The back side of the Iraqi 100 dinar (top) and five dinar bills. View Slideshow 
The Iraqi dinar -- a currency so hyper-inflated as to be virtually worthless in the real world -- is gaining fresh value among collectors.
In the three weeks since the start of war in Iraq, sellers of bank notes have seen a surge in demand from collectors for currency containing images of Saddam Hussein.
On websites of currency dealers and on eBay, merchants say prices, particularly for higher-denomination bank notes, have increased appreciably even as the actual buying power of the dinar continues to decline.
George Lindgren, who sells bank notes on eBay, calls it the Saddam dinar bubble.
"The day I saw President Bush announce they would be sending in the troops, the bids on my dinars went ballistic," said Lindgren, who runs multiple auctions each day on eBay. Over the last three weeks, Lindgren said he has been receiving more than 1,000 dinar-related e-mails a day and has slept no more than a few hours each night.
"I have literally spent almost all day bagging and tagging these little dictator notes," Lindgren said in an e-mail.
Although prices for dinars vary markedly from auction to auction, one constant is that collectors are willing to pay substantially more than market value.
In one case, Lindgren said he received $71.48 for a 100 dinar note containing a picture of Saddam. On the black market, he estimated that 100 dinars would be worth around 7 cents.
On several other recent auctions, bidders agreed to pay more than $20 for Iraqi bills that, by estimated black market rates, would be worth less than a dime.
Dinar values also bear little correlation to published exchange rates. One recent exchange listing, for example, showed one dinar as equivalent to $3.
Lindgren says these posted rates are meaningless, since major exchanges halted trading in dinars months ago. The U.S. Treasury lists the dinar as worth nothing.
Collectors think otherwise.
While low-denomination Saddam notes have some souvenir value, prices are far higher for older Iraqi currency, said Audrius Tomonis, a currency collector who runs the website Banknotes.com. A one dinar note from 1931 that contains a picture of Iraq's King Faisal II as a child, for example, retails for $600.
Still, it's hard to get away from Saddam currency, largely because there's so much of it. On the Iraq section of his website, Tomonis has nine samples of currency with Saddam pictures, and only four without them. To fetch top dollar, Tomonis says bank notes should be both rare and in good condition.
Tomonis says it's common to see increased speculation in a nation's currency during times of upheaval. In the period following the collapse of the former Soviet Union, Tomonis, a native of Lithuania, saw many collectors profit by selling currency from the Communist era.
For Iraq, the departure of Saddam will almost certainly result in the issuance of new currency that doesn't contain his mustachioed mug. Whether much of the old currency retains value among collectors will depend on how much is saved and how much is destroyed.
For serious collectors, Tomonis recommends buying rarer, high-denomination notes and looking for dinar bills produced in Switzerland, where he believes the printing is of highest quality.
Many eBay merchants, meanwhile, market their dinars more as curiosities than as potentially valuable heirlooms. One calls the Saddam-embossed bill a "great conversation piece," noting that a piece of paper valued a few years ago at $380 is now "worth less than a share of Enron."
Lindgren, for his part, says he is hoping to sell his stack of currency before interest fizzles and the Iraqi dinar mania goes the way of previous speculative bubbles.
"How much is a Pokemon worth today? Or a Nasdaq index? Yes, there is a Saddam dinar bubble," he said.
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