Both gold bars and coins and silver bars and coins offer unique advantages for investors. Getty Images Thanks to inflation, high interest rates and overall economic uncertainty, many Americans ...

Here are some of other high-value Mexican coins based on their sale prices, according to CoinValueLookup: 1732 8 Reales: $130,000. 1823 “Pattern” 8 Reales: $120,750.

Cheap silver (it sold last week at 27⅞¢ an ounce in Manhattan) is the basis of Mexico’s money troubles. She must collect her taxes in silver, pay her foreign bills in gold.

Very few countries still mint silver coins, and those that do make them almost exclusively for collectors and investors.