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Chris Perkins

What's the coin market been doing?

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I just wondered if I could get some opinions from collectors of post 1797 coinage about what they think the market has been doing with their collecting area over the last year.

What's gone up, what's stayed the same and what's still undervalued etc?

I need to do the price update in CCGB2008.

Thanks.

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This forum was only opened to pre-approved members, but now should work for everyone! Thanks for pointing that out Colin.

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I am not so consumed with what the market has done, as what it will do into 2008-9 with all the grey clouding on the horizon economically in the USA because of the greedy and under-regulated home lending institutions and the fools that fell for it. Also the downturn in the dollar has a pricing affect even for British material, more than the continental coinages because there are more collectors of British material here in N. American than anywhere outside of Britain. Remember the Gold Offa Penny that was owned by Alan Davisson, a Minnesotan? The dollars destitution of late has rather cooled my interest in many things from Europe, Australia etc. because the prices are easily 40% higher now when I factor in dollar purchases for stuff priced in foreign currency, such as €uros, Sterling, or Canadian $. It is not just myself but many collectors are feeling the pinch of the soft dollar.

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I think farthings on the whole have remained fairly steady. Bronze farthings seem to be fairly steady, but I would say that copper farthings prices seem to be rising slightly faster. Some dates that definitely need updating are:

1843 3 over 2 much rarer than price guides suggest, the Colin Cooke one sold for £100 in GF and I am unaware of any others even reaching auction.

1851 D Over D again very much underpriced, I would say this is much rarer than the 1844, but I suppose there are more date collectors than variety collectors. Again I am unaware of any making it to auction, and the Colin Cooke example hit 4 figures in AUNC condition.

1859 - Recent examples have been selling well and I would now put this as the joint second most expensive date in the copper series. 1844 first, 1849 and 1859 in joint second with 1855 WWR next.

Chris,

Is this the sort of info you were after or something more general? :blink:

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I just wondered if I could get some opinions from collectors of post 1797 coinage about what they think the market has been doing with their collecting area over the last year.

What's gone up, what's stayed the same and what's still undervalued etc?

I need to do the price update in CCGB2008.

Thanks.

Chris,

A little help with what is undervalued...I think the1845, 1846 and 1849 Victoria pennies, are way under the market valued in the CCGB, if you can find one. I just bid at the London Coin Auction on a EF+ 1849 with an estimated Value 1100 to 1400 pounds. I bid the high end at 1400, but the coin went for 2100! As for the 1846, I have still yet to find one for sale! These low mintage Victoria's have got to be classics, with the low mintage, and the market getting bigger for them. IMHO!

Bob C.

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I just wondered if I could get some opinions from collectors of post 1797 coinage about what they think the market has been doing with their collecting area over the last year.

What's gone up, what's stayed the same and what's still undervalued etc?

I need to do the price update in CCGB2008.

Thanks.

Chris,

A little help with what is undervalued...I think the1845, 1846 and 1849 Victoria pennies, are way under the market valued in the CCGB, if you can find one. I just bid at the London Coin Auction on a EF+ 1849 with an estimated Value 1100 to 1400 pounds. I bid the high end at 1400, but the coin went for 2100! As for the 1846, I have still yet to find one for sale! These low mintage Victoria's have got to be classics, with the low mintage, and the market getting bigger for them. IMHO!

Bob C.

I was also willing to go to £1400 on that one. The scratch at 10-11 o'clock on the reverse was a turn off., but if I remember correctly, it was a postal bid that won, so maybe they didn't pick it up. That one was a bit overpriced IMHO.

Re the 1846 you may be right in saying it is more difficult to acquire than the book would suggest. 15 months ago I put one on ebay in fairly dire condition - say good fine, with a feeling of guilt starting it at £20 and it made £66 which surprised me somewhat.

Edited by Rob

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I bought from Cooke a NVF 1745 Lima 1/- for £15 in 2002...latest on sale £75 !!!!

I would also suggest any respectable Cu 1/4d's are vastly underpriced and decent grade pre 1754 very difficult.

There are so many from dealers and Ebayers overgrading...I can't believe some of the crap.

I have spares of G I which I describe as Fair which Dealers rate as VF for issue . :o and others which I wouldn't even have the cheek to sell which go for F prices.

