Baldwin's St.James - shambolic, unprofessional bunch

I don't have an opinion about this specific case, as I do not know what is going on, and I don't know both sellers.

But this post and some of the comments got me to ask the participants in this thread, and other board members who wish to reply the following question: what do you think of 'professional or semi-professional sellers' participating in auctions/sales, and then offering the coins they won in their auctions, or shops, for a higher price?

I've seen this happening many times now, and not just with the 'high-end coins'. I know there is absolutely nothing illegal about this, but I do think this has a downside for the collector with a small budget. Prices are soaring and is this one of the reasons? Yes, there are many coins available, but I believe this is not merely incidental. What do you think?

 

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My opinion: I don’t like it one bit. As a hobbyist who isn’t even a millionaire, the market is competitive enough going against the big dog millionaire and billionaire individual collectors!

I wish auction houses were somehow able to prevent resellers from buying, or at least have auctions where they were, and weren’t allowed explicitly stated. That way hobbyists would know what they were dealing with. I think it’s a moral question for me at least; I couldn’t find peace in preventing the person on the other side of the screen from enjoying a coin I knew I was just going to flip for a profit. I encounter this same situation in two other hobbies: sneakers and LEGO.

One wonders if this is why CNG removed screen-names from their electronic auction? To hide dealers?

Let me caveat by saying however, I have no problem with dealers/resellers buying coins no one else bids on

 

This price gouging will mainly affect uninformed collectors. A collector buying at auction can generally afford to outbid dealers. If I feel a coin is worth €1000, I can bid that (allowing for fees), while a dealer paying that much will have to try to sell it on at a higher price to make any profit. Why would a prospective buyer pay more for something which has just been flipped, when he could have got it for less at the same venue as the dealer?

Of course, coins will sometimes sell at auction for much less than their "true value" and here a decent mark-up is justified.

The proliferation of auctions is a problem for retail dealers as people are more likely to consign coins to auctions than sell or consign to retail dealers.

Anyway, strange behaviour from Baldwin's-St James - I've bought from them and from Frank Robinson without problems, so I don't know what was going on.

ATB,
Aidan.

 

I think your concern on this issue is misplaced. Dealers buying coins at auction and reselling them at retail has been completely normal for over 100 years. Auctions are a major source of dealer stock, and spotting hammer prices with room for profit is an important dealer skill. There is absolutely nothing wrong with it. The difference today is that auctions are all online, putting collectors in more frequent competition with dealers.

My 100-year comment is not hyperbole. I collect important auction catalogues and price lists from 19th-20th centuries. Many coins can be traced from one dealer's auction to another's fixed-price list. All perfectly normal for generations.

So, I look at your issue a bit differently. If I lose a coin at auction, and later find it in a dealer's stock, I don't get mad at the
dealer - I get mad at myself for undervaluing the coin. If you want to beat dealers at auctions, bid more than wholesale.

 

This is largely how the business has operated since the advent of numismatic auctions. I watch a large portion of the market, so it's not difficult to see when a coin I lost a bid on goes to a dealer and it doesn't really happen that often. Generally it's happened when I was bidding conservatively and trying to get a coin for cheap(in some cases because the type was a compromise coin/hole filler and I wanted to leave room for resale).

Personally as a collector I also have to sell coins occasionally, either because I decided I didn't like a coin as much as I initially thought I would, or because I've upgraded, or because I need to raise some money to pay for new auction winnings. Sometimes I've resold a coin I really liked because ultimately, I really liked the 3x-4x price paid offer I got from a competing collector more than I liked the coin itself. I wouldn't bid in any auction that would hold it against me if I sold the coin a month later. Reselling is simply a part of how I, as a non-millionaire, build my collection.

 

I think a person selling a coin in their collection is different than a dealer buying coins in an auction. I have no objection whatsoever if someone buys a coin for themself and for whatever reasons decides to sell it even a week later, regardless of who they sell it to.

Again just my opinions, I will never not bid on a coin or not bid with an auction house that allows dealers because at the end of the day, if I want a coin, I’m going to do my best to get it! Just thoughts for improving the customer experience.

 

Merriam-Webster:
Definition of auction
(Entry 1 of 2)

1: a sale of property to the highest bidder
2: the act or process of bidding in some card games

I personally never cared who bid or won an auction. If I won, I had the best bid. If I lost, I did not have the best bid. I never worried about being "cleo'd", I just did not offer the best bid.

I am more than sure that a HUGE number of MILLIONAIRES have lost MANY bids at Ancient Coin Auctions.

It is not up to the Auction House to determine if folks not affording or losing the bids to take responsibility that small buyers or collectors did not have a fair shake. It is up to the individual to decide it they can step up to the bar and be able to win and buy the item. That is the choice of the purchaser.

If an auction was offering a 1-Tonne block of gold to the highest bidder, is it THEIR responsibility to ensure that it sold at a fair price for a small purchaser vs a "millionaire"? Free market dictates its price and to whom wins the bid.

Many Dealers are, in-fact, AVID collectors. That is why they are buying and selling. Why should THEY be excluded from bidding on coins? Where do you draw the line?

If folks do not care how an auction is handled, they can certainly vote with their feet: not participate. They can also go to the many Websites and Coin Shops and purchase an Ancient Coin.

