At first glance, the 1927-S Buffalo Nickel might not strike unassuming collectors as particularly scarce. After all, its price in the grades of Good through Fine are only a little stronger than for examples in similar grades from other dates. And with the issue’s mintage of 3,430,000 the coin doesn’t necessarily scream “rarity,” at least not as compared to a half-dozen business strikes in the series with mintages squarely below 2 million.
Yet, if there’s anything a seasoned collector knows about rarity, the story isn’t always in the mintage – it’s in the population or estimated number of survivors. Perhaps this goes double for pre-Great Depression U.S. coins from the San Francisco Mint, which became notorious among collectors for its many subpar strikes, particularly those produced during the 1910s and 1920s.
That was the case with the 1927-S Buffalo Nickel, a rather common coin in grades of Fine or lower but relatively scarce from the Very Fine threshold on up. The issue is decidedly rare in the Mint State realm, and in MS65 it’s exceeded in rarity by just a handful of other Buffalo Nickels, including the 1920-S, 1925-S, and 1926-S.
Values for the 1927-S Buffalo Nickel start at less than $10 for well-worn examples in the Good to Very Good range, but prices quickly ascend from there. In VF20, the 1927-S becomes a $50 coin, and in grades of XF40 retail values approach $150. Prices for any Mint State example camp out in the thousands, with an MS63 setting collectors back by nearly $3,000.
Top-tier specimens in grades of MS64 or better are the territory of top PCGS Set Registry members who are building sets that incorporate Buffalo Nickels. Currently, only one example has been graded by PCGS in the grade of MS66, and such a specimen has an estimated value of around $90,000.