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I bought from Cooke a NVF 1745 Lima 1/- for £15 in 2002...latest on sale £75 !!!!

I would also suggest any respectable Cu 1/4d's are vastly underpriced and decent grade pre 1754 very difficult.

There are so many from dealers and Ebayers overgrading...I can't believe some of the crap.

I have spares of G I which I describe as Fair which Dealers rate as VF for issue . :o and others which I wouldn't even have the cheek to sell which go for F prices.

The problem with ebay is that anything which isn't described as UNC or aUNC doesn't sell. I sold an aEF 1863 penny which made the princely sum of £5.11. Nothing wrong with the picture, but because I didn't overgrade it, nobody bid it up. It was subsequently called almost unc and sold for £46. That's why so many things are called almost uncirculated. It's a cop out, because you can't be accused of lying if you say almost. This covers a multitude of sins including an almost total absence of detail in many cases.

VF or any other grade for issue is total b****cks. There isn't, nor ever has been, any reason why the grade of a coin can become detached from the actual wear to the surfaces. You can have a coin struck from worn dies yet uncirculated if supporting evidence is present, but just because a coin is 200 years old doesn't mean that you can ignore the wear. That p's me off a lot too. :angry:

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Thanks for all the input so far, that's all great stuff.

You can be as generalised or as specific as you like. I find it hard to monitor everything, so this kind of discussion is very helpful.

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Just thinking how many number of high grade coins in CCGB 2007 the rough estimate of there number,what made them so very expensive not including the minor and major varieties in high grade.

Maybe CCGB 2008 will go hand in hand with the grading book of RR,maybe the next grading book will be in varieties and go hand in hand with CCGB 2008 or 2009 for predecimal experts have the source at hand.

Im in the bottom end maybe silver pre 1947.

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Thanks for all the input so far, that's all great stuff.

You can be as generalised or as specific as you like. I find it hard to monitor everything, so this kind of discussion is very helpful.

I have spent very little on coins this year (a side-effect of earning very little...). Pennies are my particular speciality and I would endorse what has been said above. It appears that many people have got close to completing their bronze penny collection and are now starting on the much, much rarer coppers. Hence, the scarcer dates are becoming ludicrously expensive. For an 1849, I would start off at £250-£300 in fine; the market moves so quickly that even that may be an underestimate, with a top end I would have thought maybe £4,000. 1843/5/6 are rarely available these days for much less than three figures. Going back a bit however, in my view most George IV/William IV pennies are holding steady with only a minimal increase - the result of previous overestimates of their value.

More generally, the gap between the best and the worst coins in the collectable range continues to widen with the better examples outstripping inflation, but the lower grades barely holding their value. In particular, the differential between EF and AU seems to be stretching out.

Still a seller's market in my opinion.

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Guest richbedforduk

I bought from Cooke a NVF 1745 Lima 1/- for £15 in 2002...latest on sale £75 !!!!

I would also suggest any respectable Cu 1/4d's are vastly underpriced and decent grade pre 1754 very difficult.

There are so many from dealers and Ebayers overgrading...I can't believe some of the crap.

I have spares of G I which I describe as Fair which Dealers rate as VF for issue . :o and others which I wouldn't even have the cheek to sell which go for F prices.

The problem with ebay is that anything which isn't described as UNC or aUNC doesn't sell. I sold an aEF 1863 penny which made the princely sum of £5.11. Nothing wrong with the picture, but because I didn't overgrade it, nobody bid it up. It was subsequently called almost unc and sold for £46. That's why so many things are called almost uncirculated. It's a cop out, because you can't be accused of lying if you say almost. This covers a multitude of sins including an almost total absence of detail in many cases.

VF or any other grade for issue is total b****cks. There isn't, nor ever has been, any reason why the grade of a coin can become detached from the actual wear to the surfaces. You can have a coin struck from worn dies yet uncirculated if supporting evidence is present, but just because a coin is 200 years old doesn't mean that you can ignore the wear. That p's me off a lot too. :angry:

Hi,

Can I respectfully suggest that you guys are very knowledgable about coins through years of research and experience. There are others who may be lacking this knowledge but still find themselves trading coins, for whatever reason, and find that they are unable to grade coins as accurately and confidently as yourselves.