The main thing, it is a free market, a luxury good, and everyone has choices. No one is going to die from winning or losing an Ancient Coin Auction. I find it irrelevant that folks want to add restrictions, OUTSIDE of LEGAL, that defines an auction.

NEXT!

 

Does it have anything to do with money laundering?

 

LOL, YES!

Every week, I load all my Ancient Coins, Gold, and Currencies into a laundry machine, wash, then dry them. Gives them all a clean, minty-fresh feeling!

 

Don't use softener

 

Let me take the time to point out a situation regarding dealers bidding at auctions that may reasonably contradict your thinking.

I do not personally bid at auctions. Rather, I have my dealer -- the same dealer who advised Mike Gasvoda on his collection and was extensively praised by Mike in an NAC catalog from a few years ago -- view the coins in which I'm interested prior to each auction and bid for me. Should the auction house prevent my dealer from bidding for me? Should they require him to bid only for his clients and not for his own inventory? If so, how do they enforce this provision?

More than once, my dealer has been at an auction and purchased a coin, on speculation, that he thought would be appropriate for my collection, for which I subsequently paid him. How could I have acquired this coin if my dealer had been prevented from bidding on it?

My dealer also represents and bids for other clients as well, and occasionally acquires coins for his own inventory. By combining these activities he can attend auctions in person and lower the commission he charges me since his expenses are spread among other collectors at the same time.

From time to time I purchase coins from dealers who themselves purchased those coins at an auction. I pay a markup for these coins but am glad to do so, since I myself didn't spot these coins at their respective auctions and otherwise might have missed the chance to acquire them.

I see no logic whatsoever in preventing dealers from bidding at auctions.

 

I agree wholeheartedly with everything you say. However I think we are talking about completely different things. My usage of dealer would be defined as: a person who is purchasing coins with the sole intent of selling them in their business at a profit. I would call what you used a proxy bidder, but now we are into semantics

All this being said, I was just simply giving my opinion. I know how the world actually works and there can always be counterfactuals to a general statement. For me personally, my utopia world is that everyone buying coins does it first, second, and third for the sole reason of their enjoyment, with no concern for making money!

 

I kind of share the sentiment, but I don't think that's possible in any aspect - legal, technical or even theoretical if you think about it in depth.

 

See my earlier reply. Preventing this would be contrary to how the numismatic marketplace has worked for 100+ years. Best response is to know the value of the coins and bid appropriately.

 

I'm puzzled as to exactly how to establish that a dealer has "...the sole intent of selling them in their business at a profit." Would it be OK for the dealer if he/she intended to sell them at a loss? What if the dealer purchased the coins at auction but their buyer backed out, or couldn't pay for them, or died? Could the dealer then sell them at a profit? Would they have to be returned to the auction house and auctioned again? What if my dealer shows me the coin, and I change my mind, but my dealer wants to keep the coin for his inventory and a later sale?

We are definitely not talking about a semantic difference here. An auction is an opportunity to bid on a coin and acquire it for whatever purposes the winning bidder desires. Delving into, and trying to control, the motives behind an individual's acquisition of a coin isn't productive -- least of all not for the seller who is hoping to maximize his/her sales price for the coin.

 

I'm sorry to be thick, but I can't see why that would cause any consternation. Wouldn't those bids (at worse for Mr Robinson) all loose and be swept out of the way by higher bids? Who knows, on an odd day, maybe a few of those bids would win, if no one else bid.

- Broucheion

 

I know at least one VCoins seller called Palmyra who regularly buys from CNG and resells at least 2 or 3 times the price he paid. I should admit myself am guilty of buying from him in some occasions because I missed that particular coin in CNG and really wanted it si paid what he asked for , but this is a questionable practice in any case to resell coins 2 or 3 times the price of purchase in auctions.

 

This is not a questionable practice. Dealers will buy coins for lowest possible cost and sell for whatever profit the market will bear. There is nothing wrong with that. The market will determine if they've priced the coins too high.

I've sold many coins at auction over the past few years. In several cases, the auction house bought my coins into stock and
soon listed them at double the hammer price. The only thing wrong with that scenario is that collector-bidders failed to notice my coins were underpriced in the auction!

 

I wonder if this should be rephrased: attempts to resell them at least 2 or 3 times the price he paid.

 

I frankly don’t understand why this topic is becoming so testy. I’m still relatively new to this forum but are you a dealer?

My entire point and belief is very simple: I want coins in the hands of people who enjoy them, not those looking to profit off them. In an auction setting, if 99.99% of coins went to a dealer, versus 99.99% of coins going to a collector, that would be disappointing to me.

I think we have a different definition of a dealer. To me, a dealer is someone who purchases a coin in an auction or from another dealer, with the sole intent of reselling it at a higher price. It is a business transaction for them, plain a simple. If I hire someone to represent me at an auction house, that is not a dealer, that is a proxy for a collector. If I subsequently lose all my money because I spent it on Chipotle and can’t afford the coin, that person subsequently selling the coin is not the same thing, and I would of course have no issue with it.

I am a little surprised at how few end consumers on this forum are not at least in philosophical agreement on this topic, as at the end of the day, it would bring about lower prices for collectors/hobbyists.

Edit) I want to provide an example for another hobby of mine. Say LEGO releases a new set, and 1 reseller buys ALL the available sets and then puts them on eBay at a huge mark up. Are you saying you have no issue with that? As each ancient coin is unique, this is essentially the situation I am referring to.