I think Ambani (the Indian billionaire) actually made some of his money in early fays melting down coins, and did it at such a scale government officials had to investigate what was going on
Interesting side story: for centuries coins were intentionally made to have a ribbed side surface because otherwise people would sand/cut off the sides and sell the obtained metal.
Nowadays coins are usually not made of pure and/or very valuable metals, but the notches have stayed to help impaired people and automatic identification of coins.
