I have noticed that some of the grading services are looked at with rather dubious opinions on this forum. I am fairly new to collecting, about 2 years and 6 months on this forum so I have been a little leary of sticking my nose in. I have a 1999 $5. gold piece slabbed MS70 by ACC, and several coins slabbed: Ike Dollar 1978D clad MS70, A 1964P dime slabbed silver proof 70 and a 2000-S Jefferson nickel slabbed "cameo proof 70 These 3 are "INB ceertified". All of the coins look nice, but I have no idea if they are truely "perfect 70 coins" Without bad mouthing any of the services, if I were to take these to a show, looking to trade them or sell them, would these grading services be looked at as "highly Qualified" or more on the medicore end of the spectrum? I really enjoy collecting and up until now I have only bought, never sold. If my $5.00 gold piece is truly MS70, I would like to trade it for a MS63 to 65 $50.00 gold Buffalo, what is your opinions on this?
ACC and INB will not be looked upon favorably. If you can trade the $5 gold for a $50 gold, there is a good chance you would be cheating the owner of the $50, but it would be a good deal for you. NGC, PCGS, ICG and ANACS are the top four grading services. PCI and SEGS are probably second tier. The rest are generally avoided by collectors.
Here is ACC's website. A super great company - if you believe their hype! And here is why the buyer of an INB MS70 is sorry he bought it.
well, the higher end services are: PCGS, NGC & ANACS, sometimes ICG (?) ACC & INB are very low end. (Or as you nicely put it :" or more on the mediocre end of the spectrum?") The only way to find out if your coin is 'tryly' MS-70 would be to have it graded by either PCGS or NGC-- Preferably PCGS.
For my 2 cents, NGC and PCGS have the reputation of being mostly consistent over the years (although both seem to have struggled with refining grading standards). I would agree that these two are the best and the same coin will generally grade the same at each service - obviously some exceptions exist. In general, I think ANACS comes in next. ANACS seems to grade coins about 1 grade higher than the same coin at NGC/PCGS (a PCGS MS 63 will be an ANACS 64). ANACS coins generally price lower than NGC/PCGS for this reason. However, ANACS will slab and annotate problem coins, which NGC/PCGS will not. I have some very nice coins in IGC holders also, I would rate them right below ANACS with the rest of the field coming in a very distant 3rd. I get a kick out of watching some of these home shopping networks that sell a boatload of lower-tier grading service "MS-70" coins. I would guess these coins are overgraded by as much as 3-4 grades. Always buy the coin, not the holder.... Dan
My opinion is you have nice coins regardless of who made the grades what they are. If your going to be a collector, not a dealer or trader, just be happy with your coins. Leave well enough alone. If you sell them, you'll spend the rest of your life wondering if you did the right thing. Just hang on to what you have and be happy with them as is. As you may see I am a collector only and would rather give something away rather than sell it. You have what sounds like some nice coins so be happy with them. Only my opinion.
imo ms-70 is a unicorn, that is to say mythical, doesn't exist like fairies and pixie dust, no coin is perfect.
