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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;NPCoin, post: 415322, member: 5629&quot;]Most certainly they do!&nbsp; Yet, they will only turn as much profit as they do loss.&nbsp; It is very similar to stocks, in that the loss of one person is essentially the profit of another.&nbsp; We can oversimplify stocks to four players:&nbsp; seller, buyer, market maker, and broker.&nbsp; Out of the four players, you will usually have at least two winners, if not three, but never four!&nbsp; Somebody must lose in the process.</p><p><br /></p><p>In numismatics, you can have as little as two players.&nbsp; Pretty much, there must be at least one loser in the deal.&nbsp; If there are two players, buyer to seller, then either the seller or the buyer will lose.&nbsp; Whatever the buyer pays for the coin becomes the coin&#039;s baseline.&nbsp; So if the buyer buys the coin for $40, then $40 becomes the baseline for the cost of the coin.&nbsp; If the seller bought the coin for $30 then the profit/loss is +$10.&nbsp; So the dealer wins at +$10, and the buyer loses at $0 (baseline).&nbsp; Now, as time goes on, the coin will have market fluctuations that will either raise above the baseline or sink below it.&nbsp; Now, if after five years, the coin is marketed at only $35 and the then buyer now sells, the he loses at -$5, while the new buyer also &quot;loses&quot; at $0.</p><p><br /></p><p>A true win or lose will not be realized by the buyer until time comes to sell the coin, since the price which the buyer bought becomes the baseline for the coin&#039;s profit/loss determination.&nbsp; You will <b>always</b> have a loser.</p><p><br /></p><p>So what determines whether or not a coin will make a profit is the timeliness of the sell of the coin.&nbsp; If the owner sells when the coin is above baseline, then there is a profit, if not, there is a loss.&nbsp; Simple as that.&nbsp; There is no guarantee of any kind that any particular coin will make a profit at any time or over any &quot;holding&quot; period.&nbsp; As GD said, it&#039;s pretty much luck.&nbsp; Even with a vast difference in knowledge about the subject, it still all boils down to &quot;luck&quot;, as knowledge will not affect the market one way or the other, except in very specific situations.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Most certainly they are investments.&nbsp; The real question is are they a safe investment?&nbsp; By no means.&nbsp; Are they a sure investment?&nbsp; See above.&nbsp; Of course not.&nbsp; Any investment comes with some form of risk.&nbsp; Whether it is real estate, precious metals, stocks, bonds, treasury bills, etc., there is risk of complete and total loss.&nbsp; This is more so true with coins.&nbsp; Coins can be stolen, destroyed (by fire or other means), lost, confiscated, counterfeit, etc, and these are just aspects that are outside the realm of normal investment risks.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Good for them!&nbsp; That means that they really enjoy what they do and it is for the most part a fulfilling endeavor that brings them peace and relaxation, as well as a sense of accomplishment in their efforts.&nbsp; A true collector is someone that is rarely seen today.&nbsp; In their case, there is no win or loss, but only what they like and the price they are willing to pay to obtain it.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>For a collector?&nbsp; Who cares!&nbsp; They&#039;re in it for the enjoyment of the hobby.&nbsp; For investors, dealers, speculators, market makers?&nbsp; It all depends on a few factors.&nbsp; Probably the largest factor is scruples and ethics.&nbsp; The scruples and ethics of the person selling will most certainly decide how fast and what issues decide their profit turn around.&nbsp; A seller with very little or no scruples and ethics from the pit will most certainly be able to turn a profit around on any coin within days.&nbsp; Market conditions matter very little when your conscience will allow you to lie, beg, steal, and cheat to make that quick profit.</p><p><br /></p><p>For those with scruples and a sense of any ethical value at all, however, it all depends on the market.&nbsp; There is no guarantee that the market will turn either way at any given time.&nbsp; A coin you buy today with the intent of holding on to it for a few years, may very well sell tomorrow for twice as much if the market takes a sudden twist...especially if the coin is precious metal based.&nbsp; It could take a few days, it could take many years.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>By no means!&nbsp; One of the reasons you hear of speculators talking about &quot;sleepers&quot; is because at some point in time, every coin will have the opportunity of making a profit provided that your baseline is not too far off from the market when it was purchased.&nbsp; Of course, a twenty center bought at 5x market value may never turn a profit in your lifetime.&nbsp; But, given a normal purchase based on market conditions at the time, and assuming normal inflation rates throughout time, any coin will be able to turn a profit.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Yes!&nbsp; There are WAY many questions!&nbsp; But, I do not myself believe that the problem is there are so few answers so much as there are so few answers that we wish to accept and believe.&nbsp; Every question already has an answer.&nbsp; The point is whether or not we are ready to accept the answer or if we will continue on until we find the answer we were waiting for...which may never happen.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Sorry, I didn&#039;t read it. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie7" alt=":p" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Yet.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>WHA?!&nbsp;&nbsp; &quot;Old Days of coin collecting&quot;&nbsp; 1998?????&nbsp;&nbsp; Dennis Steinmetz was preaching that mantra back in 1978.&nbsp; If I&#039;m not mistaken, Norman Stack preached this mantra well before 1968.&nbsp; !998 is most certainly not the &quot;Old Days&quot; of anything in numismatics.&nbsp; Interestingly, though, isn&#039;t 1998 about the time that eBay started taking off?&nbsp; Again, I have not yet read the article, but I see this statement as alluding to the emergence of sites such as eBay as somehow changing the market somehow, which I disagree with.</p><p><br /></p><p>As I said before, the time it takes to actually turn a profit very highly depends upon the sellers&#039; scruples and ethics.&nbsp; With the advent of sites such as eBay, we do not see a change in the market due to the fact that coins are &quot;more available&quot; so much as we see that those with less scruples and ethics have more chances of furthering their practices to the unsuspecting.</p><p><br /></p><p>This is perhaps where GD&#039;s &quot;knowledge&quot; affecting profit in coins comes into play.&nbsp; The knowledgeable buyer is more often than not able to see through these dealers.&nbsp; This is one reason, also, why we see so many posts about unscrupulous sellers in the fora online.</p><p><br /></p><p>Anyway, chew on the cud for a bit.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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