Die Links: is my coin authentic?

Although I got this from a seller that I trust, something about this coin looked odd to me, the fabric, some elements of the obverse design, the flan crack...I am not sure what made me question it and look for matches on Forvm Fake Ancient Reports.

Whatever led me there, I did find a match - a cast fake. However, it is only a single die match to my coin (RIC IV 130a), the reverse. The obverse is a different die from mine.

One die match...what could I make of this? Lots of coins share one die - perhaps I only share a die with the real coin that was the basis for the cast fake. For anyone interested in more information on die links, here is a link to an excellent site from @dougsmit.

Next, I looked for other die matches and they weren't hard to find. I found several in ACSearch from auctions including this coin from CNG, an obverse match, with a different reverse, an expensive and rare type (RIC IV 125a). The animation shows the overlay of the two coins.

That seemed interesting, at least there are other coins that have sold as genuine that match mine. In all I found 4 obverse matches and 2 reverse matches - from almost as many different auction houses - no double die matches to my coin. There are more, I stopped looking after finding a few. I thought that it might be interesting that these two different issues share a die as that could establish that they were minted in the same place and time. The obverse matches both to the rare 125a and to my coin 130a.

Next, I checked RIC and a few other references. Nothing too surprising, both coins were minted in Rome circa AD 201-206. Not unreasonable that these coins could have been minted in the same place and time.

Next, I went back to Forvm - with another thought - are there any fakes reports for the rare coin? This time I found a die match for the Obverse of the rare 125a, a "well known" Lipanoff fake. To me, this means that both the obverse and the reverse of my coin independently matched dies that were the basis of fakes. Does that have any implications for my coin - beyond a bit of practice spotting die links?

I decided I needed another opinion, so I sent the coin off to NGC.

As always, additional information, insights, questions, corrections, and input are appreciated. Any guesses on what came back?

 

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It's important to realize that a cast of a real coin will be a die match to any of the coins used to strike the exemplar. There are some issues that were very limited and struck with only a few dies. In that case, many genuine coins will be a die-match to the cast forgery.

The way the forgery was made is important -- a die match to a known forgery produced by striking with modern dies is very damning. A coin whose flan shape and dies match a cast forgery is very damning.

But in the absence of casting bubbles, soft details, a casting seam, or other indications of casting, a die match to a cast forgery isn't very suspicious. Sending it to NCG wasn't a bad idea, but I wouldn't be surprised if it came back as genuine.

 

Transfer die fake (your coin was sold by reliable British ebay seller), notice the damaged letters, the detail loss and the very typical flat surface and specific edge cracks for pressed fakes. And the die links to other transfer die fakes sold by fake sellers.
Picture 1 merged transfer die fakes
Later pcitures authentic coins same dies or same dies before recutting and without detail loss.