Net Grading (Love It or Hate It)

Yep

If I was approached by a person looking to sell an ANACS or ICG 1914-D Lincoln, "cleaned/retoned/scratched etc etc...AU details / net XF " I would not want to pay or sell at anywhere near XF levels. I would probably pass at any but a bargain basement price.

To quote my buddy Rick, " There is no price to cheap for a problem coin". Learn it. Live it. It is a fact.

I do not even care to stock them, and when they happen to find a way into my inventory, I blow them out on the bay as .99 cent starters

 

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I agree as well, they should not set prices nor should their involvement add to the price. 'problem coin' is, in many ways, a very relative term. I would rather not allow others to dictate what is 'fact' when it comes to a hobby. There is some odd behaviour in this hobby. If I follow some, all my coins would be locked behind cheap plastic and I would be paying 6X more for a coin because it has 3 almost microscopic scratches instead of 5...or just because it is in plastic and heaven forbid one clean grime off a coin.

I think all these people will eventually have ugly black silver coins behind plastic and will realize why it is that almost ALL older coins are cleaned. Including most older coins that now rest behind plastic. Then they will stop railing about cleaning a coin and start asking the best way.

 

Don't take this the wrong way, but you are completely wrong. Your aversion to plastic seems to have warped your mind. Technically, I will not disagree with the phrase "eventually have ugly black silver coins behind plastic" if you live to be 2000 years old. Stored properly, slabbed coins will not continue to tone at a rate that any of us can see. Certainly not in our lifetimes. There are Morgan Dollars that sat in bags for decades and toned with rainbow brilliance because they rested against the canvas. The ones that did not touch the bag look essentially the same as they did the day they left the mint although they certainly have a very thin layer of silver sulfide on the surface. Those Morgan Dollars did not have any protection other than that they were left undisturbed for years.

The levels of hydrogen sulfide gas in normal atmosphere are not high enough to cause horrible toning to slabbed properly stored coins. You seem to think that plastic is ruining the hobby. I will tell you this, if you buy $1,000+ coins, you will sleep very well knowing that the coin is market graded, authenticated, and encapsulated for it's protection. I have long said that coins under $100 don't benefit from slabbing, but I would not even consider buying a $1,000 raw coin. The saying is "buy the coin not the plastic." The saying should be "buy the coin not the plastic, but don't ignore the plastic."

Paul

 

I think people should be railing about improperly cleaned coins...but instead I see so many people here saying, without any further explanation, 'DONT EVER CLEAN A COIN EVAR!!' or like a saw a member here the other day saying in a blanket statement 'well, you cleaned it so whatever worth it might have had is now lost'...This was before he knew HOW it was cleaned or even saw an image of the coin...he just told the guy he ruined the coin by cleaning it. This is the behavior I speak of. Instead of dealing with each coin, they make blanket statements... cleaning is bad...Few actually try to let the person know some minor steps one could take to help...so they either walk away thinking I either send the coin to someone and pay them to clean it, write the coin off, or live with an ungly coin that might be almost perfect save for some dirt and heavy tone. OR...because coin people gave no cleaning tips, they try it one their own with no advice and end up ruining the coin.

Maybe my mind is warped, but correct me if I am wrong but you pay higher prices for a coin that has a rainbow tone correct? Rainbow tones that can be made very quickly in my kitchen...think you can recognize so called NT from AT? Bet you you think you can We obviously have a very different view of how to approach coin collecting because paying a premium for colored coins, which I feel are often unattractive save for maybe just a hint of color, is warped IMO.

I have certainly purchased 1000+ coins None of them slabbed and I sleep just fine at night thank you. Then again I dont just throw 1000 USD around without knowing what I am looking at.

