08:38 that had quote-unquote real jobs and I 08:41 do a lot of the the the precious metal 08:44 stuff the jewelry stuff but I sort of 08:47 found and hit my stride when it came to 08:49 coins because I was fascinated to buy it 08:51 I started buying lots of coins from 08:53 people 08:54 them for a profit but notice thing that 08:57 every so often I would take one and say 08:59 you know what I'm gonna hold on to that 09:00 I'm gonna hold on to that and before I 09:02 knew it I had a coin collection and I 09:04 was an official numismatist that's so 09:07 funny 09:08 Wow now so people were just sitting on 09:10 Treasury didn't realize that were they 09:12 aware when they were at these garage 09:14 sales that you know there's selling 09:16 pieces that were worth far more or like 09:18 how do I getting that obviously on these 09:20 coin collections I didn't know how much 09:21 they were worth well some yes some no 09:23 and this is actually a good point to 09:26 sort of tell you about my personal like 09:29 business ethics when it comes to this 09:33 kind of stuff my feeling is that if 09:35 somebody who's an adult in full full 09:38 mental abilities decides to take 09:40 something from their house have a garage 09:42 so I'll put it outside put price on it 09:44 there's ten thousand shows there's 09:46 storage wars there's Pawn Stars there's 09:50 I mean Antiques Roadshow has been on the 09:52 air for like thirty years so if you 09:55 decide not to do the research and you 09:57 put something out you put a price tag on 09:59 it I will happily buy it for that price 10:01 whether it's fifty cents for a gold ring 10:03 worth five hundred dollars 10:05 I'm gonna I'm gonna buy it however if I 10:08 go to somebody and they say what are you 10:10 looking for and I say well I'm a coin 10:12 collector do you have any old coins and 10:14 they go back into their house and bring 10:16 something out that they weren't planning 10:17 on selling then I make sure to tell them 10:20 exactly what it's worth and what my 10:22 offer is and I think that that's 10:24 reasonable if they weren't planning on 10:26 selling it and didn't have time to 10:27 research it I'm gonna give them a more 10:30 than fair deal than they'd get at any 10:32 coin store or a pawn shop or anything 10:34 like that but hey if you put a treasure 10:37 out and want to sell 50 Cent's I'm gonna 10:41 be a happy happy camper that sounds fair 10:45 to me that's the beauty of capitalism am 10:46 i right I would say have been some 10:52 instances where I've been at a garage 10:53 sale where somebody wants to sell me 10:55 their coins and you know sometimes you 10:59 just don't have the heart to buy a 200 11:01 dollar coin for 50 Cent's if it's you 11:04 know the classic little old lady that 11:06 doesn't know it 11:06 and that has happened before in those 11:09 cases I'll say I can't pay you 50 cents 11:11 for this this coin is where at the 50 11:12 bucks and then we usually strike some 11:15 kind of deal 11:15 and I still get a great deal on it so 11:17 it's all good that's so interesting and 11:21 I think that's a really fair you know 11:22 way to you know make a delineation point 11:25 it's like hey if you're putting it out 11:26 there right I can't help it so you said 11:31 something earlier that kind of sparked 11:33 my mind is there a specific like country 11:35 I mean American coinage maybe is the 11:36 most popular but is there a specific 11:38 country where numismatists really try to 11:41 you know get the coinage in that 11:42 country's America the most popular is 11:44 England your game coins I think it 11:47 depends on the goal of the collector so 11:49 within this community especially on 11:51 YouTube there is kind of a line and the 11:55 line is blurred between what are called 11:57 coin collectors and precious metals 12:00 stackers or silver stackers and there's 12:02 a big crossover but if your goal is to 12:05 collect because you love the coins you 12:07 love the history you love the beauty 12:09 then you're gonna collect what you want 12:11 and if you are from Canada you might be 12:14 into Canadian coins if you are from 12:16 Israel you're gonna collect Israeli 12:18 coins whatever you choose that's you're 12:20 gonna collect but if you're collecting 12:23 as an investment like you're collecting 12:25 as a silver stacker 12:26 where your goal is just to have the most 12:29 precious metals in your stack as you can 12:31 and then eventually either resell it or 12:34 just hold onto it for a rainy day or is 12:36 it or a hedge against inflation with a 12:39 US currency you're gonna want the most 12:41 liquid assets you can have and because 12:45 US coins are trusted and they are 12:48 identifiable and they are well known 12:51 most people do want as sort of the gold 12:55 standard of of coins so American Silver 12:59 Eagles for instance are the bullion coin 13:02 produced by the United States government 13:04 still today for investors and those are 13:07 one of the most popular bullion