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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;BooksB4Coins, post: 2417869, member: 36230&quot;]Generally, yes.... they are &quot;trusted&quot;, but blind trust is foolish, especially in areas where subjectivity reigns supreme. To give just one quick example: grading consistency.... do you realize how often a coin will grade out at X, then be removed from its holder and resubmitted to the same company, only to come back at a different grade, or submitted once and returned as a problem but grades cleanly the next time aroud? In others areas such as simple authentication they indeed do a very good job overall, and the liquidity their services offer is huge, but what is most important in this hobby/business is the individual collector&#039;s knowledge and preferences. If they genuinely know what they&#039;re doing and can trust their abilities, everything offered by the TPGs is gravy.</p><p><br /></p><p>With that said I certainly can understand the gentleman&#039;s sentiment, and I&#039;m sure he gets to regularly see certain negative influences brought about by the TPGs. Raw coins are, regretably, often automatically viewed with skepticism and this is partly due to the fact that TPGs have allowed collectors to become lazy. One doesn&#039;t &quot;have&quot; to learn for themselves these days or pay someone else to do it for them; they can buy whatever the plastic gods say and be reasonably safe doing so, but this has hurt the hobby as a whole. The TPGs are businesses and as with any business, they exist for profit, not for collector benefit, and unfortunately this is something that many, and particularly new collectors, fail to understand.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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