Alright, I am new to all of this mostly because I am a YN. I have a couple of coins that are in older holders that I would consider regrading or going for the CAC sticker. I have a 1885 MS65PL Morgan That is in the very first holder that they issued that could easily get a MS66PL,... so what I was wondering was how the CAC thing works. If anyone has some knowledge about it because they send coins to them it would be greatly appreciated. I have at least 8 coins that I would think about either regrading or sending them into CAC. -Kyle
CAC is basically another third party grader you send your coins into them already in Pcgs and ngc holders and they will either give it no sticker a green sticker or a gold sticker The no sticker means it didn't meet their criteria for that particular grade (over graded) The green sticker means it is good for the grade. the gold sticker means it is undergraded meaning if you sent it back in to Pcgs or ngc they think it will get upgraded.
So say you did receive a gold sticker on one of your coins in an old holder, would you rather keep the coin in the old holder with the gold sticker and not send it in, or send it in and have it regraded one grade higher?
Some of the old holder PL's have rather weak mirrors and may not PL today. Make sure the coin has good mirrors for the date as part of the criteria. A friend of mine just had a coin not sticker because though technically all there and DMPL he was told it was not monster DMPL like the year comes, so no sticker. I just got 30 PL/DMPLs back from CAC with mixed results.
If you get a gold sticker on an older holder, don't send it in to be regraded. That would take more time and money, and probably wouldn't even sell for more. And, the standards for getting a sticker are not that it would get a green sticker if it was graded properly. They get green stickers if they are above average examples for that particular grade with good eye appeal. This also means that if they do not get a sticker they are not necessarily over-graded.
Let me give you some clear information. I am a CAC authorized dealer and am a supporter of the theory of CAC. Coins submitted to CAC are evaluated to see if they match the CAC standards. Coins can only be in NGC or PCGS holders for this service. Any plus grade (+) coins are evaluated as the base grade with no weight given to the plus (+). Of course, with older holders this does not matter since the plus (+) grading scheme is new. Coins submitted to CAC have three possible outcomes- 1) No sticker. This does not necessarily mean that the coin is overgraded. Rather, this means either that the coin is overgraded, is accurately graded but is in the lower third of the grade, or has been manipulated in some way unacceptable to CAC (overdipped, wiped, scratched, AT, putty, etc...). 2) Green sticker. This means that the coin is within the upper two-thirds of the specified grade, in the opinion of CAC or that the coin might be within the lower portion of one grade higher. 3) Gold sticker. This means that the coin appears to be undergraded by at least one+ grade increments in the opinion of CAC. In other words, an MS65 with a gold sticker looks like a high end MS66 (let's say MS66.5) to them. Gold sticker coins are very rare and the market pays a lot for coins with a gold CAC sticker. The rate for gold stickers was previously published as one gold sticker for every approximately 500-coins submitted to CAC. I have submitted about 100-coins of my own and received about a dozen gold stickers.
