FRANKFURT With the euro to replace 12 national currencies of the euro zone in just five months, market prices for collectable Deutsche mark coins are soaring to dizzy heights as collectors scramble to buy the rarest examples of their well-loved currency.

"Germans are the biggest coin collectors in the world after the Americans," said Ralf Kurbach, owner of an antique coin shop in Wetter, Northern Germany, AFP reported.

There are nearly two million coin collectors in Germany, including an estimated 200,000 who are "ready to pay at least 200 euros (176 dollars) each month for their passion," Kurbach said.

The numbers give an idea of just how fierce the battle is for the last-remaining examples of a currency so closely tied to Germany's post-war self-esteem.

"Collectors will have to complete their collections of Deutsche marks before January 1, 2002," said Sigmar Milchen, a member of the Association of German Coin Dealers, MDM.

"The value of some coins has risen by around 40 percent in the past year," said Tobias Honscha, a young collector and dealer who set up his own website for buying and selling coins, muenzen.net.

A one-mark coin from 1950 in good condition could fetch up to 800 euros.

Such dream dividends and nostalgia for the disappearing Deutsche mark has also caught the interest of people who previously weren't active collectors, dealers said.

"Germans have very strong links with the Deutsche mark," Kurbach noted.

"We're very attached to it. It's a national symbol, synonymous with the renewal and prosperity of post-war germany," he said.

Such sentiment was no doubt behind the remarkable success of the new commemorative one-mark gold coins, minted by the Bundesbank at the end of July.

Priced at 250 marks (128 euros), the limited edition of one million coins was sold out within days of its issue.

Other sectors have also sought to cash in on the interest.

Faw, the Association of External Advertisers, the umbrella organisation responsible for billboards and advertising columns in German towns and cities, chose the topic of collectable coins for its latest self-promotional campaign.

Without consulting the collectors themselves, the campaign suggested Germans take a second look at any coins in their pockets in case there were any rare or valuable coins among them.

The campaign appeared to work, a fact which faw said proved the efficacy of external advertising, because dealers and collectors were subsequently swamped with phone calls from the general public.

But Tobias Honscha found the campaign "ridiculous".

"You have about as much chance as finding a valuable coin in your purse as you do winning the lotto," he said.

Honscha was also dismissive of the Deutsche mark's successor, the single currency, which he said would be "a collector's nightmare."

And along with many of his compatriots, he was opposed to the euro itself.

"The euro is as weak as it looks," he said.

A recent survey showed that up to 60 percent of Germans don't want the euro.

But Milchen at MDM was more pragmatic.

"Soon, it'll be the euro that we're collecting," he predicted.