Serious question: Why is eBay littered with common US pennies and nickels of no particular distinction that have been graded and slabbed? These coins consistently sell for a fraction of the cost of grading (NGC and ANACS, mostly). Am I missing something? Some are recent date pennies graded at MS65 or 66. But I bought an old MS69 penny for $1.99 just to get a look at the ANACS holder, since I didn't have any.
Are you sure it wasn't a PR69? It's been explained many times before as grading lots for the reward of a few really high grades. The sale of the really high grades makes up for the cost of grading of all coins. To recoup some additional costs, put the rest of the slabs on ebay starting at 99 cents.
Because dealers send those in bulk for grading hoping they get a lot of 69's and 70's the dump the lower grades. I've even seen slabbed presidential dollars going for less than face value.
Nope. MS... here's a good example: http://www.ebay.com/itm/2005-SMS-Li...33?pt=Coins_US_Individual&hash=item35d4640ea9 If you search for "ending soon" auctions at odd times of day, it's pretty easy to find them with no bids.
Three basic reasons I can think of that low value coins get slabbed: 1. As was already mentioned, dealers will often send in bulk submissions trying for high (69 or 70) grades; if even a few get them, especially if they hit 70, the profit they can make off the high grade coins easily pays for the rest. 2. Some people are really obsessed with trying to get perfect, almost perfect, or at least the highest grade, coins into registry sets. A lot of people would try with low value coins to get a high grade registry set relatively cheaply. I suspect this is why I keep coming across slabbed Roosevelt dimes (a high grade registry set of these would be very cheap compared to other coin series) that are not even worth what the grading fee would be. 3. Filler coins: a lot of TPGs have discounts if you submit a certain number of coins at the same time, be it 5, 10, 25, etc. Some people just want the volume discount but don't have quite enough coins they need/want to be graded to quite meet the volume, so they throw in a random low value coin just to meet it. It can be worth it as it lowers the average grading fee considerably. I have done this myself at least once (I sent in a 1983 S. Korea 5 won coin just to hit enough coins to lower the average grading fees on the other 4).
You have to realize, some dealers send in bulk submissions of thousands of coins at a time (i think bulk submissions have a minimum of 100 coins) for bulk/reduced pricing. So the above posters are correct.... you win if you get 10%+ of the coins at MS69 or MS70. Then dump the lower grades for whatever you can get for them on ebay.
I've bought three slabbed UNC Presidential Dollars on eBay for about a dollar each over the face value. I did it just to have cheap slabbed coins I can give away to a few people who don't know much about numismatics, to give them an idea of how higher value coins are graded and encapsulated. I don't think owning any PCGS/NGC slabbed coin at a price point under $3 can be considered a bad buy. Well, unless you buy a lot of them.
I have responded to this question a number of times. Not everyone collects coins based on how much profit they can make on each purchase. I am working on a two cent grade set. A grade set is one coin of each grade. Starting with P01 up to MS66BN, for the 1864 LM two cent that I have selected for the set, there are 26 possible coins. I still need a P01, F02, and a VG8. Yes, I do have other date sets of this series of coins in much higher grades, but this Grade set is a great study in grading, the variations in grades by any TPG and an opportunity to prepare an exhibit for my state numismatic society annual conference. And is just another approach to collecting. If you really want to learn a coin series well I recommend working on a Grade set. Here is one that won't make much sense to many.......
Yes, but you aren't selling your graded coins on ebay for 99cents. You are doing it to be part of your own set. I think the original poster's point was why would someone spend the money to grade a low-end coin only to sell it on ebay for around a dollar.... losing proposition.
But I am willing to assume that someday, long after I'm gone it just might be possible that some of my coins would end up on eBay. It could happen. The explanations earlier in this thread address the OP's point on profitability well.
