ICG Grading Standards

I was just looking at the ICG grading guarantee: http://www.icgcoin.com/about/guarantee/

What is the consensus on the ICG grading standards? From what I have seen Randy Campbell is literally the grader there. He is their public face at most of the coin shows, is extremely friendly and helpful offering free grade opinions, etc.. At the FUN show he is one of the central characters, in fact I don't know what the Florida numismatic community would do without Randy. Here on the FUN site are a bunch of pictures of Randy presenting awards, starting at photo gallery image number 32:

http://www.funtopics.com/fun-convention.html#PhotoGallery

But I see Skip Fazzari has joined ICG after being with NGC for so long.

Anyone have thoughts on the reliability of their grading standards? Randy once told me that he considered luster the most important consideration on grading coins. One example of a coin I ran by him when he was at ANACS, a rare $20 Liberty gold coin that was in an ANACS 60 holder, Randy, when I showed it to him thought it was high end for grade and a 61 would have been acceptable to him. Whereas when I tried to cross it both to PCGS and NGC they both rejected it, and I spoke in person with Mark Salzburg at a Baltimore show and he said it was not Unc..

So I am wondering what their core grading philosophies are that ICG seems to be more liberal than the others? And when Randy was grading at ANACS alongside Tim Hargis and Michael Fahey, were there significant disagreements that people heard about?

 

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never met him persoanlly...regardless, we am getting along fine down here

 

ICG isn't as bad as many make them out to be. I wouldn't put much weight on any of the grades of 70 though.

The problem is that there is no science to grading, it is simply an opinion. Often times you can crack out a PCGS coin, send it back to PCGS and get a different grade on the slab. I remember coin world did an article about this and experimented with submissions to PCGS, NGC, ANACS and ICG. You will have to forgive me for not remembering the specifics, but if I remember correctly, the coin returned with the same grade only about 40% of the time. This result was pretty consistent across all of the grading companies. I want to say that PCGS was the most consistent overall.

 

Randy Campbell is a very friendly guy, and he offers approximate grading for free at coin shows. ICG has a reputation for being more "liberal," which, depending on the person, can be good or bad. Since I already stuck my neck out defending ICG in another thread, I'll just say that my experience with the company has been very positive.

 

Since it has a more liberal set of standards it will stay below the top 2 in most collectors eyes . That's why you see PCGS sell for more with NGC a very close 2nd . Though I have bought some nice coins in both ICG and ANACS slabs for less money than if they were in a PCGS or NGC slab . I tend to look at the coin 1st to see if I like it then the grade to see If I agree with it then the price . If all is to my liking I'll buy it regardless what slab it's in .

 

The TPG sets the standard. The grader follows that standard or they don't work there.
I Really like Randy. I had the chance to sit with him a few years ago and talk coins for a few hours while we watched a football game. He knows his stuff.
I don't know if he just follows the ICG standards or if he helped write them.

If I were trying to sell coins, They would not be in ICG holders.
For coins just in my collection, I'm good with any holder.

 

I have avoided buying coins in ICG slabs as a newbie but now some of my best coins are ICG graded... I guess I've learnt to buy the coin and not the slab.

 

Doug , where does Randy publish these ? I'd like to read them .

 

I was at a show where a regular show dealer had a number of rare certified and uncertified coins. He had an 1807 Bust half dollar that ICG graded XF40. The surfaces were good, luster good, no problems, but the question is would NGC or PCGS grade it the same or higher? VF money is around a third of XF, so if you got a VF35, any future buyer would offer considerably less. Many collectors and investors are banking on the hope that the coin market will continue at current levels or rise, which history has shown is rarely the case.

 

One of my favorite dealers uses ICG so I have seen a lot of their slabs. I own/have owned quite a few Lincolns in ICG slabs - IMO they were all graded accurately. Also, they are definitely more forgiving with colorful copper than NGC and PCGS. I appreciate that they understand copper toning accurately in the toned Lincolns I have seen in their slabs.

 

Here's a coin that I love ICG for grading - NO woody penalty and NO "details" slab for a beautiful, natural cent. As a collector, I agree 100% with this grade:

 

They were tough early on when in Denver. I sent them some gold coins that downgraded from what they had been graded by NGC, I was hoping for an upgrade.

I like the fact that ICG may give numerical grades when NGC and PCGS put coins in net or genuine holders which do absolutely nothing to add value in most cases. Q David Bowers has spoken about this as have other leaders in the business about how "questionable" toning, or light cleaning gets a no grade the first time and a grade the next time with the big boys. There are coins that should never get even a somewhat lower grade due to issues but many others are given vindictive or punitive no grades that is uncalled for, even in the judgment of some seasoned numismatists. ICG may give that option where they will assign numerical grades that would stand up to seasoned analysis where the coins previously were put in details holders by the big boys partly for liability reasons.

 

We'll have to agree to disagree on that point Doug . Look at Trade dollars , there are so many fakes and so many ruined chopped coins how else are a lot of people to know they're genuine . I see nothing wrong with a genuine designation .

 

PCGS and NGC make mistakes, anyone who has submitted much has seen details/genuine holders coins later get a numerical grade knows as much; also coins that were given "questionable toning", etc., on the holder and later found them properly graded knows as much.

I average well over $1000 a year in submissions, not that that is a lot but enough to know about the variability in grading.