Ancient Chinese Key shaped coin?

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I watched a documentary recently arguing that something like 50+% of high end art sold by the biggest auction houses are forgeries (paintings, sculptures, etc). I've learned to take everything that I see in documentaries with a grain of salt these days, but they offered up some pretty compelling evidence. Pretty crazy to think that people are doling out millions for things that some guy churned out in his garage the other day.

 

I agree, that fakes are a huge problem, in the area of ancient Chinese coins, and Chinese coins from the dark ages, middle ages, and modern times. I have approximately 25 Chinese coins in my collection, from ancient times, the dark ages, the middle ages, and the early Renaissance.
I have tried to buy most of my Chinese coins from persons, whom I thought were pretty good at authenticating ancient Chinese coins. A. M. Fishman (expert), Scott Semans (expert), Breitsprecher (seems very knowledgeable), and Midwest Numismatics (seems knowledgeable).
If I ever wanted to sell the coins, then I'd probably provide evidence, that I purchased the coins from these persons, in the form of screen captures, of the seller web pages, which show the listings, coin photos, price, etc. I also have kept some of the paper invoices. Such evidence may be helpful.
However, it would be nice, if there were someone, who was an acknowledged expert in Chinese coins of all eras, who offered an authentication service, in which the expert would examine a coin, then declare the coin authentic or fake, and if the coin is authentic, then issue a certificate of authenticity (COA), with an ID number on the certificate, which could be used, to lookup photos of the coin, on an internet database, the way NGC has a photo lookup service for its ancients slabs. This would be very helpful, in my opinion, because each Chinese coin looks different, in the same way that each ancient Greek, Roman, or Byzantine coin looks different (different style, different strike or cast, different wear, different patina, etc).
After collecting Chinese coins for approximately 1 year, I think I can tell, a real Chinese coin, from a bad fake with a fake patina, or maybe even a mediocre fake with a fake patina. Especially for the coin types, that I prefer to collect, because I am familiar with them (just like certain types of ancient Greek, Roman, and Byzantine coins). But a good fake with a fake patina? I don't know.
Another problem, is that all Chinese coins were cast, not struck, until 1889. That makes Chinese coins more difficult to authenticate.
As far as non-round ancient Chinese money goes (knife money, spade money, etc), I don't collect any of that, therefore I'm not good at identifying fake stuff in that area.

 

I don't collect Chinese coins and I know next to nothing about them. I have some very rudimentary knowledge from websites like this one:

https://www.calgarycoin.com/reference/china/china3.htm

Even though I don't collect them, I have many (some 200) Chinese coins, which were gifted to me by the daughter of a deceased Chinese friend. Here is a picture of the lot:




I have sorted them roughly according to dynasties. One box contains non-round coins of all shapes. Some coins I was able to identify with certainty:

For example, the two coins below seem to belong to the Northern Zhou Dynasty (AD 557-581), Emperor Hsuan Ti AD 578-580






Here is the reference from the Calgarycoin website



I don't question their coin, but in a direct naive comparison, my examples look a lot more convincing, I think. Put differently, I think had the Calgary coin been offered on Ebay, most people would have shouted "obvious fake", while it apparently isn't.

Any experts, please step forward

 

... next to Visigothic coins of the 7th century. These crude coins were faked to an extent that at some point most dealers would not touch them. I think the situation has improved though with better publications, but it remains a dangerous field, especially for the beginner.

 

Unfortunately these days, very few Chinese cash are either obviously fake or obviously genuine. About 10 years ago, I sold my entire accumulation of Chinese cash to a Chinese gentleman living here in the US. He bought just a few pieces at first, which he sent back to China for approval. Later, he returned and bought everything I had. He said that his friends in China will only buy from overseas because "everything for sale in China is fake".

The market today largely relies on trust. There was for some years an eBay seller based in Hong Kong who had an unblemished reputation and was a source for many collections and dealer stocks. Unfortunately, his eBay account has gone silent since the beginning of the 'troubles' in his city.

Below is some good advice from dealer Scott Semans who was one of the first to sound the alarm. The article is now dated in some respects but well worth a read:
https://coincoin.com/I054.htm

 

Interesting article, thanks for sharing. It reenforces my resolve to stay away from Chinese coins. He says that coins that were outside China before 1985 have a better chance of being genuine. I know that my friend's coins were outside China from at least 1993, so that may be a vaguely good sign.

On the other hand, when I read that literally metric tons of ancient Chinese coins (millions of coins) have been found only in the last couple of years, I cannot believe that the post-1985 market is completely dominated by fakes.

