Got this beautiful Mercury in the mail and thought I would check out the bands. I have noticed in the pop reports that a very high percentage of 1916 P Mercs have FB's cared to those that don't. This one shows all bands fully split. Did they miss something, or are they super picky about this particular year/MM? Do you thinks it's because of the hits on the lower bands, even though they are fully split?
It certainly looks FB to me. To my knowledge, both NGC and PCGS only consider the central bands for the FB designation.
PCGS, yes. But with NGC, unless they've changed very recently, all 3 bands must be clear and unbroken. That said, the bands have hits on them, but I cannot see where any of the dividing lines are broken so I'm also puzzled why it did not get the designation.
The only thing I can think of is the bands are semi flat on the bottom with hits and maybe they wanted them fully round...?
I would bet pcgs would have gave a FSB designation to that coin! I see this a lot with ngc mercurys, bands that appear split when comparing to pcgs or anacs mercurys with FSB designation .. From what I've seen and read , ngc has different requirements than the other two company's , requiring the band to not only be split but raised aswell !
I would hate to resubmit and risk losing the ☆ designation, unless it was sent in as a reconsideration
Lemme put it this way. Your coin leads the pack in regard to recent realized auction prices, in quite a few of them significantly so. And all of the others are FB, but none are star designated. So either you over-paid for it by a healthy margin, or the star equals the FB designation. So you may as well just leave it as is instead of putting more money into it.
I doubt the star equals FB also. There are 21 FB's with star designations. This is the only non FB with a star. I got caught up in the Heritage bidding hype and knew I way overpaid for it right after I bid. Actually, as soon as I pushed the bid button, I had hoped I would get outbid, which I wasnt. I tend to like star and Plus grades, but sometimes I get a little too excited over it.
Well, there had to be somebody else who was willing to pay near as much as you did. But everybody overpays from time to time, and knowingly. To me the one and only consideration is - is the risk of re-submission worth the extra money ? Personally, I'd have to say no.
I doubt I will ever resubmit it. I think most people can clearly see it has FB if they were interested in buying it.
I think what gets me on Heritage is the original price looks great, until you factor in 17.5% BP and then shipping. I am used to paying Great Collections shipping of $3.50, and $0.50 for each additional coin.
I can understand differences in shipping costs, but BP ? That's factored in from the getgo, and every coin you buy, from anywhere, has a similar BP %, or even higher, factored in as well. The only difference is they don't tell you about it - while Heritage does. That's why they say ignorance is bliss
Yes, I see the price with the BP included, but my eye tends to "like" the lower price. That's why I usually have to bid only during the Internet bidding period and not the live auction period. It gives me time to make a smart decision. During the live auction, you only get about 5-7 seconds to decide if you want to raise the bid before it closes. These Heritage guys are smart. They know how to sucker some of us.
I like the live bidding. At the same time I do not use live bidding features, but there have been a couple of times I did use the feature to make a higher bid on a few coins. Never when it was live - but before it when live and after it was closed to internet bidding. I remember one time there was coin that was worth several grand that was only at a few hundred after internet bidding was closed. I thought wow - I bid like a grand. When it went live - bam, it popped up the bids and went to 2k real quick. Thought I might steal one.
Regarding the conversation about the price realized for this coin. I don't think you overpaid, I think you paid full retail for the coin. You are not the only one with eyes. Everyone else who bid on this coin saw what you saw, a coin with full bands that does not have FB on the label and they evaluated the price of the coin accordingly. Furthermore, the premium you paid is based upon MS65 FB price + the outstanding eye appeal of the coin related to the toning and the resultant star designation. If you compare apples to apples then you need to look for another MS65 FB with rainbow toning to see if you overpaid. You paid $176 for your coin: Another collector paid $164 for this PCGS example last month: To my eyes, your coin is much more attractive than the PCGS example and deserving of the premium you paid. The only real problem I see with your coin is that it is an MS65. A serious Mercury Dime collector is probably going to insist on an MS66 for the 1916 because of the availability in the premium gem grade. That limits the buyers of your coin to type collectors. But there are plenty of them and many would love to own a rainbow toned gem grade 1916.