coins 13:10 available interesting so just like start 13:14 wrapping things up a couple questions 13:16 what is the rarest coin that you have in 13:18 your collection 13:19 the rarest coin it is hard to say you 13:23 know rarity comes from a few different 13:25 things you know you know you can say 13:26 something's rare because only a few of 13:28 them that had been produced I mean I 13:30 have some coins that have a production 13:32 run of like 200 but they're not that 13:34 exciting they're there they were made 13:36 for work collectors as collectors items 13:38 but then there are other coins that were 13:41 produced in the millions but many of 13:43 them have been destroyed over the years 13:45 or have been lost to the sands of time 13:46 or have been lost the sands of time 13:49 except in really really bad shape so if 13:51 you have a good condition one then it 13:53 could be very rare I would say that a 13:55 combination of my rarest and most 13:58 favorite coin is what is called a US 14:01 trade dollar so back in the day in the 14:04 mid-1800s silver coins were the monetary 14:08 unit of trade around the world so if you 14:10 were trading goods in Asia you would 14:13 literally bring boxes and boxes full of 14:15 the silver coins but the u.s. silver 14:18 dollar was slightly smaller than the 14:21 Spanish rial which was sort of at the 14:23 time the gold standard or I guess you 14:25 could say a silver standard around the 14:27 world so the u.s. created a new silver 14:31 dollar called the trade dollar 14:33 exclusively intended to be used in trade 14:35 with Asia and other country and other 14:38 regions in the world and it was a little 14:41 bit larger and had a different design 14:44 and the coolest part is that once those 14:46 silver coins would make their way to 14:48 Asia it would be inspected by the 14:50 merchants there and they'd be stamped 14:52 with Chinese characters to show that 14:54 they have been approved and mine has 14:57 three or four different what they're 14:59 called chop marks different Chinese 15:01 characters on them and I find that 15:04 fascinating some people say that it 15:07 decreases the value others say that it 15:09 increases the value to me it just makes 15:12 it super unique and the fact that it's a 15:14 monetarily valuable coin today and it's 15:18 super interesting historically that 15:19 covers all the bases for me know 15:24 obviously with the coronavirus 15:26 everything happening right now there's 15:27 no money shows happening how has the 15:30 industry been affected by what's going 15:32 on 15:33 right now it is bananas absolutely Manas 15:37 and specifically with silver coins 15:40 meaning coins that are for collectors 15:42 only the market hasn't shifted that much 15:45 but in terms of silver coins for the 15:48 silver stackers and precious metals 15:50 investors it has gone absolutely bananas 15:52 believe it or not almost the entire 15:55 supply of investable silver was sold out 16:00 a physical investable silver so those 16:03 American Silver Eagle coins that I told 16:04 you about earlier produced by the US 16:06 government were sold out instantly and 16:09 basically every online bullion dealer 16:12 all of the bullion coins and silver bars 16:15 and gold points etc that were available 16:17 at at the market rate were basically 16:21 sold out pretty close to immediately 16:23 only the high-end really collectible 16:25 silver with very high premiums and high 16:28 costs are what's left so we're still 16:31 trying to figure out what's going on in 16:33 the market right now is that because 16:35 people were panic buying to get as much 16:37 as they could before you know it ran out 16:40 it was which is exactly what happened is 16:42 that if there I think there are two 16:44 elements and you know there's a lot of 16:47 economic theory that goes into it much 16:49 of what is which is above my head but 16:52 essentially there are two things at play 16:54 that caused it one is the panic buying 16:57 during times of national or in this case 17:00 global crisis people turn to hard money 17:03 like gold and silver as opposed to you 17:06 know national currency like the US 17:09 dollar or the yen or whatever and so 17:12 they were going in and trying to 17:13 purchase that but the same time the 17:15 silver and gold prices crashed the spot 17:18 price as it's called which is sort of 17:20 the official accepted price on the open 17:24 market or on the commodity exchange 17:26 crashed which made silver and gold 17:28 really really cheap the interesting 17:31 thing that happened is that now we're in 17:33 a position where the spot price and the 17:36 actual market price are very very 17:39 different 17:39 so normally we're a 1 ounce silver coin 17:43 would maybe have a one or two dollar 17:45 premium 17:47 over the spot price we're seeing four or 17:49 five six even ten or sometimes fifteen 17:52 dollar premiums over the actual price 17:56 the spot price now has that drought 17:59 ended like are people