1958 Franklin Half Dollar PCGS MS67+ FB CAC sells for $110k at auction

I don't see where anyone called you a fool but they have questioned some of the false information you posted.

 

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more people agree with toning being questionable, and grade being off 3 , 2 or 1 point than have not, and like i said, coin is nowhere near grade,,,,

 

Hope you take the time to read all that others said. You missed some really important information on grading coins such as this. There are many factors used to grade and you can't ignore any of them. I won't grade the coin because I have never held it.

 

What I think of when viewing things like this is comparable to wild and crazy exotic cars, boats, planes, jewelry and fancy watches. All are very overpriced and intended to entertain a very small number of extremely fortunate folks. Most of this stuff is purely ostentatious in nature, and not really appreciated by many.

 

What characteristics do you see that makes you think it's questionable? Do you think it's been gassed? An accelerated method? Chemicals/dips? Do you have problems with the color progression? Do you see colors that you wouldn't expect to find from album toning or late 50s mint sets? Are the color locations inconsistent with what would normally be expected?

As you can see, Artificial/accelerated toning can be very difficult to detect when done well. We've all seen the Technicolor monstrosities that are easy to spot, but this coin isn't one of them. Is it natural? I'm not sure but I don't think there are enough questionable attributes to immediately call it questionable without providing some reasons.

I think there are some really good toning doctors out there. With a good knowledge of chemistry and some practice, I think they can produce toning that's nearly impossible to differentiate from natural (which is why I think paying $$$for toning is ridiculous). Since it's a complex subject, I think that the more coins you look at, the better you will be at spotting problems. In this case, I'll trust the experience and credibility of PCGS graders who handle thousands of coins annually instead of somebody who just offers an opinion without any supporting info/reason why they don't like it.

BTW, I believe the technical grade isn't close, but we live in a world of market grading. Like it or not (and I'm not a fan), that's the way the game is played. If you don't like the market grade, don't buy the coin.

 

Don't blindly trust photo grade. There are many marks sometimes on high grade coins that without magnification find themselves in a gem+ slab.
Gem = Is as struck,

 

Interesting point of view. I am barely thru a quarter of a $50 dollar bag of 1963 Lincolns. I have coins that are luster and eye appeal bombs, until you magnify it and see all the imperfections

 

Your contention that the coin is AT is based solely on the fact that you have never seen a coin like this before, which ironically is the same reason it is graded so high. Nobody has ever seen a Franklin with this level of toning an eye appeal. That said, the evaluation of toning with respect to originality is based on a series of indicators. Nobody can say for certain that a toned coin is either AT or NT, but we use the indicators to make our best guess. Some of the indicators used are appropriate color scheme for the series, toning pattern consistent with standard storage for the series, depth of surface color, elevation chromatics, toning correspondence etc. If you read that last sentence and find that you don't know what some of those things mean, then I would say that you are not in a position to make an informed opinion about the originality of the toning.

I won't give you my complete analysis of the toning, but I will repeat what I have said previously, that this coin displays quintessential 1958 mint set toning.

As for the grade, your contention that the toning bumped the coin up by "3" grades is hyperbolic. This is an MS65 all day long without the toning. Furthermore, this is the second time that you have mentioned photograde. As an experienced collector, my impression when other collectors refer to photograde is that they are novice collectors. In other words, telling us that you are using photograde is not convincing, rather it impugns your credibility. All photograde can do is give you a general idea of the appropriate number of marks for the assigned grade. I haven't seen anyone in this thread contend that the coin in question has MS67 surfaces. Market grading includes more than just surface preservation and contrary to the opinions of many members of this forum, surface preservation is not a grade limiter. Look at it this way, if surface preservation accounts for 40% of the grade, and the other 3 factors account for 20% each, then I would contend that this coin could be graded:

Surface Preservation: MS65
Luster: MS69
Eye Appeal: MS69
Strike: MS67

The resultant grade would be MS67, which is what PCGS graded the coin.

Your final point about discounting toned coins because they will be black discs in 2 decades is absolutely absurd, and cements the fact that you have no idea what you are talking about with respect to toning.

 

I was offered this coin in early 2018, and had it in hand. Having collected toned Franklins for 40+ years, this coin definitely hits the Top 10 for the most unique, interesting, and beautiful toning on any Franklin known.

I graded it 66 or 66+ (forgot which), because the surfaces held the grade back, but the eye appeal was off the charts. I offered $10,000. At that time, the highest price paid for any 1958 Franklin in any grade was just over $3,000. It was a strong offer, but it was declined. If I recall correctly, the ask price was $17,000.

