Why would PCGS and NGC need the endorsements of the ANA or anyone else for that matter. They've both been around for more than 20 years. They're both considered, I suppose by most people, to be the best two TPGs. What can they possibly gain by paying for the ANA's blessings? :rolling:
Nothing in my opinion. They own the market at this moment, particularly PCGS as far as prices realized. But to play the good ol' boy game they likely need to go along with it. The Investor/Collector ultimately will pay the tariff.
I have to agree, they don't need it. But there are those who do think it matters - kind of like the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval. So I suppose they are trying to please those potential customers. Beside's, it's probably a tax write off
Great analogy! My supplier, in my real life business, did that for two years with Good Housekeeping and then stopped. Either the product stands on its own merits or it does not. The " Seal of Approval " from Good Housekeeping came with numerous caveats anyway as this probably would.
No, I'm pretty sure that would be copyright infringement. And it won't take long before they see it either. Basically it was about TPGs and what are their warranties when it comes to authentication.
Well it is copyrighted, but I hold the copyright. Guest Commentary Majors mum on authenticity guarantees Michael Schmidt of Portland, Ind., also known as "Conder101," is a collector and a researcher of slabs and slab varieties. I enjoyed Beth Deisher’s Editorial on verifying the expertise of authenticators in the Oct. 2 issue of Coin World. There was a great deal of sensible advice contained therein that should be of great value for newer collectors, if they will only take it to heart. I did get a bit of a laugh out of her advice about checking out the grading services’ written warranties on authentication. I especially liked the line, "An encapsulated coin without warranty of authentication is worthless and dangerous." A great many of the third- and fourth-tier grading services do have written warranties of authenticity on their Web sites. Some of them are a bit vague about what specifically your compensation will be if an item is found to be fraudulent, but they do seem to imply that you will at least get your slabbing fees back. What most of them do not have is any form of warranty on the actual grading of the coin. Most say something like since grading is subjective it is impossible to guarantee that different people will evaluate the same way so no guarantee of the grade should be implied by the opinion of the grade appearing on the holder. On the other hand, the major services on their Web sites all make sure to specifically inform the collector that the grading on their slabs is guaranteed and what the collector’s options are and how he will be compensated if the grading of the coin is wrong. However, none of the major services have any specific written guarantee of authenticity! There is nothing about how a collector will be compensated if his coin turns out to be a fake. After several years on the Professional Coin Grading Service coin forums, a few "troublemakers" have agitated on this topic enough that, in at least one ad in Coin World, PCGS did include the line, "All coins in PCGS holders are guaranteed to be authentic." Not on their Web site, just in an advertisement. That is the sum total response of several years of questioning on the forum, and in my case 20 years of pointing out to anyone who would listen that their "guarantee" contained no discussion about authenticity. The other major services Web sites are no better. No written guarantee of authenticity, no discussion of how a collector would be compensated. By those standards, and Deisher’s advice, it would sound like maybe the collectors would be better off with the third- and fourth-tier slabs. At least they do guarantee authenticity. But no, that isn’t true either. The real lesson to be learned is to realize that there are no guarantees, and it is very important that a collector, especially a novice, must endeavor to learn as much as possible about the coins he collects and not to trust any grading service blindly. Getting advice from those more experienced is good, but before you spend serious money on a coin, you really should understand as much as possible about what you are buying and not be dependant upon others. ("Serious money" is a relative term. For some it’s $100, some others wouldn’t flinch at $100,000.) Now I admit, to date, the major grading services have been very forthright and have always stood behind their product and compensated the collector. But past behavior does not mandate future behavior. Having paid off others in the past does not obligate them to pay off for newly discovered fakes in the future. For that you need a written promise or guarantee, something that someone can point to and say, "You have made this obligation!" So I have to wonder about the major grading firms. Why are they afraid of putting their necks on the line with a written, specific, guarantee of authenticity, and the little guys aren’t? CW
I don't think NGC will be making any blanket authenticity guarantee for all of their slabs as they have knowingly slabbed items with "COPY" stamped in the reverse. And even failed to make any mention of such on the label.
I did not state that they certified a fake, merely stated that they can not make a blanket guarantee for everything in their slabs to be authentic. That item is definitely not one of the original pieces, and evidenced as so by the "COPY" mark. Unless one wants to consider it to be an authentic copy. I would have thought it rather important that a word such as "copy" or "restrike" should have been on the label as well, just to eliminate any possible confusion with the original strikings.
I understand your point cwt, I sort of expected a coin like that was what you were referring to. There are several actually, another would be the $100 Gold Union. That coin was never even struck, there were only paper design sketches. NGC did however put Private Issue on the label since the coin was not marked. I suspect in this case they did not put it on the label since the coin is so plainly marked. They did mention on the label though what the coin was in honor of. Bottom line, I think they could issue a blanket guarantee without any problems if they wished to do so.
Tpgs put all kinds of special things on labels, but most collectors believe wholeheartedly that the "top" tpg slabs contain 100% authentic items. Heck, most folks believe you avoid all cleaned coins by buying slabs, and the tpgs don't even make such a claim. I can picture some shady ebay seller who only shows the front of the slab as some do, and have a no return policy on slabbed items as some do, and putting one of those up hoping bidders will believe it is a slabbed original Lovett piece. There was plenty of space on the label to make some kind of notation that it was not an original. From what you said about the $100 Gold Union, and assuming that the slabbed items were some form of reproduction (since "real" ones were never struck), it seems as if it should have been labeled as a fantasy piece, not as a private issue. At least that is what I believe most collectors would call a reproduction of something that never existed. There is a world of difference between the two. But then, I don't expect much from a company that has been using the (Civil War token) Fuld id numbering system for several years now and still has not figured out the significance of upper and lower case letters. I guess they would have no problem issueing a blanket authenticity guarantee anyway, since there are no provisions, terms, or parameters as to how they would handle such a problem/claim. It's just simply "guaranteed". I guess that is supposed to make people feel better. (shakes head)
Condor Wrote: "Well it is copyrighted, but I hold the copyright. " Unless Coin World gave credit to you for reprinting your material from your origanal material, then Coin World owns the copyright. That said, I havn`t subscribed to CW for over a year and cannot speak to this specific. I will research the backround, and comment appropriatly. Who cares who endorses what? We all know at what level PCGS, NGC, ANACS and the others grade at. This seems like a red herring argument. We all know PCGS graded coins will get Top dollar. NGC will be a little less. ANACS has some sway with Morgan dollars. The others have their place in the market, and most of us know what that place is.