able to buy more 18:01 now or is that still going on it's still 18:05 going on it's still going on and little 18:07 trickles are opening up here and there 18:08 as some people sell off positions but 18:11 for the most part it's still definitely 18:14 upside down and and I haven't seen such 18:16 an upset to the market since the 18:19 aftermath of the housing crisis in 18:21 2008-2009 well because it almost it 18:23 seemed like now would be the time to 18:25 invest because obviously when everything 18:27 goes back to normal things will won't be 18:29 fluctuating up and down anymore that's 18:31 that's interesting 18:33 Wow so at a good price definitely go for 18:38 it it's just it is it is really really 18:41 hard to get your hands on physical 18:42 silver right now and then just one last 18:46 question here what do you see for the 18:48 future of coin collecting and 18:50 numismatics obviously you're doing your 18:53 part do you see you know your generation 18:56 do you think that it will be able to 18:57 really grow and continue to grow in 19:00 popularity as it has over the past few 19:02 years where do you see it in five years 19:03 so I think that there there are 19:07 definitely a lot of variables and you 19:08 know we'll have to see in five 10 20 50 19:11 years what becomes of coin collecting 19:13 but what I will say is that like I've 19:17 been talking about earlier silver 19:18 stacking I think is the single best 19:20 thing for the numismatic world because 19:23 right now because of all the turmoil and 19:25 all of the craziness that's happened in 19:27 the last decade from the financial 19:30 crisis the housing crisis - pandemic 19:32 going on right now there is a lot of 19:35 distrust in traditional currencies you 19:37 see people's outlets going towards 19:40 Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies and 19:42 of course back into the the good old 19:45 trustworthy precious metals so I think 19:48 because of that there's a lot of 19:50 interest in precious metals that's being 19:52 drummed up by these younger more savvy 19:55 and somewhat less trustful of 19:58 traditional financial tool 20:00 that is getting people interested in 20:03 silver and gold coins which then opens 20:05 up the door for that love of history and 20:09 that love of the aesthetic beauty of the 20:11 coins to really come into play as well 20:13 so I think that coin collecting is 20:16 definitely here to stay if any of the 20:18 the old guard tells you otherwise I can 20:21 tell you that's just because they're 20:22 hanging out at their local library in 20:24 the coin Club and have on YouTube and on 20:27 tick-tock and on all the places where 20:30 young people congregate now gosh that 20:33 makes me think of another question so 20:35 digital currencies crypto currencies 20:37 they're growing in popularity do you 20:40 think that they could eventually eclipse 20:42 you know hard paper currency and coins 20:44 do you think that there might be a 20:46 future where they don't exist except for 20:48 you know people who want to get a hand 20:50 on precious metals and whatnot you know 20:53 it's a if I knew the real answer to that 20:55 I would certainly be investing in lots 20:58 of different ways but I guess my 21:01 layman's opinion on cryptocurrency and 21:04 the future is that I think everything is 21:07 trending towards digital in general 21:09 contactless payments digital payments 21:12 cash I mean most people under 30 don't 21:15 even carry cash anymore and I think that 21:18 is definitely leading more towards the 21:22 cryptocurrency side however the question 21:25 for me more is I believe that 21:27 cryptocurrency is here to stay certainly 21:28 blockchain is here to stay the 21:30 technology is really innovative and it 21:33 has a lot of potential but the real 21:35 question is is Bitcoin the one that's 21:38 going to be around or is Bitcoin gonna 21:41 be like blockbuster right blockbuster 21:43 was the first to get there with movies 21:45 but now it's all Netflix so we'll block 21:48 but will Bitcoin be more of a 21:50 blockbuster or will it be more of a 21:52 Netflix and I think only time will tell 21:55 on that also well thank you so much max 21:58 it was great to have you give it a hang 22:00 a plug your YouTube channel will include 22:02 everything in the info down below but 22:05 yeah thank you so much thank you you 22:07 have anything else to say yeah so if 22:09 anybody wants to learn more about 22:11 precious metal investing happen get 22:13 to buy silver and gold if you're 22:16 interested in learning about coin 22:17 collecting or if you just want to have a 22:19 good time and make a couple extra bucks 22:21 with my personal finance stuff come and 22:23 join me on silver bigger we have a lot 22:25 of fun and it is very accessible and 22:28 anyone is welcome a little good links 22:30 down below alright 22:31 awesome thank you so much max thank you 22:33 you have a good one okay thank you for 22:35 having me I had a great time