Sometimes it is safer not to grade if you are unsure, it is the lesser evil. It can be very intimidating to grade a coin and put that coin and grade up before the experts, even if you take into account the fact that the experts will not always agree.

That's not to say that an overgraded coin is acceptable, but the rules of buying and selling are the same regardless of the commodity - let the buyer beware.

Ever bought a car that was unreliable? Where you told it was useless before you bought it? Thought not.

Rich

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Thanks for all the input so far, that's all great stuff.

You can be as generalised or as specific as you like. I find it hard to monitor everything, so this kind of discussion is very helpful.

More generally, the gap between the best and the worst coins in the collectable range continues to widen with the better examples outstripping inflation, but the lower grades barely holding their value. In particular, the differential between EF and AU seems to be stretching out.

Still a seller's market in my opinion.

The differential between EF and AU is probably widening because buyers are relating to the U rather than saying it isn't uncirculated and so it it should be graded extremely fine or variations on this. Uncirculated should be a statement of fact which therefore should not support the A prefix and thus AU should be graded good EF but that can turn potential buyers off because at this grade everyone wants an uncirculated coin. The number of collectors appears to have dramatically increased in recent years which has exacerbated this effect because many appear to have learned their grading from others' descriptions on ebay and the like. This becomes a monster which feeds off itself and will invariably lead to a hike in prices.

The lower grades are kept in check by ebay which has led to a serious oversupply of VF and lower grade coins. Becasue Spink only prices down to fine in most cases, this forms the lowest grade (and hence price). However, many are in grades such that even a scrap metal merchant would ask for a discount.

A genuinely UNC coin should almost always be worth top dollar because they are a lot scarcer than people imagine or sellers' descriptions suggest. A choice one is worth a premium.

Edited by Rob

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Thanks for all the input so far, that's all great stuff.

You can be as generalised or as specific as you like. I find it hard to monitor everything, so this kind of discussion is very helpful.

More generally, the gap between the best and the worst coins in the collectable range continues to widen with the better examples outstripping inflation, but the lower grades barely holding their value. In particular, the differential between EF and AU seems to be stretching out.

Still a seller's market in my opinion.

The differential between EF and AU is probably widening because buyers are relating to the U rather than saying it isn't uncirculated and so it it should be graded extremely fine or variations on this. Uncirculated should be a statement of fact which therefore should not support the A prefix and thus AU should be graded good EF but that can turn potential buyers off because at this grade everyone wants an uncirculated coin. The number of collectors appears to have dramatically increased in recent years which has exacerbated this effect because many appear to have learned their grading from others' descriptions on ebay and the like. This becomes a monster which feeds off itself and will invariably lead to a hike in prices.

The lower grades are kept in check by ebay which has led to a serious oversupply of VF and lower grade coins. Becasue Spink only prices down to fine in most cases, this forms the lowest grade (and hence price). However, many are in grades such that even a scrap metal merchant would ask for a discount.

A genuinely UNC coin should almost always be worth top dollar because they are a lot scarcer than people imagine or sellers' descriptions suggest. A choice one is worth a premium.

I agree with Rob,

AU is obviously more of an American grading scale but people are listing coins as AU instead of EF+ or good EF because novice collectors hear the word Uncirculated mixed into the sentence and bid more.

It also seems like almost everyone is over grading coins on eBay. Sellers are probably scared to call their coin VF and put it up against similar coins that are being described as EF.

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Coming back to this, while I'm going through adjusting the prices in the book - it seems that a lot of stuff over the last 12 months has remained about the same. Also, compared to last year there have not been any choice collection offerings (like Cooke, Bamford etc).

I hate to say this, but I think a lot of the prices are going to stay the same in the 2008 book (don't tell anyone, or it'll sell less!). Especially 20th century stuff, it seems to be about the same.

I've already adjusted the pennies and farthings mentioned above.

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The 1953 half penny low mintage and beginning of the series even minted in million should it be a little higher than the rest of the series.

also other coins that are low in mintage the crown downwards upto three pence, in low condition or fine what is the melt value of the silver coin,seen other silver coins both and sold in the web way below thier melt value,even others bought them they will not going to melt it,hope so,

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Buying individual coins for scrap is very time consuming and I think the postage costs probably make it uneconomical.

