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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;TIF, post: 8185155, member: 56859&quot;]I&#039;m not the OP, but let me take a stab at this...</p><p><br /></p><p><b>It&#039;s a rare coin with fewer than 10 known. </b> <b>The last one sold (per ACsearch) was in 2013.</b> It&#039;s not like the OP had dozens or hundreds to choose from.&nbsp; He had no say in the matter; the coin was already slabbed--because it was sold by Heritage, one of the few companies that stabs everything that can be slabbed.&nbsp; Slabbed ancients tend to be sold at venues not specializing in ancient coins (such as Great Collections) and/or whose primary customers collect moderns and are conditioned to expect slabs, and who are trying to get their modern-collecting customers (who are accustomed to paying comparatively huge money for cookie-cutter modern coins) to dip their toes into the ancient pool without the burden of research, other than comparing prices (and they provide the comparisons... to other slabbed coins, doing whatever they can to spoon-feed a new <strike>addict </strike>buyer <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie8" alt=":D" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" />).</p><p><br /></p><p>I can sometimes get highly interesting coins at a bargain price when they appear at venues not regularly browsed by the collectors of ancients, if they don&#039;t have Magic Letters.&nbsp; From my standpoint that has been the only good thing about slabbed ancients, since I mainly focus on provincials and on the whole, there are a lot of low grade but fantastic provincials out there.</p><p><br /></p><p>As for reassurance of the coin&#039;s legitimacy, yes, NGC is certainly a trustworthy source of authentication even if they technically don&#039;t authenticate coins or guarantee authenticity.&nbsp; Barry Murphy and David Vagi are less likely than most to slab a fake.&nbsp; However, with some effort at learning about ancients and knowledge of resources, even casual collectors of ancients feel comfortable authenticating coins without paying for help.&nbsp; Perhaps slabbed coins are attractive to beginners or those who just don&#039;t have the time or inclination to learn how.&nbsp; Certainly there are instances where it is difficult, and then it might be worthwhile to seek an expert third party opinion such as from David Sear (no pesky sealed slabs), Harlan Berk (are they still offering authentication?), or NGC (even though they don&#039;t guarantee authenticity, if they slab a coin it means they believe it to be authentic).</p><p><br /></p><p>Despite not liking slabs, I will certainly not hesitate to buy a slabbed coin if it something I want at a price I&#039;m willing to pay.&nbsp; Removing the coin is not hard nor is it harmful to the coin... or to the value of the coin.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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