Question regarding to grading system...

Once you get past the rigid interpretation of standards based grading and come to the realization that TPGs really price or rank coins, things like excuses become irrelevant.

 

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Not disagreeing, but what happens then when, (and they do), market tastes change? What happens when one thing that was popular and got graded higher by the TPG suddenly is not popular?

That is the danger of a TPG making today grading decisions on desirability.

I am old school I guess, the grade is the grade period. When I disagree with the market I put my money where my mouth is. I know they are grading AU's as BU's now, but back before they were I used that loophole in US grading to buy up AU's. I felt it was a failure of the market a nice clean AU CBH was selling for 1/10th of a nicked up BU. I still do. However, the answer is the market should be smarter, the TPG shouldn't lie to us and tell us these AU halves are now magically MS62 or 63's.

 

That's the fluidity of market grading. When the market changes, so do the grades.

Some might call that a 'lie', others might call that an 'excuse', and yet others might describe it as simply reacting to a hobby that evolves over time.

I'm not saying one view is right and the others wrong, but it is what it is -- and we as collectors would be wise to see things as they are, not as we would have them be.

Respectfully...>Mike

 

WHich all boils down to "Buy the coin, not the slab"

 

According to you....

The purpose of the TPGs written standards is to help people understand the underlying method of judgement. I'm sure if they didn't publish standards, you'd also take issue with that. Damned if they do, damned if they don't, I suppose.

Also, neither coin grading nor life is nearly so black and white. Coin grading, as practiced by the TPGs, is a subjective opinion, and by definition, those are imprecise and difficult to verbalize. Add to that the challenge of a moving market, and I'm sure you can recognize the difficulty introduced.

Surely you are not suggesting I am unable to grade coins or blindly follow anyone.

And who suggested you are not able to doubt their opinion? You are free to disagree as you see fit, just like you are free to buy a coin or not, and submit a coin for grading or not. Nobody is holding a gun to your head, just like nobody is forcing you to agree with a grade. The choice is your own.

Lastly, I don't see anything "wrong" with the TPGs or the way they grade coins. Are they perfect? Far from it. Could they improve? Almost certainly. Should people "blindly" believe what's on a slab? Absolutely not! Do they provide a valuable service that millions of collectors and dealers use? Without question! Do I want to go back to the good old days of rigid standards and dealers who largely ignored them? Not for a minute!

Please don't feel sorry for me because I don't see things the same way you do. Variety is the spice of life, and I'd like to think there's room for all of us and our varying opinions/perspectives. Respectfully...Mike

 

My only issue with TPG changing their grading based on market whims is that its not an electronic system where they can change all previous slabs. Lets say Oregon Trail commemoratives are hot, so instead of a 64 they assign them a 65 grade. Now a decade later they are cool, so instead of a 64 a new coin will get graded a 63. In between times the coins were graded 64.

What do those grades mean anymore? So we have 3 grades of the same coin in the same company's slabs over a period of time. Which is right? Any of them? Should they put a "good by" date on the slabs saying this grade is only good for a couple of years, and after that needs to be resubmitted for a more "current" grade?

This is exactly why there has to be a definitive grade standard that a TPG has to follow all of the time, regardless of market conditions, for a TPG slab to have any meaning. Since they don't, in my eyes a slab's grade holds no value to me. I would buy a coin in a slab if I was concerned about it being genuine, and nothing else.

Btw, it makes me sad to bring up a "good by" date, since I could see that being put in place. TPG firms could make a lot more money if their slabs were not good forever. In a way though they do the same thing by grade inflation. If you gradually raise your grades assigned you are encouraging "crackouts" and more volume and profit for them. Are we sure that is not what is happening, rather than "market grading", its "grade inflation" to try to drum up more resubmits and fatter bottom line profits? Another reason for static written grades they should have to be responsible to.

Chris

 

you will never have that. grading is, and always has been, 100% opinion. nothing more, nothing less. just take a look at all the "what would you grade this" threads on here and all the varying opinions, i mean grades, given in the thread.

 

pcgs, ngc, and the ana all have different standards. the only one that prints it's standards is the ana. when someone is grading a coin in a pcgs slab with the ana standards book, they will see that pcgs uses different standards.

