The Most Valuable Stamp in the World

Ever want to know what the most valuable stamp in the world is? Well, it is the “Treskilling” Yellow. If this stamp was a steak and its value was based on how much it costs per pound, as of 2004 the Treskilling Yellow would have cost you about 35 billion dollars per pound!

The Treskilling Yellow is a stamp that was one of Sweden’s first stamps. It was printed in 1855 as part of a set of a five stamp series that depicted the Swedish coat of arms. These stamps had values from 3 to 24 skillings (a denomination of Swedish money similar to the British shilling). What is unusual about this stamp is that most other 3-skilling stamps of this age were blue-green in color. The 8-skilling stamp was the one that was yellowish orange.

No one is sure what happened, but people suspect that the 8-skilling printing plate either was broken or got damaged and the 3-skilling plate was used in its place, resulting in 3-skilling stamps that were yellowish-orange instead of blue-green. No one knows how many of these “mistake” color stamps were printed. In fact no one even noticed the 3-sikilling stamps had a strange color. In 1858 the stamp design was changed and plates retired.

It was not until 1886 that a stamp collector going through his grandmother’s attic found one and sold it to a dealer for 7 Kronor (which is like the British coin called the Crown). In1894 another collector bought it for almost 1,000 times that amount because by that time, although people had looked for more, no others were ever found and this was the only surviving stamp of its kind.

The last time the stamp was sold, if it went up for sale today, it would probably fetch $2.5 million dollars!! Talk about a good investment!