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The 1920 series of crown its quite expensive mintage less than 10,000,proof coins others mint 5,000 to 20,000.is the crowns overvalued or undervalued?

The gold should it be BV in fine unless other series is much more expensive.

Coin in high grade is very expensive most of things are expensive now, dont know about the higher grade for other expert can follow the market in auction house if they appear,dont know but pricing coin should be from BU to fine across the grades and its mintage but you and other expert can judge on this, Im just comparing other countries when mintage is below a million in high grade is a good find maybe this is not applicable to GB for GB predecimal coins maybe are stock in most of the closet in GB and easily available.

Other countries like Canada and Australia and US are also collecting GB coins and maybe other dealers are selling coins in those countries overvalued or undervalued?maybe they are back tracking maybe because slab and high grade coins are very expensive,or maybe GB coin market and its value is second to the US market even in raw coins compared to US in slab both are becoming very expensive.

Maybe that is the difference between metal value and collecting value of coins.

Is this for GB market or world wide market?like the gold penny.

In times of inflation is the coin value is the same?or it will go downwards?

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In times of inflation is the coin value is the same?or it will go downwards?

This is a hopelessly difficult question to answer. Coin collecting (and therefore prices) has different stimuli at different times :

Late 60s (medium inflation, but impending decimalisation) : coin collecting fever, modern coin prices go through the roof

Mid 70s (high inflation) : post-decimalisation, modern prices collapse, but pre-1887 values increase sharply (a "true" market)

Early 80s (medium inflation) : speculation e.g. in silver bullion, pushes coin prices to 'silly levels'

Mid 80s - mid 90s (low inflation) : gradual stabilisation (aka decline) in coin values, leading to stagnation

Mid 90s - early millennium (low) : shortages of good material; a return to coin collecting by many of the '60s schoolkids';

the takeover of the Standard Catalogue by Spink - prices go up double or threefold or even more

Currently : coin values stabilising from the dramatic increases, but shortage of good material persists

Whether the economic recession will result in a 'flight of money' (leading to lower coin values), or see coins as a 'hedge against recession and better than shares' (which should stimulate the market), remains to be seen.

But, it will be increasingly true that there will be more collectors than coins as the supply of pre-decimal coins remains ever-fixed. Never has the maxim 'buy the best quality you can afford' been so true. To give you a humbling lesson : 12 years ago, new to dealing and therefore still wedded to 'book price', I bid for a BU 1873 bronze penny at auction, pulling out when the bidding went past the then book price of £75. I should have known better, I should have hung on. That coin would now easily fetch £400, probably considerably more.

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ahh 10-12 years ago, thats when i bought my first pieces, some i am very pleased with *cough 1858 farthing* cough i found the card the dealer had with it (description and price) i was unware then about the fact it was small date lol

noticed the bits i bought then and now, i got some nice pieces back then for about a fiver

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In times of inflation is the coin value is the same?or it will go downwards?

This is a hopelessly difficult question to answer. Coin collecting (and therefore prices) has different stimuli at different times :

Late 60s (medium inflation, but impending decimalisation) : coin collecting fever, modern coin prices go through the roof

Mid 70s (high inflation) : post-decimalisation, modern prices collapse, but pre-1887 values increase sharply (a "true" market)

Early 80s (medium inflation) : speculation e.g. in silver bullion, pushes coin prices to 'silly levels'

Mid 80s - mid 90s (low inflation) : gradual stabilisation (aka decline) in coin values, leading to stagnation

Mid 90s - early millennium (low) : shortages of good material; a return to coin collecting by many of the '60s schoolkids';

the takeover of the Standard Catalogue by Spink - prices go up double or threefold or even more

Currently : coin values stabilising from the dramatic increases, but shortage of good material persists

Whether the economic recession will result in a 'flight of money' (leading to lower coin values), or see coins as a 'hedge against recession and better than shares' (which should stimulate the market), remains to be seen.

But, it will be increasingly true that there will be more collectors than coins as the supply of pre-decimal coins remains ever-fixed. Never has the maxim 'buy the best quality you can afford' been so true. To give you a humbling lesson : 12 years ago, new to dealing and therefore still wedded to 'book price', I bid for a BU 1873 bronze penny at auction, pulling out when the bidding went past the then book price of £75. I should have known better, I should have hung on. That coin would now easily fetch £400, probably considerably more.

