There was a posting on or about 28 August describing a buyers experience with purchasing fake coins out of China. That post and all the responses were removed for some reason as this one may be as well. During my years collecting coins I have acquired a number of fake/counterfeit US coins some where very good counterfeits and some were very bad attempts.
There are a lot of postings on eBay as well as other forums where you can identify attempts at passing off counterfeit coins simply by looking at the listing. If the price seems too good to be true it's generally a dead giveaway. Nobody sells a $1 American Eagle silver coin for $4 unless it is counterfeit or they don't know what they are doing.
While the National Coin Hobby Act allows anyone to produce copy/replica coins there are very specific standards for doing so and some producers are not following these. The following article explains some of the requirements.
https://www.sbcgold.com/blog/4-reasons-avoid-buying-replica-coins/
One of the big things with regards to eBay is while the seller may specify returns accepted if you purchase one of these coins and identify it as counterfeit or fake you are prohibited by the USPS as well as other Federal laws from sending the coin back. To do so would in fact make you as guilty of passing counterfeit coinage as the seller was when they sold the item.
One of the best counterfeit coins I ever purchased, unknowingly at the time, was a 2022 American Silver Eagle. The price was in the market range and the images looked real. Whenever I receive a coin I check the size with a micrometer and the weight with a digital scale. Both were within tolerances for this coin as was the toning for an uncirculated coin but it did not pass the sound test so I took it to a coin shop that had a metal analyzer and the coin turned out to be silver plated copper with a few other metals which is how they got the weight so close.
Because of the eBay return policy which would have required me to potentially return the item on a NAD I simply filed a NAD with my CC company and was refunded. I am in the Washington DC area so I turned the seller information and the coin over to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. The officer at the Bureau told me it's a HUGE problem and they can do little to stop it.
