Hi Wcj10. Welcome to the forum. Hope you will stick around and join in the discussions. I would think that PCI is as "legit" as any of the rest. After all, grading (especially uncirculated coins) is just a matter of opinion. Who's to say that PCI's opinion is any better or worse than NGC's, PCGS's, Jody's or yours for that matter? Good luck with your coins, and don't be a stranger.
Thanks, I have already learned alot just reading some of the posts. I'm a 46 year old kid in a candy store when it comes to coins. Look forward to being here often.
Weclome. Two books to help you begin to learn how to grade are "Photograde" and the ANA grading guide. Different slabbing companies use different criteria. Do not buy any coins slabbed by Accugrade, until you understand their non standard criteria. If you do not learn how to grade, you are at the mercy of the person who did grade the coin.
Moreover, you, your hard earned cash, your buyer's remorse, etc. You can extract a lot of uneducated pleasure from this hobby, but the number one thing you simply have to learn is the basics on grading. And once you start learning, well, it's kinda hard to stop...
As Jody pointed out, it's difficult to make a general statement about the grading standards of PCI compared to NGC or PCGS. However, it's a well known fact that a PCI coin with the same grade will not sell for as much money as a PCGS or NGC coin. Take that for what it's worth, it very well may be that the PCI graded coin would slab in NGC or PCGS at the same grade.
As a general rule - the marketplace does not place much confidence - which can be translated as value - in the grading ability of PCI. For the most part - PCI is considered as a lower tier grading company by the numismatic community. The marketplace considers the top two grading companies to be NGC & PCGS. Next in line are ANACS & ICG. All other grading companies come after these 4.
PCI labels can tell the story of changes in their company. The earlier slabs were green and red (problem coins) with one type of font in the lettering. When graders (or something) changed, so did the appearance of the slab label, particularly in the font. PCI changed hands not too very long ago and the label then switched to gold. During their early years, I sent in about a dozen coins to test the waters. I was pleased with most of the results. A few coins pretty much hit the mark and one or two didn't do as well as was hoped. When the labels changed (still green but new font and format), I sent in another round and noticed that the grading was a little..."off". Most of this group were high grade mercurys and morgans. The results showed that, especially the morgans were more loosely graded..the standards didn't match when compared to coins of very similar condition. I haven't sent anything to them since they went gold but have seen a few at shows so nothing compare yet.
Grading and authenticating are a little different. When we are at the shows, some customers won't take our word on the key coins when the price is a little high. So PCI is used because of the short time to slab. The top four services have a 24 hour service best case. 24 hours can be a lost sale. Most will wait 2 hours. Now I do not recommend them for grading. They are always off a couple of points.
