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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Troodon, post: 1744263, member: 4626&quot;]I fully understand that all the TPGs use market grading (one can argue to what degree each does, but they all do it to some extent) but disagree with those that don&#039;t seem to think there&#039;s anything wrong with it.&nbsp; As I understand it the term &quot;market grading&quot; as it&#039;s commonly used refers to grading that is done not based on some set of fixed technical standards (or at least not completely on them) but based on how market-acceptable they are; in other words, grading them according to how good the market would value a given coin in its condition.&nbsp; Case in point, read the other thread about how weak strikes on Peace dollars are often forgiven (given a higher grade than such a weak strike would warrant on other coins) because the market doesn&#039;t seem to mind that they&#039;re not penalized for such.</p><p><br /></p><p>The ANA standards (the rare instance of a set of standards actually publicly published, and since NGC is &quot;the official TPG of the ANA,&quot; in theory the standards NGC should be going by) <i>claim</i> to be in essence a set of technical standards, but it&#039;s clear NGC uses market grading just like the rest of them.</p><p><br /></p><p>I understand of course that there&#039;s a certain amount of subjectivity involved in grading coins, and opinions will differ from TPG to TPG, person to person, and sometimes you can resubmit a coin to exactly the same person and get a different grade.&nbsp; However I think the TPGs do a disservice to their customers, investors, and those in the hobby, by not setting a set of standards for a given coin series and strictly adhering to them to the greatest degree reasonable (in other words, &quot;technical grading.&quot;).&nbsp; I don&#039;t think it&#039;s the TPGs&#039; place to determine what a coin is worth; they purport to be third-party <i>graders</i> after all, and are not supposed to be appraisers.</p><p><br /></p><p>The plural of anecdote is not data of course, but one example comes to mind of blatant market grading, such as an NGC PF-70 given a star (which should be impossible, since 70 is perfect, and by definition nothing can possibly be better than perfect).&nbsp; Determining &quot;eye appeal&quot; or &quot;market acceptability&quot; are things that should be left to the free market (buyers and sellers) to decide, and the TPGs should stick just to grading.&nbsp; It&#039;s what they claim they&#039;re in business to do after all.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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