Ancients an Alternative Asset?

If you’d bought a ton of Owls a decade ago, you might not be very happy today, given that 100,000 of them were recently dug up. And you saw how well my JC denarius did over 20 years.

My point is that it’s probably not enough to just buy “popular” coins.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Well there is the answer choose your coins wisely IE not with emotion.

 

This thought comes up regularly on coin chat groups I've attended over the last 20 years ago. It's mostly not true. I have been collecting Roman coins for 35 years and in my experience, most buyers of $500 coins are accountants or engineers, possibly dentists, sometimes army veterans, IT specialists, real estate lawyers and such like. 90% of the volume of "high end coins" are bought by modestly paid people in ordinary common professions, mostly waged employees. I'm a retired engineer for example, living on an income around the US/EU median, so am a 50 percenter, not a 1 percenter. Yes $600 is a lot of money, but it's the time and dedication that gets you there. If you work in accountancy and have been collecting for three decades and put aside 10-20% of your monthly for that purpose, and sometimes sell coins you bought 20 years ago to fund new coins, then you will have amassed a six-figure value collection and should be able to cautiously continue to add $500 or even $1000 coins from time to time. I am extremely cost conscious, yet sometimes I miss the chance to buy a coin when cheap, and later pay a lot more than I would like. Still, in doing so for example when buying from a retail dealer who bought a coin cheap, I'll try and pare back every dollar I can, and look for payment terms, discounts for bank transfer and so on, and will often walk away (have often walked away) from a coin that was 5 to 10% more than I was willing to pay.

There are some well off people buying $1000 coins. But most coins at that admittedly high price level are bought by guys on a $5000 monthly net (which is BELOW the US median income) who are just very careful, and are in it for the very long term, selling as well as buying.

 

That's really interesting. I wonder if there's some data out there on who's bidding at these auctions. I think one area you're missing is the influx of money from collectors (undoubtedly wealthy) in foreign countries like Russia, the Middle East, China, etc.

 

I actually collect two types of coins, high end and low end but both of the same sort of material - Roman Republican coins. To this day, I continue to buy exactly the same sort of interesting cheap rarities as I did 30 years ago. I study them, enjoy them a while, research their types and provenances, fondle them, photograph them, think about them, then after some time, I'll often pass them on, by sale sometime or often by swaps with other collectors. In parallel with this, I continue to improve the quality of the core part of my higher end collection, funded by s small slice of my modest monthly income and/or by fostering some of my other coins to new collectors, once thoroughly researched. I love all my coins equally, those costing two figure sums and those costing four figure sums. This week I added two pieces, one at either end of the scale. One was a Julius Caesar portrait denarius, which though worn, has a portrait in the very best style for the series, and is a remarkably complete strike for the issues, with full crossed legends on the reverse and with apex and lituus completely clear on obverse: a coin of exceptional quality that exceeds many costing multiples:


The other was a cheap lead piece with a female head in very fine style with a notable hairstyle and drapery:


I recognised immediately this must be … Cleopatra (seller was not aware), which you can see by comparison with the denarius issue:


100% the same head, not just hairstyle and drapery and general layout but the profile of the face, same nose and lips etc. This is unlike any lead piece I've seen in being struck from a highly detailed .. COIN DIE, not the usual hand cut crudity. For example the hair braids are very tiny and extremely detailed, with not only the braids detailed but also the strands of hair in the braid. So what is it? Caduceus, it has been suggested by a fellow CT member, may indicate her portrayal as Isis, or it may be a Roman influenced type. The piece is not a tessera as one can see from its edge shape, nor a seal which would have signs on sides or back. It seems to be a test strike of an unknown Cleopatra coin type with a bust that copies that on the Roman denarius type (or possibly, some think Greek drachm type).

The point of this long discourse is that one can be a high end collector who regards his coins as part of his assets - and still do it intelligently and with great care about cost - and at the same time collect stuffs that clearly have no asset value whastsover. I'll spend some time working with the Cleo type and consult friends, to figure out what it is. And at the same time I'll enjoy my new Caesar portrait and respect that it has some real value for old age pension purposes.

 

To add something to the conversation - my collecting practice is to try to buy coins at or near to the suggested bid at auction. That way I can be sure I am getting a fair price. I have a fair number of coins that I paid more than $1000 for but also many other pieces in the $80-200 range. I am pretty confident that the principal paid could be recouped if I decided to sell, but I don't really expect any profit. Also, I have no plans to sell during my lifetime so my concern is for my heirs.

 

That is very interesting Andrew. This post of yours, and the next one, pretty well summarizes my own circumstances (I am a retired Industrial Engineer and a Veteran) and approach to collecting Roman coins (and that always has been).

 

Nice website!

 

Ancient coin collecting and the discussion of alternative assets or investments is always interesting.

Ancient coin collecting is a spicy mixture of precious metals, art, history, and fashion (what's in and what's out) traded through a thin market that is easily disrupted by a few motivated buyers and occasional supply surprises (hoards) while having the ever present overhang of busy body politicians that could effectively make your collection illegal to sell in certain markets or even own at the stroke of a pen.

Welcome to the hobby. It's exciting over here.

