CNG revealing all proxy bids

We are taking about a live auction without floor bidders and telephones. So the flaw as I said is that the person bidding live online doesn't get automatically a message that his bid is outbid because of an pre existing equal book bid but you have to intervene manually to change this. This happens automatically in the weekly HA auctions with no floor bidding. Now in your case what was actually the benefit of having an auctioneer and an audio stream when everything could have been automated?!

 

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We could have held the auction as a totally electronic auction. The problem was when we took in consignments for this sale it was supposed to be a live sale. Covid-19 changed that. We asked the consignors what they would like us to do: delay the auction; hold it electronically; or hold it electronically with a live auctioneer. They preferred the last option. So that is what we did. And yes, had it been totally electronic the bids would have done exactly as you stated.

 

Ok that clarifies, thanks. In past only tritons in January were floor auctions, now you turned the others into floor auctions as well

 

Yes. All printed sales are now intended to be floor auctions. We had quite a crowd planning on being in Lancaster for 114. Sadly it didn't happen.

 

You have to realize that there were a number of us who would take the sale of a trusted institution with which we have been dealing for 30+ years to an unknown person with less than full, trusting acceptance. Old people tend to resist change and Victor has long been a trusted person. Thank you for posting here to clear this up. I do admit that the 78 part of MSG 78 worried me since that would be a bit young as a birth year. Obviously the Covid situation has made many things "can't win" no matter which decision is made.

You will note there are two kinds of coin talk registrants. Some use their given name while others hide with pseudonyms. My name was more likely to be previously taken than yours. It is a problem I have faced.

 

Welcome to CT! Thank you for addressing this topic and clearing things up. I was wondering if you could also address the topic many have brought up here surrounding how the bulk of so many coins in auctions seem to end up in the hands of only a couple of people.

I worry that those like myself who are collecting purely from a hobby perspective are being pushed out due to these select few individuals buying upwards of 70% of an auction at prices far above estimates. When I see this occurring I must wonder whether CNG is the proper place to spend my time attempting to acquire coins. I attempted to buy multiple coins in the recent auction for a few thousand dollars each, still well above estimate, and lost every bid to the same paddle each time. What comment would you offer to those of us feeling, and quite literally being alienated from acquiring coins due to situations like what we have seen in the most recent feature auction?

 

@MSG 78 , we all appreciate you speaking to us here sir. You truly have great people working for you Mike.

As to my position on this thread, it is two-fold. First, regarding any buyer "buying up 70% of the auction", oh well. It is capitalism. If they have the money, they can buy what they want. There are unlimited wants in this world. I sure would love to own a Davinci Codex, or a malibu beach house, or all the Eid Mar's in the world. I don't have that much money. Am I "mad" at people who do? Heck no. I should strive to do what they did to get such money. I do have more than two nickels to rub together, live in a lake community in one of the best suburbs in my vacinity. I sure there are 20,000 families near me that wish they could have my house instead. Just like I do not feel guilty living in my home that I could afford but others could not, I do not feel bad about anyone outbidding me at an auction. They bid more money period.

As to the "clearing the books" comment from the auctioneer, I could see it MAYBE when the live bidders have maxed out the prebidders. Even then its a maybe. I always envisioned my prebid as basically a proxy bid. The lot opens normal, live bidders bid against my prebid, (if I am the highest prebid), and a price is determined. Many of us who buy 3,4, or 5 figure coins do not have the luxury to listen to an auction live, let alone attend it. If my prebid will always be tipped off to floor bidders so they will always have that upper hand, like others it will simply discourage me to bid at all. I was gong to bid on a couple of high end Byzantine gold this last auction but got distracted. However, hearing this makes me leery now. I would suggest, simply as one businessman to another, to draft and publish guidelines on when the auctioneer may announce "to clear the book" simply so everyone knows the rules of the game. IF real money is involved, most people do not like playing a game they believe is rigged against them. The danger is if enough people stop prebidding, net realized prices will decrease since it is always the underbidder that sets the final gavel price.

 

I have a lot of respect for the dealers and auction houses who make time and effort to communicate with the collector community. Kudos, and welcome @MSG 78

 

This would only be the case if only one floor bidder wanted the lot. I would prefer sale either be floor or mail but not combinations of both. Those unable to attend a sale could employ a representative who would attend the sale (used to be for 5% - what is it now?) and buy as instructed or examine the lots and advise as needed. The elimination of pre-bids would considerably slow the sales since there would be competition on each lot but the end number should be about the same unless those in attendance had examined the lots and decided they were not worthy.

The matter of the super-rich brings to mind my favorite numismatic book Fun While it Lasted by Bruce McNall. He related the story of a Hunt Brother inquiring into the possibility of buying ALL the Byzantine gold - not a set but all of them. We need not worry too much about the long term effect of the 70%ers. Hunts, go broke, Sheikhs fail to pay (or is it die?) and old guys die leaving coins to kids who don't care so the coins are converted into racing cars. I do agree that it is a waste of time for most of us to follow the big sales unless we are smart enough to look at the 30% coins.

