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I dropped the possibility into conversation with my wife and her face left me in no doubt as to her view.........

Penny falling out of the bottom market...

Curiously parallel to my business, all this. I restore old studio recording consoles, all one make, British, from 1968 to 1980. I've collected all the parts and console bits I can find for 25+ years. The prices over the last five years have trebled, as people that can't find places to invest their cash join in the feeding frenzy, looking for investments. The good stuff rose first, followed a couple of years later, the average stuff. A nice console now can be £250K...... I'm happy, since my stock of consoles and console parts will give me a pension. However, for example, consider my stock of old audio transformers. What used to be £10 is now £250. Fantastic, you would assume, BUT I now control the world price. If I wanted to sell 300 to buy a really nice car, I would get £100 each, or less, since the _perceived_ rarity is what is keeping up the price. So- what if collectors of good rare pennies sensed that interest rates were going to rise, Swiss banks no longer charge negative interest rates......they'll sell, and all the rare stuff that has never been counted, like F169's all appear at once, and people find that there are actually 50 of them, and the new 30 are all EF+...... Either, collectors buy them up at a good price and flood the market with their old average ones, lowering the price of examples in Fine, or, the flood of EF examples lowers the price of the EF ones......... Maybe.

Talking about missing Hs, I picked up this 1876 penny recently - no trace of the H at all ! Assume a filled die given the position of the date.

Absolutely. You only have to listen to an online auction to realise that auctions have expanded from room only, to buyers from all over the world in a relatively short time.

An interesting snippet in CoinWeekly and though directed more toward the hammered penny market, nonetheless interesting and still pennies. Good to know the British coin market is attracting foreign buyers.

I am more than happy for you to do your own research and should you decide to do so ,you may well find a few more that you were not aware of.

Dave Craddock had an F169 on his stall at the Midland a couple of months ago at a grand. It was sold I think in the course of the morning, at least it was no longer in his case when I went back for a second look. I had passed it as too pricey initially but somebody seems to have bitten. However I did win the Baldwins one at £420 ie £540 ish with juice, fairly happy with that though the slab needs a polish. One I always look for on the bay. I also need an F164A but was not tempted by the Baldwins offerings. A better one will pop up eventually. Jerry

I don't know if anyone else noticed but I think St James internet bidding site was playing up or being incorrectly used by the auctioneers: eg if the opening ask was 80K, bid button should have said 80K; instead it said 85K, the next up, and the 80K "ask" was described as "80K opening bid". The absence of any bid was then confirmed when the coin end up "passed". So it wasn't the opening bid, it was the opening ask. No-one's going to bid 85K online when the coin is really available at 80K (but there was no button for that!) I think this happened quiet a few times.

I thought you might have gone for that, Richard.

I wouldn't be put off too much, Blake. The point being made here is that coins like the Gouby X, 164A, and 1903 open 3, are scarce, but not rare. Hence they aren't going to command that much of a premium in low grade. That was pretty obvious anyway. Conversely, the F169, which is rare at all grades, and I understand >20 in existence, will always secure a high price. Obviously the price will vary somewhat, due to how strongly a given example is sought after on the day, but consider these hammer prices:- Workman Nov 2010 - £1200 VG LCA 3.3.13 - £1600 NF LCA 1.9.13 - £1400 VG+ LCA 1.6.14 - £800 NF LCA 7.6.15 - £820 VG LCA 6.3.16 - £1700 VG LCA 5.6.16 - £500 VG LCA 3.6.18 - £1100 VG Baldwin of St James 12.6.19 - £420 VG

Absolutely - it appears there's nothing to stop anyone inventing a new Freeman number for an unrecorded "variety" and pulling the wool over the eyes of unsuspecting collectors not fully au fait with the range.

https://bsjauctions.auctionmobility.com/lots/view/1-1XDHDY/united-kingdom Its only SOME of the low grade varieties which have become a lot more common Blake 🙂 You only need to look at some such as these in high grade.

An interesting excerpt regarding the 1882 no H penny: When studying the Victorian bronze series it is essential to work rigidly to the principle that no new variety is acceptable unless it is entirely beyond question. Details in the designs of this series cannot be satisfactorily studied from worn coins, though, unfortunately, this is attempted by some collectors. The fact that only two really fine, undoubted examples of this penny have turned up during the nine years since this catalogue was first published is ample evidence of the scarcity of these pieces. Any worn pieces, seemingly without H, can now be re-examined in a much more favourable light. Craig tells us (The Mint, p. 335) that 'the Mint stopped work on 1 February 1882 for ten months'—for reconstruction. During this period the coining of bronze was undertaken by Heaton and it is extremely unlikely that the Mint would be in a position to strike any bronze during the January preceding this upheaval. This leaves December as the period during which these pennies without H were almost certainly struck —doubtless a small issue to tide over