I hate to say it but the biggest skew on coin prices in the last 3-4 years has been ebay. It's the only dealer in town with a daily average of 40,000 UK coins. It's has certainly made coin collecting widely accessible.

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I hate to say it but the biggest skew on coin prices in the last 3-4 years has been ebay. It's the only dealer in town with a daily average of 40,000 UK coins. It's has certainly made coin collecting widely accessible.

It depends on which part of the market you are talking about. The choice coins rarely find their way onto ebay for the simple reason that your avarage punter doesn't have the ability to recognise true quality for a given type of coin. It has kept the middle market up remarkably well with the assistance of photography sometimes showing what isn't there. The bottom end of the market has been stratospheric with most coins deserving to be melted achieving prices wildly in excess of this value.

Agreed on that last point. The only problem is that more than 95% of what's on offer is dross. Finding quality is well nigh impossible and most people simply don't have the time to trawl through the lists. So you are going to end up with a welcome expansion of collectors, but whose grading experience is in the main derived from ebay listings and won't look at a coin described as gVF or nEF despite it being a grade or so higher than the UNCs in their collection.

Edited by Rob

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So you are going to end up with a welcome expansion of collectors, but whose grading experience is in the main derived from ebay listings and won't look at a coin described as gVF or nEF despite it being a grade or so higher than the UNCs in their collection.

Sadly so true. I had a look on eBay yesterday at some George V halfcrowns advertised without grades but as 'really nice'. The photos glittered and sparkled. The grades were clearly better than VF, with the odd EF there. Every single one of them had been beautifully cleaned, hence the 'glitter and sparkle'. They make a nice photo, but a poor purchase...

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In times of inflation is the coin value is the same?or it will go downwards?

This is a hopelessly difficult question to answer. Coin collecting (and therefore prices) has different stimuli at different times :

Late 60s (medium inflation, but impending decimalisation) : coin collecting fever, modern coin prices go through the roof

Mid 70s (high inflation) : post-decimalisation, modern prices collapse, but pre-1887 values increase sharply (a "true" market)

Early 80s (medium inflation) : speculation e.g. in silver bullion, pushes coin prices to 'silly levels'

Mid 80s - mid 90s (low inflation) : gradual stabilisation (aka decline) in coin values, leading to stagnation

Mid 90s - early millennium (low) : shortages of good material; a return to coin collecting by many of the '60s schoolkids';

the takeover of the Standard Catalogue by Spink - prices go up double or threefold or even more

Currently : coin values stabilising from the dramatic increases, but shortage of good material persists

Whether the economic recession will result in a 'flight of money' (leading to lower coin values), or see coins as a 'hedge against recession and better than shares' (which should stimulate the market), remains to be seen.

But, it will be increasingly true that there will be more collectors than coins as the supply of pre-decimal coins remains ever-fixed. Never has the maxim 'buy the best quality you can afford' been so true. To give you a humbling lesson : 12 years ago, new to dealing and therefore still wedded to 'book price', I bid for a BU 1873 bronze penny at auction, pulling out when the bidding went past the then book price of £75. I should have known better, I should have hung on. That coin would now easily fetch £400, probably considerably more.

I hate to say it but the biggest skew on coin prices in the last 3-4 years has been ebay. It's the only dealer in town with a daily average of 40,000 UK coins. It's has certainly made coin collecting widely accessible.

It has made coin collecting much more accessible, and I would bet that those 60's schoolkids referred to by Peckris, have had their youthful interest in numismatics re-kindled by a tour of the coin pages on e bay, and with available money many orders of magnitude greater than the peanuts they had available to spend back then.

I take on board all the criticisms and obvious weaknesses which attach to e bay, but at the same time, I would offer in their defence the fact that I have managed to find coins on there, which seem to be almost completely absent from the dealer's shelves. However there can be no doubt that much of the stuff is seriously over-priced, not to mention overbid for, by people clearly not experienced collectors. It's often possible to buy a better example of a given coin direct from a dealer, at lower than the winning bid price on e bay.

There is at least one dealer on a bay (power seller), who I am absolutely sure consistently undergrades his coins. But he is in the minority. Probably a minority of one.

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