The vast numbers of Morgan silver dollars along with their mint state beauty has served to make this series the single most collectible and popular coin among coin collectors.
Their wide range of dates, mint marks, conditions and varieties give lots of possibilities to collectors with diverse interests and budgets.
Morgan silver dollars are often divided into four categories.
They are: common date, semi-common date, semi-key date, and key date examples.
The lower condition examples generally serve as silver bullion, or a place to start a coin collection.
That's where I started collecting coins.
Once an appreciation of Morgans sets in, the beginning collector often takes the next step and starts looking for the least expensive, most common, BU coins.
These are the most frequently traded and are the most liquid of the entire series.
There are millions of BU and circulated Morgan dollars available at affordable prices to the collector.
If Morgans weren't so generally affordable, I suspect there would be a lot less interest in owning them.
Semi-common MS dates appeal to the more advanced collector.
Their higher price makes them less affordable to more people, and their prices are slightly more volatile.
They are better investments than common date and yet still fairly liquid.
Semi-key date BU examples are often added to collections when they are finally found at the right price.
They are usually only sold to upgrade the collection.
They are often held for the long term and trade less frequently.
Key date Morgans are actively sought by both collectors and investors alike.
Once they are found, they're rarely sold.
The best grades are usually sold at auction or private transactions.
These coins are regarded as "keepers" by their owners and rarely come to market.
Surprisingly enough, some of the semi-key dates are among issues with well over a million coins originally struck.
Their semi-key status comes from the number surviving in mint state condition.
Therefore original mintage figures don't mean as much in determining rarity as the survivors.
The lack of government records regarding the great melts makes it even more difficult to determine potential date/mint mark rarity.
As certified populations of Morgans reach the point where grading them doesn't significantly increase their value, more accurate estimates of rarity will evolve.
Fewer and fewer hoards are coming to market as the years pass, and will continue to be less frequent in the future.
Several dates lost their rarity status in the 1960's and 70's when the government released their stash of silver dollars to the public.
These dates include the 1903-O, 1898-O, 1904-O, and of course the many BU Carson City releases.
Determining surviving date numbers is an inexact science at best.
We all know that resubmissions and slab crack outs skew the TPG population numbers.
But for now, Third Party Grading population reports are all we have to rely on for the Morgan silver dollar census.
An actual estimate of coins available is separate from the rare coin market, which only measures the supply in relation to demand.
The market gives a general indication of rarity, but not the actual census numbers.
As time goes by, and things in the silver dollar world settle out, there will be less activity that disrupts the population numbers.
Rarity estimates will become more accurate, and another piece of the numismatic puzzle closer to being in place.