You know what happened next, it sold at auction in Sept 2018 for $129,500. Update for those who are not aware, it was put back into auction in May 2021 and sold for $47,000.

Funny, had my offer been accepted, this discourse would not exist.

P.S. - Some folks making comments here should listen to Lehigh96 and ldhair, they are doing well with trying to help you.

 

Can anyone remember this Franklin from about 15 years back? Sure looks like the coin that was bouncing all over the forums at that time.

 

i am a novice, i have only been collecting for 47 years now, used to be a dealer full time in the early eighties, and am getting back into selling, ok, i have taken several ana courses as a young numismatist back in the eighties, but i still use photograde as a choice, as it is rather easy to use, and it is by their standards (pcgs's site, after all)..so whatever, go ahead and pay ms-69 prices for a coin that is ms-64 (65 at best), the coin is ugly and i repeat myself, in my opinion it looks like all the others on ebay, you can buy a whole roll of at cents for 20.00 if you so wish....and toning does not make any points in a grade as far as i am concerned, and in some cases lowers the price if hideous, or screaming fake, that is all i have to say

 

I can only recall about 3 yrs. back when it sold for about 129,500. I didn't get it then, and I still don't get it.

 

supposedly the pretty colors adds 2 or 3 points to a grade, go figure, not in my book, and not for my money

 

If you want to live in your own world for grading thats fine, but I fail to see what the point of going on and on and on about it. Multiple people have tried to help you underastand how to actually grade and you just keep repeating the same things in multiple threads. You're not going to change grading by posting on here and you aren't really adding anything new by posting essentially the same thing for pages on end.

You really didn't even address Lehighs response you just repeated a previous response.

 

“Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and to remove all doubt”

 

Sometimes the cone of silence is the correct route.

 

i am not the only one that thinks coin is overgraded, so will stick to my guns on this one,just my opinion, if that were my coin and i posted it, there are some on here would argue not even unc, becuase it is in a holder, it is a 67+...the damage to the coin is there, albeit covered by pretty toning, not worth anywhere near what it brought in my opinion..and that is all i am going to say on this subject...

 

You and the others who think this coin are over-graded either don't understand "market grading" or simply refuse to apply it. Pretty much every person who has opined on this coin thinks it has MS65 surfaces at best, but they also admit that the toning is the reason the coin was, in their words, "bumped up" 2 grades. Therein lies the fundamental mistake that everyone is making. The TPGs don't grade the coin based solely on its surface preservation and then make adjustments based on the other elements of grading (luster, eye appeal, & strike). They grade the coin holistically and incorporate every element of grading. So when they see a coin with MS65 surfaces, an MS67 strike, and the best luster & eye appeal they have ever seen (MS69-70), they appropriately market grade the coin to MS67. The added "+" designation is an adjustment intended to mean this coin is better than what you would normally see in a typical MS67.

So on your side, you have a bunch of amateur collectors grading a coin from a photo, and on the other side, we have the professional graders at PCGS and John Albanese at CAC both who have seen the coin in hand agreeing that he coin is an MS67+. Earlier in this thread, you scoffed at my assertion that people who admit to using PCGS Photograde to help them grade are novices, and made some ridiculous statement about how you have been collecting for nearly 50 years and were a full time dealer when you were young. When I grade this coin, I don't need to use Photograde, because I have seen dozens of 1958-D Franklin Half Dollars in hand, including premium gem and full bell examples.






Above I have shown 4 premium gem examples for the date/mm that I have personally photographed. Not even having seen the subject coin of this thread in hand, I can tell you that none of the 4 coins shown above hold a candle to it, despite everyone of them showing better surfaces. The other elements of grading matter, and when you find a coin with the combination of color & luster that is the finest known, it dwarfs the impact that surface preservation has on the overall grade of the coin.

If you notice, all four of these coins are toned, and while you can't tell from the photos, the luster is muted in the first 3, and the toning on the 4th while stunning in its own right, simply doesn't compare to the subject of this thread. Tomaska called coin #4 and Everest Coin, so what does that make the coin in question?

Seems to me, you can either continue to make ridiculous statements like you did in your last post when you said that people will think the subject coin is AU, or you can take the L.

 

And then there are those of us who wish they had the opportunity to see as many as you have. But we don't, so we work with what we have, and often that is Photograde.