Since there are so many questions about this subject I thought this article might help shed some light and provide some understanding. CLICK HERE
"Another important point to be aware of in purchasing the very high-grade modern coins is that the high grades mostly result from dealers sending in prescreened coins in bulk lots that they’ve removed from sets. It is rare for a collector or dealer to send in just a few cherrypicked coins and get back the very high grades of 69 or 70. Therefore, many dealers obtain their inventories of these coins from bulk submissions, rather than outright purchases." This applies only to specific issues like many of the proofs and most of the later date bullion coins. It does not apply to most of the older BU coins since these are not normally sent in as large bulk submissions. Where is someone going to come up with something like thousands of '73 Ikes or 1970 quarters? They aren't available in quantity and if they were there still would be very few that are worth the grading fee.
From this article that GD linked: "The best resources available to identify common-issue modern coins that are scarce or rare in high condition are the grading service population reports, which list the numbers of coins graded in each grade for both circulation strikes and Proof coins by issue. PCGS, Numismatic Guaranty Corp. and ANACS produce these reports several times a year. Studying these reports is both revealing and surprising." Funny...I was taken to task when I did exactly that...which is to look at and study these very reports! When I did look at these reports and upon further review (a little football humor), when I posted conclusions that NGC hands out 5, 10, 15, 20 times MORE 70 grades than PCGS, you could of swore I committed treason! So...I would encourage all to look at these reports (especially PCGS and NGC). Since the liklihood that a modern coin would be cracked out an resubmitted again is almost nill, these reports can tell you a bunch. Study the amount of TOTAL submissions for a given coin and see how many 70 grades or (any high grade for that matter) were 'awarded'. After all, if I were to submit a ASE Proof (for an example) for grading, I would definitely "hope" for a 70 grade, wouldn't you? So, if a given TPG received 1,000 submissions for a given coin and 500 were awarded a 70 grade, you can see that 50% of their submissions were awarded the 70 grade. Obviously, this all plays a part in prices realized and values in the free market. So as the article stated, study and look at these POP reports. Does one service "hand out" more MS67RD grades (i.e., Lincolns) than the next...all things being equal? Do you really beleive one TPG could receive 5, 10, 15, 20 times more 70 grade submissions than the other? See for yourself... NGC population look up PCGS population report
Hardly Midas I have never had a problem with anyone studying the reports. The only issue I ever had was your trying to use them to prove some point that PCGS is somehow a better grading company than NGC. But I won't rehash that discussion again. But what the reports can tell you is just how hard it is to find a business strike coin, other than a modern commem or a bullion coin, that will grade MS69 or better. That's the point this article is trying to make and why I posted it. I also posted it for another reason - the last paragraph. " Be aware also that some of the dealers who sell very high grade modern coins don't buy these coins back at current market prices. So before you purchase these high-grade modern coins, you may want to research how you can sell them back into the secondary market if you should ever decide to do so. " There are far too many people out there who are not aware !
I agree with your comments Clad. But I might take it just a bit further. Wouldn't you also agree that it doesn't apply to most business strike circualting coinage period ? I mean after all, there are so very few examples of of MS69 or 70 in any denomination. And not just for the older issues as you mentioned but for the more modern ones as well.
Yes. For the main part it applies to most modern (1965-'98) business strike coinage. It also applies to many of the ultra-moderns as well. Even those moderns which can be located in quantity like 1975-D pennies it can be very difficult to find enough to warrant grading. Most bags will contain only twelve or fourteen die pair and none might be of sufficient quality to survive prescreening. Certainly if you pick up three or four bags then you'll find at least twenty or thirty coins which might be worth submitting, but you won't find any bags of old clad quarters and if you did the odds of it containing a gem are nearly remote. Even bags of four or five year old nickels can be extremely difficult to find. 1997 nickels are worth several times face and this with almost zero demand.
"" Be aware also that some of the dealers who sell very high grade modern coins don't buy these coins back at current market prices. So before you purchase these high-grade modern coins, you may want to research how you can sell them back into the secondary market if you should ever decide to do so. " This is the type of comment that one often hears from non-modern collectors. While it's not truly bad advice one's time would be much better spent looking at raw coins and learning the differences from series to series and date to date. Where very similar coins can be purchased for a small fraction of the price or the coin is fairly easily found raw then it's not reasonable to expect premiums to remain high. With coins that are easily replaceable from raw coins few dealers will have much desire in purchasing already slabbed coins at high prices. These coins will bring market prices on ebay and such venues but market prices are susceptible to changes and common coins with high prices are always more likely to decline than increase. It really isn't too tough to learn what's out there. Look at the raw coins of whatever you're interested in and learn to spot the differences. If you're not interested in spending huge multiples for slight increases in quality then there's a good chance others won't be either. Sometimes though an issue can be remarkably scarce in nice shape or just a little lower grade and have tiny premiums simply because the demand for these is still pretty small compared to the old classics. Even large premiums are sometimes be justified but you won't know if you don't look at the coins. Learning what dealers will pay is of limited value simply because most dealers have no interest and no customers for modern coins. Even modern specialists buying interest will be of limited value since it will only tell you what he can find raw and does have a customer for. I don't like pop reports because even when they're actually right they can distort reality by over- representing popular and in demand coins and understating unpopular coins. These report the price almost as much as the population in modern coins (in classics, too, to a lesser degree). But even the population reports are a better bet to study than dealer buy back prices. Most real collectors don't plan on selling in the near future anyway and the modern markets will no doubt be very different when most collectors sell. I know it will be when I sell.
All to true. However, it should always be known that buying for one price usually means not recouping the same if trying to sell to soon. Buy a house today and sell it tomorrow and unless your lucky, the closing costs, attorneys fees, realestate agents fees, surveyors fees, etc will mean you loose. Same with cars, boats, guns, waffle irons, computers, etc. You buy shoes for one price and the next day you couldn't sell them for half that price especially if you have athlets feet. As to grading services, I don't care who is better as long as the coin is authenticated. To many fakes out there of the higer priced coins and I just want a real one. Since I am not planning on reselling a coin, I don't care and never will which grading service is better. Who services my car is different. I have to drive my car. The coins just sit there.