When I said that about black ugly coins, of course I meant many years which is why my example was a coin from the 1600. You see most coins we collect have been used, and haven't been stored in a vacuum save these god awful new coins that look like tokens. They might have even been touched and circulated!! If they ARE to be preserved for later generations then they will need to be worked on a bit then stored correctly and a slab has nothing to do with this...and certainly I dont want all my coins to be either black or locked behind plastic. The fact is, most coins that are worth 1000+ are older coins from long ago...if they are not black, most likely, they have been cleaned...90% of all of the most valuable coins have been cleaned...from ancients all the way to the 1800 and even early and mid 1900. Unless someone just used the harshest methods (and no, soft cotton cloths dont ruin coins!!), a nice coin should never been proclaimed worthless and I certainly wouldnt accpet it if it were.


Yes, I think plastic has ruined US coin collecting as a hobby IMO...You have people scouring the internet to find a coin, getting it slabbed and flipping it at a great profit...THATS a fact... , raising the price of coins, seriously effecting values. I believe a lot of these people see these things as just a commodity, this is their right but the practice, if allowed to creep into a hobby, does change it for the worse in many ways as I have stated in detail many times before.

Here is a coin I own, one of many that is worth well over 1000 USD:



When I got it from the previous owner who stored it in a desk drawer, it was black as night, I spent quite some time trying to thin out the black corrosion...would a TPG say its a problem coin? Maybe...do I care? not in the least....it will still sell for what it is worth. Would I ever think of putting such a nice coin behind a plastic sheen...not on your life..Do I have even the slightest doubt that it is real? Not at all...its a lovely coin. the one below is also a lovely coin...also it has been cleaned...also it will not lose a dime in value for it...I know this because I have had many offers.

 

I agree with Doug and I believe this actually backs him up. They do not profit by either grade - so if they give a coin a 66 then they think it should bring 66 money. If they say net-XF then they think it should bring XF money. Buyers decide the final price.

Lol - please take no offense, but this is funny - "I personally have no interest in buying a cleaned coin". When I look at your sig line I see all those toned Morgans - I am willing to bet some of them have been dipped or cleaned. I do know what you mean - or at least I think I do. I personally believe anyone who collects silver coins (even it top tier slabs) probably has a cleaned coin in their some where. For what ever reason it got past the graders - (key dates, light versus harsh cleaning, etc.). Don't take offense this is just my opinion.

OOPs by the way net grading does not bother me. I look at the coin and try to determine what I want to pay for it.

 

agreed. Even if its graded as NET VF-45, ultimately myself or another buyer will determine the true price.
If someone has it for sale for VF-45 prices, and no one buys it, well guess what? Its not worth VF-45 money.

Also, some damage can be very detracting, and even though it has a net grade of say VF-45, people arent going to pay for something like that, especially if its like this:



what would you grade it?
VG-10?
Would you pay 10 money for it? Even G-4/6 money for it?

 

The problem is determining a far market price for a cleaned coin and that depends largely on the nature of the clean and any other problems that might exist.

Ruben

 

I agree Ruben. I have some obviously cleaned coins that I really like - so I understand others would not buy them at the price I did, but the coin makes me happy which is all that counts.

 

That's an important point.

Yes, it works well with EAC guys... keeping in mind that, as a group, the EAC fraternity is WAY above average in personal skills and expertise.

It's instructive to realize "not all EAC 15s are created equal", just like "not all PCGS MS64s are created equal".

Consider two large cents, both EAC 15. One is 20 sharpness, very minor imperfections, net 15. The other is 45 sharpness, with major problems, net 15.

Which is preferable ? To each his own... but many prefer the "less problems, less detail" coin.

 

it's not very helpful

 

You've made another key point... any given damage is in the eye of the beholder. For one guy, it's forgiveable... for another, intolerable. That was the thrust of my earlier point about why I don't like net grading - it's impossible to assign a weight to any given flaw that is universal. Some give more weight, some less.

The coin above is NC - not collectible. No money above face. But that's just me.

And yet, through it all, the system works... because we don't have to agree on grade. We just have to agree on price.

