How on Earth could PCGS have graded this coin problem free?!!!

Touche!

 

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I agree, this looks to be a coin that PCGS blew the grade.

 

There are a certain percentage of coins from every grading service that are inaccurately graded. Let's say it is 10% with PCGS in the under $500 pricing range, less than that with NGC and even more inaccuracies with Anacs and ICG. What recourse do you have? A guarantee submission, PCGS makes it harder than NGC. When I have contacted PCGS on the issue they try to charge you on their restoration fee if the coin has problem toning that they will argue happened after they slabbed it. Your expense for a guarantee submission with them are all the charges associated with a submission. If they disagree you will get a nice message from them probably on why they disagree with you. If they agree it could take many months to get satisfaction. So why this fawning worship at the PCGS altar? Probably because of their many successes, but some people have given up on them due to the way they have stonewalled on guarantee claims. NGC is not a publically traded company like Collector's Universe so maybe they can afford to be more honest and fair.

 

Playing Devil's Advocate....under magnification...if the graders were able to determine that the flaws results from contact with other coins....I could understand the MS. I've looked at thousands of GSAs mutilated far worse then this coin, and all of them fetch a minimum grade of MS 60.

63 is really generous!

 

Pete nailed it!
Pcgs standards policy tends to change per submission organization or order. It's most likely due to fact their a public company and have stockholders and a CEO to answer to.
About 2010 one coin publications did an article about the time graders are allowed to inspect a coin. It made it sound like they where put on s production line.

 

lol

 

So this is a generous grade, which frankly I would be digging if it was my coin. What do you guys do if you send a coin you feel is solid and get a lousy grade or a details slab? Crack it out and send it somewhere else? Or just live with it?

 

I have seen this discussed on a lot of threads and realize that there is a consensus that the standards loosened up around that time. There has also been discussion about PCGS in particular becoming even more lenient just in the past year or so. That is why I just had to raise the question when I came across the particularly egregious example that I posted, as it was in a new holder from this year.

Judging by the responses I definitely wasn't the only one who thought this grade was out to lunch. So was it an isolated incident that was graded on a Friday afternoon right before (or during) happy hour, or is it indicative of PCGS changing its standards again in the last year?

 

If this is a nickel Morgan, it must be exceedingly rare!

 

PCGS did not change their standards, not in 2004, and not last year.

 

Morgans are bigger and hence have more bagmarks. Thats not a planchet flaw; that's a scratch. I can see from the picture how the metal is displaced. The scratch is that big that I can actualy tell.

But yeah, I agree sometimes it's tough without a loupe (or I have a microscope I use to get a much better look).

The Ike seems to hve a scratch between the I and the B but that's not necessariy disqualifying. You need to keep in mind how much bigger a dollar like that is from a V-nickel.

The same scratch on one would disqualify it while the other might not. That's the way it's always been. Planchet flaws can disqualify coins in some cases too, I believe, just not die errors (for example die lines vs. cleaning -- you can ony tell by looking very close if they are raised or dispaced metal)

I'm guessing the same thing caused the two scratches (but that's just a guess).

So yes -- you'll see that in Morgans with plenty of bagmarks grade a 63 but this is practially unheard of. That's also not a bagmark; something greater did that to the coin.

Then again -- I believe in "buy the coin not the holder." I can geenrally grade pretty accurately by looking at pictures but if someone is selling a very high-priced coin RAW (*cough* GS) coin it makes you wonder why they didnt get it sent in to get a premium.

Likely because it's a problem coin, and they know it.

They can also do photography tricks to hide the problems.

If they have a return policy though, I'll sometimes go for it and then examine it in-hand. I have not had much luck with that. Most of the time it was BS (but I paid something like 4 or 5 bucks for return shipping on a ~ thousand dollar coin. Big deal.)


~ Ricky

 

I too have noticed a significant amount of terrible grades coming from PCGS as of late. The coin in the OP is damaged, plain and simple. Yet because the rest of the surfaces are nice, with no wear, and great luster, PCGS decided it was market acceptable with the gouges. I think it is a shame that this happens and it is a big reason why we are gonna cover this type of grading in the podcast. It is important that people understand why coins grade like this and what to do as a collector.

 

This is interesting, and cleared things up quite a bit for me:



I did not realize that an MS graded coin can exhibit poor surface preservation, as long as it does not show any wear (I have purchased quite a few AU graded coins, none of which have scratches like the original coin in question)... which opens the coin up for a lot of marking in lower MS grades. I'm a newbie, of course.

 

Very good idea.
Now you just have to get noted as a Priority Client and your coin grades will get a extra consideration.

 

Is this a fact or just on opinion? Serious question. Lots of assertions made about TPGs on the forums and as a newer collector I don't always know the backstory.

 

Miko W their 10-15 auction house your see in Coin World and other coinage magazine.

 

Well after sending a box of 20 MS 64 to one of them to be graded all but 3MS 65 went to 17 MS 66
How do you explain that?
They were not old Green holder Pcgs ether.