The Toning Premium Thread

Read it again Chris. No where did he use the word ALL. He simply said "chances are" which loosely translates into a 50/50 bet. Chances are it is and chances are it isn't. At least thats my take.

And BTW, I personally don;t think QDB intends to "scare" anybody. He just wan'ts folks to "know" before they buy. Not learn after the fact. Nothing is more edumacating than posting a gorgeous toner to the forums and then have everybody say "AT AT AT".

As for AT vs NT Knowledge: I don't believe that anybody knows for sure unless its obvious to everybody. Otherwise, the doctors would not be good enough to cause concern.

 

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I'm not sure I agree with the former (which suggests more than 50% of rainbow coins are AT). However, I sure do agree with the latter, and have been preaching that credo for a while now (not that anyone listens to me ).

p.s. I guess $750 for Shane's gorgeous Morgan, but suspect Shane got it for a bit cheaper.

 

I agree with this.... coin doctors are very good at what they do, and there is "significant" profit in taking a $300 morgan and turing it into a knock down toner for those who know how.. and then selling it for $4000+.... and it benefits the tpg's also, as more folks who've hit big at this game send in more submissions and happily take a 10% 'grade' vs. 'bag' rate for that big score... and the wheels on the bus go round and round. I like art, and appreciate the work that doctors do, and willingly pay premium for good paintings on coins,,,, but I don't go nuts and I don't make toners a majority portion of my coin collection.... I concentrate on key dates first, rips or super deals second regardless of the coin, and then fun stuff last (toners falls into this group)... now if I can combine a key date or super ad hoc deal with toning, great... if not, then that's a good score imo too.... and for those spending 20x+ on a toner, good for them, but as the population of these monstors continues to grow, economics and Einstein's universal law of regression to a historical (or natural) mean will likely find them with less $ when it comes time to sell, while those who bake in some investment minded key dates and sharp spot buys will likely do better at the point of sale.....
Guess my biggest downer on toners,,, i.e. the investment side... but they still rank very high on the fun and enjoyment side..... just depends on what your in the coin collecting game for.. me? a bit of both..... so I try to never go above 5x on a monstor toner, or find toning patterns that are pleasing to me but which do not drive the crazy premiums.... Antique toning, golden, and light blue seem to be where I'm settling in within the toner space as I find these colors and patterns can be had readily within my comfort range....

 

I have to say, that I don't often agree with you when it involves the subject of toning, but I agree with most of your analysis here. I firmly believe that Bowers was speaking of a subset of toned coins. Bowers believes that coins with VIVID RAINBOW TONING are predominantly AT. Take a closer look at my scale. Notice that while there are rainbow shades on both the NT example and the Widely Accepted example, they are not vividly toned.




As you move further to left of the scale, the vivid colors start to show up. It is these coins that he warns against and these coins that drive the biggest premiums. And in truth, he is correct. The context of his article is about cherrypicking coins for their value and being a smart buyer. He is correct that buying expensive conditional rarities and paying large premiums for wildly toned coins which may be AT are very risky propositions and are not always financially prudent decisions. I don't think his statement is an indictment of rainbow toned coins. It is just that he would prefer this



which was purchased for 60% of PCGS Price Guide over this



which cost 5X PCGS Price Guide.


Regarding your 1891 Half Dollar, if it is AT, it is most certainly type 1 AT. The purpose of AT back in the early 80's when toning premiums were non existent was to hide problems or flaws to achieve a higher grade.

 

$605

 

Looks like Leadfoot is the closest...I paid $700 for the coin and it went right into my collection. I probably would not have paid that strong if I were trying to add it to my Ebay sales as once you get over $500 for common date toners the pool of potential customers drops off a bit. With that said...I owned this coin less than 30 minutes before I was offered a $200 profit on what I paid so while some might think me nuts....others might be a bit crazier. I also know that a few years ago this coin was purchased for $1500 so I think the $700 price tag is a bargain but hey that's just me lol

 

Exactly. Scary when we agree huh? Btw, I never said premiums were non existent back then, but were labelled differently. "Original" coins with "clean surfaces" were highly valued. They were often times toned. I have paid over book for pretty toned coins, partly for the toning, but partly for the nice original surfaces. I was never a fan of dipped coins, and only ever dipped them myself when they were extremely ugly or bordering corrosion. I admit I never paid todays prices, (5x-10x) but I paid well over book for nice original coins, as did others.

It simply the degree of pricing and ability for them to be reproduced that we differ my friend. You may be right on reproducibility nowadays, I have just posted what I saw with my eyes back in the day is all.

 

Shane,

Does that mean that you think $1,000 is a fair retail price at present?

 

Yes I do...that's exactly what I value the coin at in today's market, which is down from 3 to 5 years ago when this coin traded hands at $1500.

 

Dang , I really have underestimated the premium these beauties bring , guess I should double my guesses .
rzage

 

Beautiful coin,, but be careful.. as shane pointed out, the coin sold for 1.5k a few years ago and he picked it up this year for less than half of that....
Now someone just lots $800 on that beauty, probably for doubling thier guess when they purchased it.

 

Another good reason for this thread is it clearly attests to the market volatility over the past 5 years with regards to toned coins. Those of us in the market are very aware of the eb and flow but beginners jumping into the deep end with large premiums can quickly get in over their heads. I once bought a coin in 2009 from Sunnwood on the PCGS forums who put together one of the greatest if not the greatest set of toned Morgans on the planet. He had paid $1800 for the coin but as the market took a downward turn along with the economy he knew that the market value for the coin had dropped considerably. He offered me the coin for $1000 and I quickly purchased it. I have been on the wrong side of these deals a few times and while it wasn't pleasant...I knew fully what I was getting into. I think the point that Doug and a few others have tried to make in this thread is exactly that, even if I don't agree with the way they have gone about it at time.

 

To further illustrate my point above I just looked in the Heritage Archives and found my coin was sold in the Jan 2009 FUN Show for $546.25....and then I know if was resold by the purchaser for $1500 to a collector. So $546 to $1500 to $700 all in the span of roughly 2 years

http://coins.ha.com/common/view_item.php?Sale_No=1121&Lot_No=9282

 

Based on that photo, $550 is a very fair price. It surprises me that the coin was won with an internet bid considering the poor quality of the photo. Was the coin listed in the internet only bullet section of the 2009 FUN Sale? I am at work and don't have access to my printed catalog.

 

Woo hoo. Lucky guess for me.

Here's a coin I don't think we've discussed in detail before on this forum, but it should look familiar if you look to the left of this post -- it's my avatar on this forum:

A shot showing the color:


A shot showing the surfaces (note: the roughly vertical scratches on the reverse are on the slab):


The coin was purchased from Mark Feld in January 2006. The coin is graded by PCGS as a PR 66. CAC subsequently agreed with the grade.

 

I know you have had that avatar for some time, but I do not remember just how long. How about giving us a clue what era you bought that coin, please?

 

Amended post above -- in January of 2006.

 

$800

 

pulling a number out my donkey. $1234.56 ?

 

Thank you!

If I can interpolate things correctly, that should be $750 - $800 coin at the time. How about $1500?