Saw this up for auction. 1896 S. Redbook or NGC coin guide says $900 for a straight grade AU50. Personally I would never pay over $500 for a coin I can't hold in my hand and look at first, but this was interesting, and want to know what others think. I don't even know if it's legit, but it hammered on the flea for $727. Deal or no deal? Impossible to tell if it's been cleaned from photos. It looks nice, but no, never was interested. Scared and skeptical is the best explanation. Someone either got a real deal or got scammed, and I'm not sure which happened. What says the group? Sellers photos before they disappear, and they are not great photos. You guys are great to bounce ideas off of and I appreciate it.
I don't like the looks of it (counterfeit). I'll bet the reverse picture is blurry because it's not as convincing as the obverse.
I was hoping Jack Young would see this one. But like you say, the pics are terrible of the reverse. Buying off the Bay for coins this valuable is like playing Russian Roulette. What really made this interesting (and disturbing) was that this was a one off for the seller. No other coins for sale, no history whatsoever. I do a check on all of the sellers before I buy. So it's either a red herring where someone doesn't know what they have or just someone passing off a fake, hit and run. That's a real coin flip, no pun intended. I wasn't even remotely tempted. I watched it and saved this one to discuss here after it sold. It had a ton of bids on it.
I see what look to me like tool marks on the face. I don't collect Morgan's. Maybe it's VAM stuff or something. But tool marks are what they look like to me. After Liberty there's a discolored area that looks a bit like brass. I hope that's just a lighting issue. Also, it looks like half the feathers are missing from the eagle's right wing, and a lot of bumps there instead. What's with the notebook paper? If it's a raw coin then why? Morgan collectors are not widely known for negative reactions to slabs. As I remember it, PCGS had so many Morgan submissions when they first started they stop accepting anything for awhile until they cleared their backlog.
In that case, somebody (the winner of that auction) is going to be an unhappy camper. eBay has protections for buyers but seeing that the seller has no other listed items I wonder what recourse eBay has against that seller? A fraud would simply close their seller's account and disappear.
Everything about this one screams counterfeit. Obverse looks to be plated over base metal (look at rim), missing hair detail, reverse image deliberately blurry, etc.
