Heritage Platinum Auction, Session 5

Went back and read the thread and had completely forgotten that I had contributed to it. After almost two years, it all still seems to be a lot of speculation. Perhaps it's better that way.

 

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"Blame" is a mischaracterization of my comment regarding Heritage and NGC. I'm theorizing about the reasons for the rapid rise of prices -- far more rapidly than inflation -- for otherwise common ancient coins.

No one would disagree that people should choose how to spend their discretionary funds in whatever manner they wish. Inflation alone doesn't appear to explain the rise in prices for the (e.g.) Julius Caesar elephant denarius, though.

Based on your graph about inflation, my own personal observation is this: because net household worth has risen significantly in recent years, people are spending their inflated net worth in uneducated ways on "collectible" ancient coins that have been commodotized by the meaningless application of modern coin grading and slabbing to ancient coins.

If my observation is accurate, the obvious conclusion is that these individuals are not collectors in normal definition of the word, but rather speculators or "investors" who wouldn't otherwise have purchased ancient coins without the slab and NGC grade. They have been misled into believing that the slab and accompanying grade are valuable and a substitute for actual research and knowledge about the coins. Sadly, this seems to apply equally to highly priced ancient coins as well. The most information they'll ever know about their coins is that which is printed on NGC's label.

Maybe this is just a bubble (my hope) but more ominously maybe it's a trend and collectors who are truly interested in ancient coins for their beauty, history, and artistry will eventually become marginalized by the artificially inflated prices.

 

To know the origin of hoard you must ask the good persons. Many speculations that true but many facts too: Martin Armstrong was publickly advertising a bulk sale of Athenian owl from a hoard 2-3 years ago: truly dozens and dozens of them. The prices was: vf=950$/coin, vf-ef=1500$/coin. Someone here know him and ask where the batch come from ???

 

Thank you for these words, that's also exactly my feeling.

 

Does it mean time has come to get my own example slabbed and properly auctioned at Heritage ?



My only concern being this :

Maybe naive on my part (or I'm not that much after money), but I wouldn't like an un-educated person have "my" coin for the sole reason they have the money. I need it to be loved and appreciated

Naive Q

 

It is tricky at present. Nice coins, like good real estate where I live is unconscionably expensive. I was hoping for a nice portrait JC denarius, later downgraded to a lifetime issue elephant coin to facilitate my "Ancient History Thru Coins" talk to high school students. It looks like I'll have to rely on my J. Caesar portrait bronze, ex-NFA, @ $950, for quite some time now.



At this time a nice Cleopatra, either the tetradrachm or a denarius, is out of the question.

 

The biggest beneficiaries of the net wealth increases are older individuals. Older individuals by definition have “less time” left here. Therefore, I think it stands that many older collectors just don’t give a fig anymore for how much they spend, and simply want the coin. You can’t take anything with you when you go, so who cares if you pay $15k for a $5k coin, especially when you’ve made so much in the last 13 years as to make $10k immaterial.

I fret we won’t see a diminishment of these prices for a few decades, and then only if the new generations of inherited wealth decide not to continue on with their parents collecting habits. The market is not going to burst any time soon; I remember people saying one, two, three, ten years ago that it would, and what wealth accumulation those people lost out on. So, I think these prices are here to stay for quite some time.

 

That is an excellent (double) portrait bronze. Among the finest style that I've seen.

 

IMHO this is totally wrong. We "older" collectors may have more wealth than the previous generations, but we are still on fixed incomes. Inflation hits and our stash of money is worth less. We have to take the same dollar and make it stretch. And not knowing what the future has in store for us, older collectors are cautious about what they spend today. In my case, when I die my wife's income will be cut in half, so she will rely on our savings to supplement her needs. So in conclusion, I believe older collectors to give a "fig" about how much they spend.

 

Thanks, it was a nice one for the time. There are {far} superior ones out there at far superior prices. Rather than upgrading it tho I've tried for some of the other Dictatorial-era bronzes in high grades. I like this one tho as it has clear readable lettering on both sides. I can't find the NFA catalogs tho to pin down the exact sale & lot# tho and don't want to pay Ex Numis, for looking up that one piece.

 

I just posted my own antoninianus {two cents} opinion on this on the Heritage Platinum sale results.
the thread is here:
https://www.cointalk.com/threads/did-anyone-win-anything-at-heritage.385200/#post-7845482

 

reality is on pause anytime heritage or great collections has an auction....i bid on 30 errors last time around (winding down now), and am possibly going to win 1 coin, lolwe shall see saturday..

 

My suspicion is this isn't really an age thing. In the case of Heritage, they have a more international reach than most of the other auction sites. For example, they regularly host auctions from Hong Kong. I would expect that to bring them more buyers from China, and in my experience they tend to be less price conscious.

From what I can see at non-Heritage auctions, prices for the "well-known" coins like a Caesar elephant denarius are strong, but those for more niche coins are flatter. I expect the specialist who really knows his coins to continue to find bargains.

The other thing I've been wondering about is the total population of ancient coin collectors. I read somewhere that the estimate of worldwide ancient coin collectors is somewhere between 50k to 100k. Therefore, if only a few thousand more collectors join worldwide, that will cause demand and therefore prices to jump. It would be interesting to see statistics on the total number of bidders at various popular auctions over the last few years to confirm/deny whether that's the case.

 

I’ve definitely noticed an increase in prices for mid to high end Greek silver.
Seems like we are in an ‘everything bubble’ and all the excess money that has been printed just needs somewhere to go.. it finds its way into just about anything scarce, desirable, or otherwise investable…
With that said, I was pretty salty about getting smacked down in bidding all year but finally won my first coin of 2021 from Stacks this morning!
Not a bargain but certainly not an insane, unreasonable hammer price like those shown above
Surprising as the coin is slabbed and graded Ch AU 5/5, 3/5

 

Another way to look at it is asset inflation. Inflation is absolutely happening but it’s effects are not felt evenly across all of the economy. Manufactured and mass produced consumer goods may remain relatively flat while things considered assets are booming - the wealth distribution is being stretched.
Those with assets are seeing their net worth balloon while those without assets are left behind as prices accelerate into the stratosphere..

If you look at prime real estate, stocks, fine art and other ‘rich people stuff’ over the last decade you’ll find they’ve grown not at the rate of ‘inflation’ (aka the CPI) but they have roughly tracked the growth of the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet.

Money printer go brrrrrrrrrrr

 

update, with 28 coins bid on, no wins, all went for crazy money

 

My situation exactly. I guess defense contractors are pretty happy that they'll soon be getting orders to replace the 85 billion $ of equipment left in Aghanistan. Won't take many of these guys to pretty much buy up and control the acients market.