Frank Robinson auction ending March 27

I'm confused about this. On this lot, if the "...bid [was] 24x minimum..." then clearly the lot sold for "...over ten times minimum..." since it sold for, well, 24x minimum. What am I missing here?

It is very interesting, and potentially useful in future bids, that this auctioneer posts the maximum bid he received in addition to the winning bid. Sort of wish the major auction houses did that, but maybe their bids are mostly in-person and they don't have a lot of written bids that end up exceeding the hammer price.

 

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Ugh, it's still too soon. Lol

 

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SPQR is highly recommended. Read it last year. On one of my coins I bid $120 but got it for $67. (Severus Alexander sestertius). The other ones were roughly 10% higher than the trailing bids.

 

Bid 3, bought 3. Two nice, one hard to come by. Nice additions.

 

Can't wait to see all you guys' coins. I won a nice Byzantine coin I can't wait to show you all.

 

Me either...looks like i won lot 131...a nice drachm of Artabanus I! Horray!!

 

Haha, I'm whining about not winning it.

 

Yep, I'm looking forward to all the "Look what I got!" threads next week.

 

What you are missing is that someone bid $1200 on a coin where the second high bid was under the $625 that they ended up having to pay for the coin. I am less surprised that someone bid $1200 than that someone else bid almost $625. Many of us have a few coins that are the only ones we have ever seen of the type. In some cases that did not mean we had to pay ten whole dollars since some of us collect things that collectors and dealers with money do not want at any price. I am shocked at several of the results but everyone knows I am a cheapskate. I am sure this sort of spread is common in the big name sales but we never see it because we don't know if the winner of a $10,000 coin bid exactly that amount or $100,000.

"...the lot graded F+ that sold for over ten times minimum on a bid 24x minimum."
Working from memory I mispoke. The minimum was $50 so it sold for a bit over 12x. I hope I know the winner. It is a coin I would have liked to win.

 

Thanks -- I think I understand what you meant: the winning bidder would have paid as much as $1200 for the lot but ending paying "only" a little over 12x times the minimum of $50.

Maybe the lot was simply underestimated?

 

As a one man operation, he puts together quite an interesting inventory!!

 

You think? I maintain my previous statement that most of the people here would not have paid the minimum bid. Frank does not post estimates but only a number below which he will not sell the coin. For the first couple decades he ran the sales, he posted no minimums but I suspect got tired of receiving $1 bids on every lot. I know I would have!

 

Back in those days Frank did not have minimum bids or reserves. They sold for whatever someone bid. But then again his sales back then had a lot of lower quality material. When he issued prices realized it was common to see a realized price of, say, $17.23. Yes, he actually took fractional bids, and in theory one could win a lot by one penny (its one reason he encouraged people to bid as early as possible).

I myself grow tired of estimates. It is just a mind and numbers game. Today I got an e-mail touting prices realized (I am sure many of you got the same one) highlighting a lot which estimated at $125 but realized $1,000.

For my next auction I will experiment and do away with estimates. The only number will be the minimum needed for a sale to take place.

 

We must think alike. As soon as I saw the list, I pasted it into excel and subtracted the sale price from the highest bid. If the value of things are truly "What someone is willing to pay for it", then these numbers are useful to know.

I placed a bid on Lot 235, when Frank responded with what was needed to overtake the highest bidder (someone bid $1000) I thought, "Wow, I was way off!". But now that I see the sale price, I realize that I was probably 2nd highest. Guess I wasn't that far off after all

 

I'll be interested to see if this has any effect on your auction.

Personally, while I note each auction house's "estimate" it never governs my maximum bid. I'm much more influenced by my research and my dealer's input.

 

I agree 100% on the 'tired' part but the fact as I see it is 'estimates' are actually 'minimums' when the house has announced in the rules that the minimum bid is 60% of the estimate. There are coins estimated at $100 that will not sell because no one wants the coin for $60. Either is better than the idea of posting a $100 estimate but allowing the seller to have a $150 reserve. There are coins that are estimated at $100 that everyone knows will go for much more. Given the choice, I'd prefer the minimums but either way the days of $17.23 bids beating $17.22 are gone. I suspect there were several back then who would append the same number of cents to every bid in the hope that their $.03 would beat my $.02. This made more sense when more people sent in a written bid sheet and had no idea whether they won or lost until the bill arrived a week after the sale. Some people phoned but in those days 'long distance' cost money. Someone could write a text on (abnormal?) psychology based on things they saw happen in coin auctions. Some of us met some strange birds. Some of us were......

 

I understand why estimates are manipulated. Often it encourages people to bid who might not otherwise if they feel there is a chance they might be able to participate. Other times it encourages consignors ('hey, we estimated $200,000 on this auction, but we got $1.2 million! Consign with us!).

Some people may laugh or just not understand, but as you say many of us did in fact get these cheap-o sales catalogs in the old days and enter blanket bids on pretty much everything. Often on my bid sheet I would enter "Lots 117 through 233, $17.48". But you know, it worked. I won a great many coins that way.

 

Funny, I had no idea who Mary Beard was, but happened upon the "Rome: Empire Without Limit" series on Amazon the other day. I'm a few episodes in and thought they were great. Glad to see I'm in good company!

 

It seems the bidding approach that Frank allows is quite fair. The maximum bid doesn't pay the amount but actually just a fraction above the next closest bidder, in other words what is necessary to win the coin, but not the high bid. This seems to me to be a very ethical approach to running an auction.