Are CAC stickers destroyed if an attempt is made to remove them? Are CAC stickers counterfeited? What do the colors of a CAC sticker mean? Thanks!
I can only answer one part which is "what are the colors"... Green sticker means it "meets expectations of that particular grade" Gold sticker means "surpasses expectations of that grade". Whicg is why you see very few gold stickers because most get resubmitted. As for the tampering questions, I personally have not had any issues with mine or have I known of anyone who has tampered with any of their stickers.... P.S. CAC stickered slabs can be verified at the CAC website, so if a sticker is removed or happens to fall off, you can still view the information (using the same cert numbers as TPG's) at the CAC verification website! http://www.caccoin.com/look-up-your-coins/
Hate to disagree , but the green sticker means it's solid for the grade or high end of the grade . There are 3 parts that each coin falls in for a grade . A. High for that grade , B. middle or solid for that grade and c. low end of that grade . The coin is graded correctly in all three parts but an A. or high for the grade is almost but not quite the next grade , B. is solid for the grade . C. means it just met the given grade standards and even though correctly graded , CAC will not sticker these coins , they will only sticker A. or B. coins .
What to do, then, when a CAC stickered coin doesn't show up there? That's why I asked about removal and counterfeit.
I would say if you pull the cert number up in the database and it does not show up, some "not so good" person maybe peeled it off another coins slab. Although I am not certain because I do not know how a sticker may look when removed. Thank you rzage for the info!
FYI, If a coin get's a green CAC sticker, it means it meets CAC's expectations for that grade. Along with any other grading company, no one can accurately, perfectly know those standards, but the company in it of themselves. With that being said, many coins DO NOT get cac stickers. Does that mean they are not that certain grade, a slider, or just a bad coin with a high grade? Nope. It just means that they do not meet CAC's expectations. CAC is just another service to add another layer of "Grade verification", for lack of better words. It should be ultimately left up to the collector to decipher if that grade is accurate or not. If you cannot, sure CAC is a good service, but not a necessity. The gold sticker means that the coin is excedingly well for that grade. I've seen 2-3 gold stickers so far.. If you don't believe my info, check CAC's website.
Let's start a company to tag over graded coins. NOT! The old saying of "buy the coin not the slab" is so very true.
So I shouldn't even consider buying a slabbed coin, right? I asked for answers to questions, not lectures.
If you are questioning the authenticity of a slab with a CAC sticker and you can't find it on their website, then you should contact CAC directly. They will have a record of all coins that they have stickered and they will also be very interested in any which have stickers that they have not certified. I hope that helps
that's not necessarily true and kind of unfair to make as an assertion. Every seller is different. Maybe they bought a bunch of slabs that were already stickered, maybe they only submitted a few that they thought would upgrade, maybe they could only afford to send a couple, it's just impossible to say, but I think that trying to relegate the rest of a seller's coins as less desirable based solely on the fact that they are selling one or two CAC stickered coins and that in my eyes is unfair to the seller and to his other coins. It's a bad assumption based on a faulty premise.
Actually it is not always true. Most coin collectors don't have the requisite grading knowledge to be able challenge the grades assigned by the TPG's so buying the slab instead of the coin would not hurt them at all. Personally, I hate that mantra even though I follow it in my chosen series.
...because the TPG have their own grading system. Of course they are the experts in their own grades. Now, to the extent someone is simply not good at grading, recognizing cleaned coins, damaged coins, etc. I agree with you. I simply disagree a TPG company is better at standardized grading, (ANA standards for US, ancient standards for ancients), than an experienced collector. Also, since the nature of TPG will be nearly all coins will be at a fair grade or overgraded, (undergrades are usually cracked out, and NO ONE cracks out overgrades to correct them), saying to buy the coin and not the grade on the slab is still sound advice. Just because the slab says 65 is no guarantee AT ALL its not really a 64, and will sell for that if you try to sell. Its a pretty good guarantee, though, that its not a 66.
Are there coins with CAC not in their database on the website? Seems to me the only protection for a buyer would be a complete database on a website, otherwise I am sure there are printers in China dying to sell rolls of little green beans.
Glad I could help . About the coin with a CAC sticker not showing up on their website , definiely contact CAC as it could be a counterfeit sticker . I'm pretty sure ( but not 100% ) that the Chinese were faking CAC stickers like the faked slabs , always check out their #s .
While I am sure that CAC strives to keep it's online database up to date, if one should encounter one that is not listed on the database one would be well served to contact CAC directly. That is what I said. It means that you should be able to find it yourself, but if you can't then CAC (and only CAC) will be able to tell you whether or not the coin has been certified by them.
My point was that most collectors are not experienced collectors and most don't know squat about grading Another way of saying that is to say: buy the slab with the CAC sticker. After all, isn't that exactly what the CAC does, separates the solid for the grade from the dreck. They basically have stopped gradeflation in it's tracks!
I wouldn't hold my breath for that, Paul. When PCGS first started people exclaimed that this would end the controversy over grading and that hasn't really happened yet
