A rare 50p coin from 2009 has sold for nearly £200 - and there are still some in circulation.
Darren James said he felt 'shocked' when bids started to come in for the iconic botanical coin. The coin was released in 2009 to mark 250 years since Kew Gardens opened in 1759 and the Royal Mint estimate around 210,000 were made.
It features the famous Chinese Pagoda at the Royal Botanic Garden on the tails side with Queen Elizabeth II's face on the other. Darren, from Plymouth, put the sought-after coin on eBay after purchasing the 50p for around £80 a couple of years ago.
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Darren, 34, said following a Google search he learned that people were buying the 2009 coin for an "astronomical' price. On the last day of the coin being on eBay about 200 people were watching the sale and were bidding on it.
Darren told Plymouth Live: "I bought the coin at the height of the craze when people were collecting 50ps and I also collected some of the Olympic ones. I bought it for quite a high price, about £80 at the time, and I thought I would just throw it in the back of the cupboard.
"When I saw an advert about to 'check your change' for rare coins, I thought I would Google the coin I had and realised people were buying them for an astronomical amount and gave mine a go."
Asked how he felt when the coin sold for £186.11, he said: "Brilliant. It was a bit of a shock because it was a bit of a panic bid towards the end and the starting price was much lower than what I sold it for. Within the last five minutes of the sale closing, the price just rocketed through the roof.
"It was bid after bid after bid - my phone went nuts. I went from two or three people watching it to the last day of it being sold to nearly 200 people watching it. I don't understand how people got their bids in so quickly.
"Definitely check your change. If you have got anything lying around which is a bit unusual or bespoke I would get it checked and see if it's worth anything. There are people out there who buy these coins for astronomical prices. It's a bit ridiculous - but hey ho."
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