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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Lehigh96, post: 991198, member: 15309&quot;]The chart does disprove what you are saying.&nbsp; You don&#039;t seem to understand what happened in the 80&#039;s.&nbsp; Prior to 1986, the grading of coins was done by primarily by dealers and telemarketing corporations, many of which were blatantly over-grading raw coins.&nbsp; BU (or worse) coins were being passed off as MS65&#039;s with incredible frequency.&nbsp; And yes, there was a governmental investigation that took place.&nbsp; The people who were duped during this time were not knowledgeable collectors nor were they big time investors.&nbsp; They were small investors with little numismatic knowledge.&nbsp; I liken them to the people today who buy their coins from the TV coin shows and think they are getting a good deal.&nbsp; These people lost their money but it was not because the market crash of 1989.&nbsp; They were destined to lose money because they were sold MS63 coins at MS65 prices and they didn&#039;t know any better.</p><p><br /></p><p>In 1986, PCGS was formed and revolutionized coin grading.&nbsp; What these unscrupulous dealers had been calling MS65 were now being graded as MS62-64 by PCGS.&nbsp; The arrival of the TPG&#039;s leveled the playing field for coin grading and created the opportunity for Wall Street investors.&nbsp; With the problem of subjectivity in coin grading seemingly solved, coins as an investment became a reality.&nbsp; Soon, the brokerage houses were offering their clients the opportunity to invest in professionally graded coins.&nbsp; Since the coins were graded, every coin would have already gone through the grade lowering process.&nbsp; The Wall Street investors were not buying raw MS65&#039;s that were actually MS63&#039;s.&nbsp; They were buying professionally graded MS65&#039;s that were still MS65&#039;s after the market crashed in 1989.&nbsp; The difference is that they now owned an MS65 that was worth a fraction of what they paid for it.&nbsp; The coin was the same coin with the same grade, just worth a whole lot less.</p><p><br /></p><p>Remember that this flurry of Wall Street money into the coin market was also spurred by the stock market crash in October of 1987.&nbsp; Investors who had been burned by the stock market were looking for new avenues to invest and the coin market was new and ripe.&nbsp; The incredible rise in the market was due solely to the influx of big time Wall Street money and the hype that went along with the process.&nbsp; Eventually the investment bubble broke and the market crashed.&nbsp; Again, it had nothing to do with grade lowering or conditional rarities.</p><p><br /></p><p>I understand your point that it is risky to pay huge premiums for conditional rarities, but with respect, that is an opinion.&nbsp; Until you can provide us with factual evidence of higher volatility with respect to conditional rarities, my opinion will differ from yours.&nbsp; Furthermore, we are talking about coins graded by TPG&#039;s.&nbsp; The grades are guaranteed by the TPG&#039;s.&nbsp; If a 2010-D MS68 FS Jefferson Nickel becomes an MS67 at some point in the future, the TPG must compensate for the loss.&nbsp; Now that doesn&#039;t mean they will make up the entire loss, but it does mitigate the apparent risk.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>I know that many people believe that the TPG&#039;s standards fluctuate significantly, including Doug.&nbsp; In my experience, the fluctuations are negligible and are more a result of gradeflation as a result of the inherent subjectivity of the grading process than a conscious change in standards on the part of the TPG.&nbsp; I have pontificated on this subject at length in the past and would prefer not to revisit it.&nbsp; It is much more fun to agree with Doug!&nbsp; LOL![/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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