 

This was a common thread on Facebook as well. Here is the fact. The bidder that bought a great deal of the early lots in CNG 114 was a dealer. This dealer did something rather intelligent, given our current circumstances. They had the sale shipped to them so they could review the entire sale. Then they went out and solicited bids from their client base. Obviously, as the auctioneer, we were quite pleased by that. But it appeared that all the coins were being bought by, essentially, a hoarder. It just wasn't the case. I think the two main collectors people were directing their comments to have been harshly treated in these threads. Both collect a single coin of each type, maybe type by the specific reference number, but still simply one of each type. Can you outbid them? Yes, but you will have to bid strong. But are they hoarding and keeping everyone else from winning lots? No. From what I have seen, and not just in CNG auctions, they buy strong in two specific areas: coins with great provenances that they still don't have for a given type; and coins which are rare for their given variety as these coins are likely still holes in their collections, just like they are in most of ours. But for coins that aren't "one of" or coins that are somewhat available over time, I don't think they are any factor at all. I have seen prices rise dramatically for coins of all value and all types in the last few months. If you follow any dealers Esale at present you will be astounded at what some coins are selling for. I attribute a lot of this to Covid-19 and the fact we, as collectors, have a lot more time to look at auction and bid on coins we need. Once we all go back to work this may revert back to normal. But who can say for certain. I hope this helps clarify the situation.

 

I agree. I think this started out as an honest misunderstanding of what was actually happening and really wasn't cleared up fully, until @MSG 78 contributed a rational explanation. Thanks for spending a significant amount of your time to clear the air.

 

Not to belabor the point but I think your analogy misses the crux of the issue. The point is not that a person buys a singular coin, or in your case a singular home. But rather - imagine if your entire community was bought up by 1 person. That is the issue.

 

But it has been in many areas of the country. Hedge funds and others have bought tens and tens of thousands of homes to rent. Do they have the right? Of course. We still live in a free market. I actually own 3 homes, two being rented. Am I "wrong" too?

My avatar coin I own about 8 of now, 5 of the same type. I own multiples of each Byzantine anonymous type, and just bought another Class E from Frank Robinson. Are you saying I am forbidden from buying more than 1 of each "type", (however and whomever would define that)?

Sorry, but it is still capitalism. You have the money in your pocket, you can own it. Another have more money than you? Tough luck, they can outbid you.

 

Thanks Mike, and welcome to the forum! I can corroborate this as well: I had a handful of bids with this dealer (and another dealer, and a few clicking online by myself; there's strategy in spreading bids around).

What everyone is seeing from a single bidder number is not indicative of it being a single end collector.

That said, the collections being built by some of these collectors are vast and academic so, at times, it feels like they're siphoning up a large swath of meaningful coins which is challenging to compete against.

Hopefully they do indeed avoid buying many duplicates (although I've had discussions with these collectors and, for some series, even slight varieties in the die are worth acquiring in their eyes, which further balloons out the number of coins that will eventually end up in their collections).

The coin industry runs on a constant stream of consignments and it's looking like most of these coins will not re-enter the market. I've had conversations about them considering selling off duplicates but the effort is non-trivial and there are concerns about selling something that is even slightly different.

It is interesting to see the ebb and flow of massive buyers. "Happily", we haven't had a scenario in which there were more than 2-3 pervasive buyers starting off within a short window which has allowed enormous collections to be built with the newcomer joining late enough in the cycle to not be in contention for all of the key pieces. But, time will tell if new entrants into the market continue to broaden their collecting foci and if new players come from US/other sides of the broader coin hobby.

 

Monopolies are actually very anti-capitalist by nature, hence why we have things like the Sherman Act in the US. If you are a true believer in capitalism you should support having these large singular bidders "broken up" as it were. Though per the response from the CNG owner it appears in this instance it was not a single bidder.

 

Thank you very much for the reply! I appreciate the direct line of communication and tackling this question head on. Hearing it was a dealer versus 1 or 2 people definitely makes "moving on" from the losses easier to bear. Though I will forever miss the coins I lost on regardless ha!

I suppose us smaller bidders will just have to content ourselves with hoping Lady Luck helps out on the coins we want

Always been a happy customer of CNG and look forward to continue purchasing from you in the future, and hopefully in tomorrows auction! Thanks again!

 

Boy, how times have changed!
In my days, all it took to get a coin, even if it was in the 5 or even 6 figure range, was to keep your hand up.

 

medoraman brings up a point. We all differ on what constitutes a difference. By some standards a collection has room for a hundred different minor variations. I am attracted to the South Italian incuse reverse coins. It seems that some of them have just about as many minor variations as there are dies. This requires you to care about such things as letter placement and what small items are in the fields on one or both sides. The coins come in more than one denomination so it would seem possible to 'need' a dozen coins that someone else would consider the same type. Add to that the fact that some of us care about weight standards, fabric changes or even errors and we might need fifty coins to cover one "type". I do wonder if the quantity buyers here recognize these differences or are just assembling 'roll sets'. Every ancient coin seems unique in some way and we all differ in where we draw lines. One person's defect is another's variation. I hope I am not forbidden to want another Metapontium grain, Kroton tripod or Sybaris bull etc. etc. etc. There are still many I don't have. I never will (not being a billionaire).
This thread lacks coin images so:

Someday I will get attracted to a normal coin but those get bought by the big dogs leaving these odd ones for me.

 

Are you saying that, for example, they would theoretically be interested in acquiring one of each different known and cataloged die/control mark variety of every Roman Republican coin, which in many cases would mean hundreds of different specimens of each of the 500+ coin types? That really wouldn't leave much room for anyone else!

 

I can say that as mainly a Seleucid collector, that the wealthy collectors in my field try to buy essentially every interesting coin on the market. There is very little left for the average collector unless you want to spend an absurd amount. There have also been two major published collections bought in their entirety before even entering the market by a main player. It’s a very difficult, and increasingly impossible situation for collectors of normal means. Let’s not forget the Gorny sale earlier this year that mirrored the CNG results, if not exceeded. This doesn’t bode well for the ability of collectors of normal means to compete. The auction companies are certainly not at fault as it is their job to generate the top prices the market will yield. But, it doesn’t change the fact that the market has turned to the detriment of we little guys.