Modern minting technology minimizes the number of error coins, with safeguards to reduce the creation of such errors, and to increase the likelihood that, when made, they are discovered and removed before entering the coinage supply.

For these reasons, a triple-struck 2015 Australian dollar was an eye-catcher among the items being offered in International Auction Galleries’ March 20 and 21 sale, the firm’s 93rd.

The error is in Uncirculated condition, according to the auction house based in Queensland, Australia.

Doubling of the design and lettering is present.

Based on the auction house images, Mike Diamond, Coin World columnist, said that, “This Australian 1 dollar coin doesn’t seem to present any mysteries. The obverse die (Queen’s bust) was the hammer die. The coin received at least two closely-spaced, well-centered strikes. The first strike occurred in a partially deployed collar (a partial collar error). I suspect the subsequent strike(s) occurred out of collar (a broadstrike).”

That explains two of the strikes, but the third one is more mysterious, at first glance, he said, until seeing the coin’s edge.

“The edge of the coin may have been nicked by the dies after these strikes were completed,” according to Diamond. “In other words, a final, far off-center strike.”

Among U.S. coins, such errors are well represented, although by no means common, Diamond told Coin World. “I don’t know how common they are among Australian coins. A similar error on a U.S. coin would not sell for as much as this one is estimated to realize,” he said.

Diamond said, “A Sacagawea, Native American, or Presidential dollar with a similar error would struggle to break $1,000. Lower denominations would be worth considerably less than that.”

The Australian dollar error has an estimate of $2,200 to $2,400 Australian ($1,714 to $1,870 U.S.).

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