1873 cc Trade Dollar... Real or Fake???

Right now a foreign counterfeiter is reading this forum while rubbing his hands with delight as he reads how secure a slab makes so many buyers feel.
I bet it is way easier to make a fake slab that fake coin.

 

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But you can check the slabs numbers on the graders respective websites to make sure they're authentic, right?

They use both casting and dies for counterfeits. A local swap-meet had a dealer selling cast ones a couple years ago.

 

They put real numbers of another coin on their fake slabs... that way it checks out.

 

Hey, it isn't very sanitary to take the words right out of someone else's mouth!

 

The coin doesn't look real to my eye. The rims look "off".

That said, why anyone would attempt to purchase a raw coin they didn't have the ability to authenticate is beyond me -- however, greed is a powerful motivator.

 

p.s. I would ask who offered him $1k for those coins.

 

Call me a cynic, but I'm amazed at how many grandfathers collected modern Chinese counterfeits.

ps This is NOT a comment on the coin. I have no clue there.

 

Wrong. So far all of the fake NGC slabs and most of the fake PCGS slabs check out as good on their respective certification verification sites. The counterfeiter have been using the Heritage auction archives to get genuine numbers to put on their fake slabs.

 

I'd buy a good digital scale and meet the guy at a bank to weigh the coins.
A collector should have a good scale among his tools.
They are far less expensive than I expected, and have many uses when sorting/authenticating coins.

 

After looking long and hard... I voted "Fake" due to the near lack of denticles between 6 and 9 o'clock.
The coin is not worn significantly there, but the denticles are gone. Not a good sign IMHO.

I could be wrong....

 

To be honest I spent 5 seconds looking at the photo. The color is that of the fakes coming out of China. It is the "old coin, trying to look old, so I bury it for 6 months in chicken droppings" look. If you see them, if they are all similar color you know they are all fakes. Groups of these coins are usually extremely easy to spot they are fake, its when they are separate they are harder to tell.

Just ask yourself, why would granddad have only cc's? S mints were much more common for these, shouldn't a few be s or no mintmarks?

If you really wanted to pursue it, bring along a digital scale, luckily most of these forgers are greedy and do not use the correct alloy in their coins.

 

This is the email I got from him after I told him I wasn't interested anymore:

"THATS OK I SOLD THEM TODAY TO A COIN DEALER FOR $2250 HE GRADES COINS FOR NGC THEY ALL GRADED VERY FINE TO EXTRA FINE AND YES THEY WERE ALL REAL. SORRY YOU HAD YOUR CHANCE TO BUY CHEAP, GLAD I DIDNT SELL, THANKS FOR THE INFO MADE $1000 MORE THAN YOUR OFFER. HE TOLD ME THE SAME STORY ABOUT FAKE COINS BUT MINE WAS A GREAT FIND.. LATER"

Is it just me, or does this email seem to be written with an angry tone? He got an offer of exactly $1000 more than my $1250 offer? Sounds like a lie... I think that I was his only real offer and he just wanted me to feel like I missed out on a great deal when he's the one that really missed out. Also, If he was telling the truth and they were all real, then he got ripped off because they would be worth a lot more than $2250...

 

There are fakes that are die-struck as well.

Why all the mis-information?

 

Lots of liars make up an even bigger lie to try to make you feel bad. They do that since you made them feel bad for calling them out. The anger comes from defensiveness about being found out about being a liar.

Dang, my undergraduate psych teacher would be proud lol.

I wouldn't worry about it, they were forgeries. Even if they weren't, (and they were), he just got screwed out of a ton of money assuming they were real. So either way he loses.

Chris

 

I smell something stinky...

I wasn't aware that coin dealers were graders for NGC... It sounds like he was just trying to get your goat... I am sure that the coin posted was a counterfeit... don't sweat that guy he's delusional.

Welcome to craigslist sellers....

 

Very true. The casts ones makes you feel nostalgic for the good old days when forgeries were easy to spot. Chinese coins now can be die struck, with proper metal composition, and for even more they will melt down correct coins so that even metal studies cannot disprove authenticity. The new ones can be scary, but the looks of these do not look like those super fakes out there now.

Btw, I just remembered I just saw 2 cc Trade dollars that looked just like these at the Hmong market in St Paul 2 weeks ago. It wasn't Craigslist MN by any chance? They had CC Morgans, Trade Dollars, and 1804 silver dollars. It was a real jackpot find!!

 

No, It was Craigslist Chicago.

 

Lol not too far away, probably from the same "hoard". Like we said, relax man, they were forgeries and the guy was just making you feel bad. He was a liar and you called him on it. He got mad.

I bet you they show up again on CL or another free site in a few weeks.

If you wish to buy stuff on CL and places like that, invest in a digital scale and write down what correct coin weights are. That is the part most forgers do not get right. At least then you can detect 98-99% of the forgeries out there. The super forgeries? Well those suck, the only good thing about them is that they are expensive and most criminals are greedy and won't pay that price.

 

That's OK. If you expressed disappointment, his Uncle may suddenly die and leave him some more for you.

 

I forgot the real # but there's at least 4 fakes for every real unslabbed TD out their could be even 10 to 1 , sufice to say your chances of buying a real trade dollar off of Ebay is pretty bad . If you buy off a repubatle dealer they'll weed out most of them and at least you have recourse .
You're right in that his letter has an angry tone , if he sold them why tell you anything .
rzage