 

I think it's partially myth at the level we are now discussing ($1000 coins). When one gets as specialised as I am, one gets to work out who is buying what in my specialist area, helped by there being usernames on the CNG site, and visual observations in some room auctions. I am aware of some known and some anonymous better-off collectors. What I have observed is that those wealthier collectors hardly move the needle for three to four figure coins at all. This is because they are very selective what they bid on (quality) and so in numerical terms, an auction section with 100 lots estimated at average $1000 each with some higher and lower (such as in a typical CNG mail bid sale) anywhere from 0 to 10 coins actually sell to collectors who could afford (if they wanted) to buy all 100 lots. So as long as one isn't directly headbutting a well off collector who really wants a specific coin, then one can feed on the remaining 90%, alongside the other quantity surveyors, government civil servants, doctors and similar mid-level workers. Occasionally one sees two such bidders headbutting and one coin can go for 20 times estimate. But in general, $1000 coins are low enough end for our hobby not to be influenced by the Russia and China and Arabia money.

What I do hear sometimes is specific usernames being mentioned on CT as sweeping up all relevant coins. Then I check the facts, and in just about every single case, it turns out that those people have just being bidding the correct (in my view) price for the items concerned, and can be outbid by ordinary collectors who are also willing pay the correct full price. I use the better NAC auctions as a measure of true value - NAC tends to reach the widest number of interested collectors. Use that as a measure, and you won't regularly be outbid by China, Arabia or Russia. You may have to up your bid a bit however, and then coins won't seem so cheap.

At higher end - auctions of best Sicilian silver or rare aurei - it's a different market, but collectors even at that end have other things one can spend money on. Once a coin gets too expensive, perhaps it's nicer to buy a marble bust for example.

Finally, on the overall picture, some people here follow value trends over the years at auctions. Since a peak in 2010-2014 or so, possibly due to people seeking alternative investments after the 2008 crash, there seems to have been a modest decline in ancient coin prices for the last 5 years or so. That doesn't suggest we are being swamped with new money.

 

This is what I've noticed as well. At least at the auction houses where I'm regularly bidding and which show bidder handles I'm regularly bidding against the same few(50-100) people. I record rival bidders when possible both on coins I win and those I lose and there are definite patterns that emerge. This is even the case on eBay apparently where I can't see a bidder name but enough info is shown for me to correlate the same bidder across multiple auctions. I don't know who all these people are but the fact I'm seeing them over and over again, often even on coins that are of more specialist interest, tells me that they largely aren't investor types.

 

The portrait on this coin is excellent, btw. Congratulations.

 

Those user names can also be deceiving. For example, I was shocked to see someone with the handle "Carausius" bidding on Roman Republican coins in the CNG sale. That Carausius is NOT me. I wonder if this person thought they would benefit from reduced competition because of the massive good will I've built-up over the years on various coin forums. Perhaps I should change my CNG bidding handle to...TIF.

 

I change my username every time just to be deceptive. I haven't tried impersonating anyone but that's not a bad idea! ;-)

 

I'm not ashamed to say I've used Forvm layaway to pay for some $700 or $800 coins in the past. When you are middle class, have tons of responsibilities, but also have a side passion for ancient coins, sometimes you have to use every tool at your disposal to get a coin you want.

 

How long after one abandons a name on CNG does that name become available to be used by someone else or by you again? I once received a note from a person rubbing in that he had outbid me so I changed my name. I have never understood using an emperor name for a handle and then bidding on someone else's coins. For that matter, if I see a a coin of Carausius bid on by a guy named Carausius, I might think this must be a sleeper so I should bid on it. I wonder if anyone has the name Fickle?

 

To address the initial theme of this thread (Ancients as an investment), In my early 20's I negotiated with my wife to allocate some of our limited funds to coin collecting because it was a good investment and we could make enough for a trip around the world in about 15 years when I sell my collection. I haven't really sold my collection yet and this is nearly 50 years later. We've been around the world from other means, not numismatics.

I don't hope to make much money from my collecting, but I do hope I don't lose money for me or my beneficiaries when my collection is ultimately disposed of. I buy high grade coins not only because they are more likely to increase in value, but also because they give me the most pleasure to look at. I'll definitely lose some on some individual coins, but I know many of my coins are worth significantly more than what I paid.

I think of my collection as a store of value "with benefits". The benefits are the numismatic stimulation, anticipation, scholarship, and sheer excitement of finding something new and unexpected - The "collecting".

 

Precisely why I don't use the name Carausius as a bidding handle!

 

Brilliant! This quote sums the entire topic in one sentence for me. I plan to steal and use it, but will pay you back with a picture of a lovely victoriatus (now mine) that is illustrated on your website with the Haeberlin plate photo.






Anonymous. 211-208 BC. AR Victoriatus (3.42g, 17.1mm, 6h). CROT series. Uncertain mint. Laureate head of Jupiter right / Victory standing right, erecting trophy; ROMA in exergue. No CROT on reverse. Crawford 92/1a; Sydenham 120 var w/o CROT; RSC 36b; RBW 386.

Provenance:

• Gorny & Mosch Auction 261, March 4, 2019 Lot 529;
• Sternberg XI November 20 & 21, 1981, Lot 432 sold to Munzentrum Kolner;
• ex Peter Hofer Collection, pictured in Silbermunzen der Romischen Republik Privatsammlung P(eter) H(ofer) February 1980;
• Münzen und Medaillen AG Auction 52 June 19-20, 1975, lot 300;
• Adolph Cahn and Adolph Hess Nachf., Haeberlin Collection, July 17, 1933, lot 145 , sold to T.G. Appelgren (16 - 14 Reichsmarks) 3.88g. Flaches Relief, Strichzeichnung. FDC. Correctly noted as CROT series.

 

@Carthago, Thanks for the appreciative comment. This Victoriatus is the finest of this very scarce and distinctive variety, and is really unimprovable. I had this in my crosshairs in the G&M auction and was determined to get it but alas, could not muster the funds at that time to bid so high. You will never regret your high bid for this perfect coin, congratulations.