In recent years, the market of Chinese coins has seen an unprecedented boom, becoming one of the most sought-after areas of coin collecting in the world as well as one of the most lucrative ones. With every new auction, world records are broken, prices realized are soaring into millions of pounds, new varieties are recorded and the utmost rarities are coming to the market more than ever before. The interest in Chinese coins shows no signs of abating and even the issues that are considered very common and minted in huge quantities are now reaching very competitive prices.
Caveats in collecting Chinese coins
The coinage of China has a history of 2,500 years and for the purposes of this article we will be focusing on the period from the last Qing Emperor Puyi to the dawn of the Republic of China. A great variety of coins was produced during this period, with a lot of experimentation in utilizing national symbols and portraiture as the country was going through a political and economic shift, as well as challenges from other countries. These are some of the most
