Abon/SGS Slammed in Coin World

The guest commentary in the current (May 5th) edition of Coin World takes a good swipe at shady practices on eBay in general and specifically mentions Abon and SGS and their probable connection.

Worth a read.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Cool. I hope CW is waiting for me in my PO box.

 

It's about time Ebay and some of their "honored" sellers get the notoriety they deserve! :hammer:

Ribbit

 

Dont get this mag over here so has anyone got a link to the article?

 

DeOrc:
There is no link on the web site for Coin World, but I guess that they are referring to this:

Guest Commentary - by John Mazor
The growth of grading services and their coin slabs has mostly benefited collectors and investors. However, some grading services just don't make the grade.

 

I just read the article and he points out (IMO) what the main problem is. That is, people who are new to collecting are sucked in by folks like SGS. We all know that no one on this board would buy SGS coins. The problem lies with dear old Aunt Agnes who wants to buy some coins for a birthday or for Christmas for you, her favorite niece/nephew. Yes, Agnes should do some research, but clearly, the mass population does not. We are a trusting people and folks like SGS/Abon are taking advantage of that trust.

It is unfortunate that the folks who really need to learn about SGS and those like them, are not the folks on this board, or the folks who are reading Coin World, but your friends and relatives who are thinking about beginning a collection.

 

Sad but true. I just hope it's only a few get a bad taste and leave the hobby. None, if possible.

Fortunately, the internet and this site in particular have the "share knowledge" mentality. It's helped me greatly.

 

:whistle:Um actually my first slabbed coin was from ABON:whistle: it was graded a MS-70 franklin half and when i posted it on here i was lucky too get a 62 out of it but i have learned and wont make that same mistake again

 

Sounds like a good read. Might need to go find an issue...

Ben

 

Ben:
Let me know if you find it.
If not, mine (Coin World) usually arrives on Friday or Saturday.
I'll copy it & mail it to you.
Frank

 

Some of the guys with scanners might be able to put them to use to send this article to our friends abroad.

 

That would be appreciated if someone could scan it and pm me for my email :hail:

 

DeOrc:
I would but I don't have a scanner.
Sorry.

 

Graded by SGS

Yesterday I was scaning some auctions on Ebay. Came across a seller that had MS ASE for sale graded by SGS. I never knew that MS ASE had Mint Marks prior to 2006. The photos showed 1986 P MS 70 and a few other dates prior to 2006 with a P MInt Mark. But to top it off one of the coins was labeled 2005 W MS 70. I E-Mailed the seller and asked him about it and his replay was the coins were graded by SGS. I will try to upload the sellers site but the listings are under Proof ASE. So it must be true BUYER BEWARE.

 

If anybody has a chance to post the article,that would be great.:thumb:

 

I won't post the Guest Commentary (which is what this is) but I hope it is OK for me to quote a line or two (or three) from it.

My first impression was the writer - veteran coin dealer Jay Bowman - has a bad case of sour grapes. He starts off complaining that eBay yanked his coin auction due to "the mere mention of" SEGS in his description.


Throughout the piece he rails against both eBay and ANA and used ample portions of hyperbole. He makes a few meaningless arguments and rambles quite a bit.

Is he saying that the criteria to determine a good TPG is whether they have a "nice holder"? From what I have heard the Chinese counterfeit PCGS slabs are "nice holders".

Since when are SEGS coins as "conservatively graded" as PCGS or NGC? Who does this guy think he is fooling? But I digress.

Next he offers "Graders are only human; mistakes happen." and lets us know that he has seen coins from every TPG that have been overgraded and undergraded. (Too bad he didn't give us numbers or percentages. It would have been very informative to know what percentage of PCGS or NGC slabs are overgraded vs. what percentage of SEGS slabs are overgraded.)

After touching on Chinese counterfeit coins and slabs he launched into a great deal of hyperbole equating ANA's recommendation and eBay's decision to only allow the top 4 TPGs (or 5, according to Bowman who also includes NCS) to Big Brother, bigger government and a loss of personal freedoms. (This guy should write speeches for politicians.)

Bowman rambles quite a bit saying buyers ("investors and speculators") should become "more alert and educated". He fails to appreciate that beginner collectors and non-collectors do not know how to grade coins and count on the TPG to tell them the grade of the coin. "The grading services should just confirm what you already know." That's great (unless you know nothing about grading).

Do ya think Mr. Bowman's opinions are affected at all by the fact that "a third of his business is conducted via the Internet" (according to his bio)?

 

Yea, I thought about that after I posted, I guess litttle snippets will have to do.

 

I finally realized why I thought that I had read this before--
It is in the April 28th issue, page #14.

 

No it's not. The article Hobo is quoting from is in the April 28th issue, but the guest commentary I was posting about is in the May 5th issue by a totally different writer and from nearly the opposite point of view.

Since quoting parts of the article seems to be okay here (fair use), this is one of the relevant paragraphs from the article:

"The next purchase was for three slabbed, supposedly "perfect" Brilliant Uncirculated
dimes from the Philadelphia, Denver and San Francisco facilities.
Yet, all three obviously had been whizzed, dipped or both. There was absolutely
no variation in color or tone over all three universally white specimens. They also
had numerous bag marks - yet they were slabbed by Star Grading Service (SGS) as MS-70!
Any reputable grader would have returned all three dimes (and the Franklin half dollar) in body bags."