King Charles coin is selling for 400 times its value - do you have one in your change

A coin featuring King Charles has taken the top spot as the rarest in circulation in the UK, and can be sold for 400 times its face value - so keep an eye on your change to see if you have one

Most of the time, when we pull our change out of our pockets or wallets to pay for a coffee, parking, or to help out someone in need, a lot of us don't even really look at the coins themselves. Particularly as people use contactless payments more and more, we think even less about the coins in our change jars or in the depths of our handbags, but sometimes you might actually have a bit of a goldmine in your pocket because rare coins can be worth far more than you think.

The Royal Mint quite often issues special coins - these can mark special occasions, like the King's birthday or coronation, notable public figures, or landmark political events, like Brexit. But these aren't the only coins that can end up being worth more than their face value.

A few factors generally go into a coin's value to collectors, with a low mintage being a major one. When a low number of coins were ever minted, it means that's it pretty rare, and die-hard coin collectors will search high and low for them. Another big factor is if there are any errors on the coin - for instance, a spelling mistake, or something is missing from the design. The Royal Mint doesn't generally make that many minting errors, which makes a coin in circulation with one seriously valuable to rare.

One coin, in particular, has become increasingly valuable recently - and the 50p coin featuring King Charles has been sold for more than 400 times its value. The coin in question features Atlantic Salmon on what we would traditionally call the 'tails' side of the coin, and only 200,000 of them were ever minted.

It knocked the Kew Gardens 50p coin off the top spot, which had held strong as the rarest and most sought-after coin for an impressive 15 years.

The Kew Garden coin had seen a mintage of 210,000, so that's 10,000 more out there than the 50 pence pieces featuring Atlantic Salmon. According to the Islington Gazette, there is a reason that 50p coins are so often the most valuable out there: the 27mm size of the coins means there is more room to include artistic designs on the tails side. The newspaper reports that one of the Atlantic Salmon coins recently sold for a whopping £195 on eBay, so it's well worth checking out the 50p coins in your home to see if you have one.

The Royal Mint has said about the Atlantic Salmon coin becoming the rarest out there: "The releasing of mintage figures is an eagerly anticipated event among the coin collecting community – and this year is particularly exciting as we reveal the Atlantic Salmon as the rarest 50p in circulation. For the first time in 15 years, the highly collectable Kew Gardens 50p loses its top spot as the rarest in circulation with the Atlantic Salmon 50p splashing its way to number one.

2023 marked pivotal changes for the nation's coinage, including the introduction of coins celebrating King Charles III's coronation entering circulation. Finding these special designs, like the Atlantic Salmon, in your change is a win for all collectors."

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