 

Hi. Resident expert in Chinese material. I’ll try to help you where I can.

Sure! From my collection:

It is not. The whole coin is very crude, and the two characters on the handle are raised rather than incuse and inlaid with gold.

It’s actually a very obviously modern patina. Electric blue and pasty green are very bad and never seen on genuine coins.

Most are uncertified, but there are 6 grading companies that certify Chinese coins. 1 is in the US (ANACS), 1 is in Hong Kong, 1 is in Singapore, and 3 are in China.

Many of them are fake.

Not the best pic, but looks much more genuine than yours.

That one is clearly a fake.

I can for the most part. There are several others whose opinions I would weigh heavily.

100% accurate.

ANACS kinda offers this service. I’ll be trying to get something similar in the US (specializing in Chinese) in the nearish future (this decade, hopefully).

Both are forgeries. (EDIT: second one might be genuine upon second look. Not sure from the pics. It still looks weird.) Here is mine, which is authentic:

I find the opposite to be the case. Yours have the weird patina and the characters are very thick and crude. That is wholly unlike a genuine coin.

I encourage new collectors to either stick to highly-trusted sources or find another collecting area altogether. Prices are also skyrocketing like cryptocurrency, which makes it a much riskier and unstable market to enter.

There are literally billions of genuine coins to be chosen from. The tricky part is identifying them as genuine.

 

@TypeCoin971793 Thanks for your informative post.
Does ANACS offer a COA service, with ID and photo lookup on their web site, in which they don't slab the coin?
If so, do you know, where I could find that info, on the ANACS web site?
I just now looked at the ANACS web site, but I haven't found that info.
Also, what do you think, of the expertise, of ANACS, for authenticating Chinese coins, both ancient and medieval?

 

No, just a slab

 

I’ve heard they contract out Chinese coins to a highly-reputed dealer, but that is not confirmed. I have not seen a single fake Chinese coin in their slabs

 

P.S. : I've seen Chinese coins in NGC slabs. What do you think, of the expertise, of NGC, for authenticating Chinese coins, both ancient and medieval?

 

P.P.S. : What do you think, of the expertise, of the non-US companies, which you mentioned in your above post, for authenticating Chinese coins, both ancient and medieval?
Is one of them GBCA?

 

That was a one-off arrangement with a dealer who bought a hoard of Chong Ning 10 cash in slender gold script. If any regular folk sent them in, NGC would reject them.

It varies. The Shanghai branch of Wende grading is considered the absolute best and infallible. Gongbo (GBCA), Huaxia, and Baocui are all considered reliable as well. There are many different branches of each grading service, and some are considered better than others. There are like 180 other grading services with widely varying repute. So big 4 and many basement slabs, like in the US.

I have a couple Chinese slabs with me here. The left is Baocui, and the right is GBCA. Both companies provide high-quality images of each and every coin certified on their websites to add security. The Baocui slab is interesting in that it is designed to be opened so the coin can be examined out of the slab without having to destroy the slab. These slabs are popular in China because you have the protection of the image and Chinese cash coins are not at all sensitive to handling with very few exceptions.

 

Thanks for the information. That's interesting.
Do those one-off NGC slabbed Chong Ning 10 cash seem to be authentic?
I have purchased a couple of slabbed Chinese coins.
One was in a GBCA slab. The other was in a Baohu slab.
Have you heard of Baohu?
Do you know, if Baohu is good at authenticating Chinese coins, both ancient and medieval?
Here is the Baohu slab, after I removed my coin from it. The coin is a Wu Shu.

 

Yes

Nope

No clue

It’s probably authentic. I rarely encounter fake wu zhus

 

Thanks. That is good to know.
One problem, with the Chinese slabbing companies, for me, is that I cannot read much Chinese. For all I know, the Chinese writing on the slab, could say "SMOOTHED" or "TOOLED" or "FAKE PATINA" or something like that.

 

P.S. : I guess, that a Chinese slabbing company, such as GBCA, wouldn't slab a coin, unless they believed, that the coin is authentic. Is that correct?
In other words, they wouldn't slab a coin, that they believed to be fake, and then write "FAKE" on the slab, in Chinese, would they?
Also, would they slab a coin, if they believed, that the coin is smoothed, or tooled, or has a fake patina?
If they believed, that the coin is smoothed or tooled or has a fake patina, would they note that, on the slab, in Chinese, the way NGC does, with ancient coins?