 

Hello everyone, I am sorry for being a wall flower, but your discussions are valueable as I learn a lot.

I have next question regarding to one proof coin. It's 1964 proof mint set with cello wrap. Kennedy coin is virtual perfect in every way through my 10x magnifier and micro camera. I can determine it to be MS70, but there are one insight on the coin. It's fine streak lines from left to right. It's from polish to make it a proof. I wonder if it will effect the outcome grade? I will send this coin to PCGS soon. I will post the coin when it slabbed by PCGS. However, I would like your opinion on this one. Thanks.

 

i was not aware that pcgs did that book. my bad.

 

IMO TPG's can't have it make an impact. They have to grade the coin as if it was a proper strike because if they start deducting grading point because of the flaws created inside the mint, by mint processes and not evironmental or PMD damage they would also have to start attributing them as such and acknowledge their existance and difference from a "normal" coin and a Dbl.Die or RPM etc. Kind of a middle ground between a full doubling and the way the coin should be. Which would also mean they would have to basically make machine doubling a mint error much like a planchet defect or striking error. Granted it would be a minor thing kind of like PCGS saying position A or B with the edge lettering but they would have to mention it on the label. Either that or they have to go opposite extreme and body bag all of them as damaged or flawed and ungradable.

 

I suggest you pay better attention if you think my opinion "almost always coincides" with the TPGs.

Please don't confuse my giving the benefit of the doubt to a grade given by three experts and a finalizer over a picture posted on a forum. I disagree with the TPGs all the time -- on individual grades and more generally gradeflation. That said, what I don't do is try and project my idealized version of grading on the TPGs -- I recognize they are businesses with profit as their goal and they can be run as their owners/directors wish...and complaining about it all the time accomplishes nothing, IMO.

I do think they do a very good job overall, and the market suggests they are providing a valuable service. I do not agree with them on everything...not even close...but certainly more than you.

Now, let me ask you a leading question. If the rigid ANA's technical grading standards are so good, why aren't they widely used anymore? Could it be that the TPGs market-based grading standards, as imperfect as you contend, are actually better?

Take care...Mike

 

Mike, if I could take a stab at it, its because the TPGer's will never use ANA standards. If they did, then they could demonstrably be proven to have misgraded coins. If they have their own standards they can change at will, then they can never be found guilty of an error, since they are the ones who make the rules.

If a company can get away with this, they will do this every time. My company wishes they could make products that have defined definitions a different way, but since the FDA defines and regulates the definition, we do not have a choice. If the US defined and regulated the grades then the TPG would have no choice. Since it was just the ANA, the TPG chose to ignore their standards and come up with their own. They got away with it too. I say shame on collectors for allowing them to do so. No one said markets are perfect, and there was a lot of money, (in a small industry), behind PCGS and NGC. In a perfect world a competitor would arise grading according to ANA standards and displace these two, but any economist worth his salt will admit markets can be imperfect.

Chris

 

Nobody is stopping a competitor from coming out with a better way of doing things. If the rigid ANA standards are so good, why does nobody use them any longer?

I contend market grading (i.e. pricing or ranking coins) is actually the better way of doing things. Collectors/dealers don't grade coins to grade coins, they grade coins to price/sell them. When viewed through this lens, the value the TPGs provide as they exist today, is clear and real.

The ANA grading standards are a means to no end, IMO. They give you a technical grade that is a more imperfect way to reach a price/rank. Heck, even the EAC uses net grades. The rigid ANA standards do not give you this latitude, to my knowledge, and as such are less perfect than market or even EAC grading, IMO.

Now that doesn't fit into someone who expects the world to be black and white and to be able to grade from a written description, but it does match the challenge of the real world of pricing coins in the market. And that's precisely why, IMO, they have succeeded where the ANA failed.

Now, you might argue that gradeflation is nothing but a scheme to increase TPG profits at the expense of collectors and the market, and I would agree with you, but the underlying "soft" logic employed by the TPGs is superior when compared to the "rigid" logic of ANA grading standards, IMO.

Again, I am not defending all the TPGs practices, far from it, but I am suggesting that market grading (as evidenced by the TPGs) is better than technical grading (as evidenced by the ANA) when it comes to buying/selling coins -- even as imperfect as the TPGs are.