Has anyone ever seen a study published of price increases or decrease by coin type or series, over a long period of time? What I am looking for is an analysis of the changes in prices, of say, gold eagles over a 20 year period, broken down within the eagle series by "common coins within the series", "rareities within the series", and "ultra rareities within the series", preferably by date within each class. (Hopefully this makes sense). Using a hypothetical investment of say, $30,000, I wanted to study what combinations of coins increased the most in value, also taking into account the coin's availabilty for purchase, as well as how the markets were performing generally within that 20 year period. It would be interesting to see whether a more diversified purchase plan versus a more concentrated purchase plan yielded a better result. Any thoughts?
The greysheet offers exactly this kind of material called research packs. http://www.greysheet.com Let me add this. Coins are not the best investment. As a consultant for several investment firms in Delaware, and as a dealer I have a good perspective of this business. If you want investments, look to IPO'S.
Thanks for the information. I am first a collector, but I was wondering about the market gains. I am also a tax attorney and CPA, and I have worked on several very large IPO's. Unfortunately most of those are not great investments either.
PCGS offers on their web site exactly the info you are asking about. They list an index for just about any series you can think of and it's performance over the years.
Here ya go Longacre The main index is known as the CU3000. But it is also broken down into segments - just scroll down a bit. CU 3000 I will say this - please be aware of just who is providing this information. Food for thought.
Past prices are history and nothing more. They do not predict future prices or future performance. Stock and commodity brokers love "technical" traders the same way that casinos love "system" bettors. The fact that the highest state 19th and early 20th century Proof coins are often the ones that maintain their relative values over time really says nothing about your ability to buy a "market basket" of coins and stay ahead of inflation. Most of the astounding auctions of headline grabbing coins were net losses for their owners -- if those owners had invested the same resources in their original sources of wealth (Garrett, Norweb, Eliasberg, Pittman). If you want to own nice coins -- hey, what's wrong with Hungarian stock certificates? they are numismatic, too! -- and profit from their sale, fine. Enjoy the shiny objects while you own them. If you can buy and sell coins for a profit, more power to you. However, the buy-and-hold strategy is not an easy path to some child's college tuition costs or to some graybeard's retirement. Michael