 

That's what I was trying to say in my first post too. This damage doesn't affect the details grade of the coin, but definitely does impact the coin itself. I don't think I could give VG money for that coin. This is why I lobby for a details grade. If this coin was graded "VF Details, Surface Damage" I would look at the coin and see the damage was quite extensive and decide what it's worth to me...and in this case not much. This way there is nothing on the slab to influence the price.

 

example of net grading?

Hello Lehigh,

FYI- This photo depicts a Liberty nickel that looks like a gem proof under typical florescent bourse floor lighting. It includes many many hairlines that you can see under a Halogen point light source. The TPG's opinion was that the cleaning was within market acceptable limits so they slabbed it. Hairlines and net grading are not mentioned on the PR62 slab label.

Very best regards,
collect89

 

Yup, I'd have a hard time passing that coin off for more than its silver value. Even though its in better condition than some other seated liberty coins - but those others might have no damage.

 

I'll give you a dollar.

 

I don't personally agree with TPG's practicing this form of market grading either. IMO, they should only consider surface preservation, strike, luster and eye appeal when assigning the grade. Where the coin should trade on the market should not enter into the equation. In this case, the TPG's thought the hairlines were not bad enough to warrant a body bag, but they did penalize the coin with a PR62 grade.

 

I will agree that we approach coin collecting in very different ways. However, I doubt that you have the skill to make passable AT coins in your kitchen. With regards to my skill in detecting AT vs. NT, Doug has made the point very well in the past that almost nobody can tell the difference all of the time. There are certainly AT coins that look so good that they can only be classified as questionable. In this case, the TPG has to determine whether the toning is market acceptable or not. I am very good at determining toned coins that will meet this market acceptability.

With regards to the $1,000 price tag, maybe I guessed too low in your case. I think that almost every coin collector has a monetary limit on coins that they will feel comfortable buying raw. Maybe your limit is $10,000, I don't know. But if you buy a raw coin valued at $25,000 in MS63 and you decide to sell it and it comes back MS62 @ $15,000 from NGC, my guess is that you will lose sleep. If you decide to sell a $25,000 coin raw, then I wish you the best of luck finding a buyer. My guess is that they will all offer MS62 money, because they don't want to take the risk of the coin coming back from the TPG in an MS62 holder.

You think slabs have ruined the hobby. I think they have saved it from the bad coin dealers. Gone are the days of the coin dealer buying that $25,000 MS63 for MS62 money and then calling it a gem and selling it for $50,000 because their is no independent third party to refute his so called expert opinion. The TPG's force the dealers to sell the coins at a reasonable profit. They bring stability to the market and level the playing field for the collector IMO.

 

With all due respect, I don't think your post is very accurate. First, the TPG does profit by net grading because they incentivize people with problem coins will submit those same problem coins for submission. Second, I probably should have said "I have no interest in purchasing a harshly cleaned coin." I have no problem with TPG's encapsulating dipped coins as long as the luster and overall eye appeal of the coin have not been affected too drastically.

I really don't know what you are talking about in my signature line. There is only one toned Morgan and it is from the Battle Creek collection. Furthermore, I don't understand why you think a toned coin would be dipped or cleaned. The purpose of dipping a coin is to remove the toning. ??? It is true that the original reason for arificially toning a coin was to hide defects such as surface marks and cleanings, but the coins in my signature line are all representative of what is referred to as Type 2 toning. A type 2 artificially toned coin is not trying to hide a defect, rather the purpose is to create a dramatic rainbow pattern that will cause the coin to sell at a huge premium over its untoned counterpart.

The purpose of the statement about not wanting cleaned coins was supposed to mean that I don't want a coin that has obviously been cleaned. If cleaned properly (NGC calls it conservation), then I would purchase the coin as long as it meets my high standard for eye appeal.

I am not trying to be argumentative or cause offense either, just stating my opinions.

Respectfully, Paul