I hate to get political here, but this whole mess has me so peeved that I am beside myself. It's not so much an economic tragedy as it is a human tragedy of extreme proportions. I can't imagine the suffering that the Ukrainians are living under now. We are sitting on the precipice of a global catastrophe. I hope your dealer is doing as good as can be expected and that you will soon be doing business with him again. My daughter and son-in-law both have friends who have relatives in Ukraine. I also pray that they are safe and find refuge in another country. Gary 

On 3/11/2022 at 4:01 PM, coinsbygary said:

I hate to get political here, but this whole mess has me so peeved that I am beside myself.

I'm not sure that saying war in Europe or war in general is bad counts as a terribly controversial or political statement.

But the whole situation is a disaster. It isn't a crisis. It's a disaster, from start to finish, and it should have never have gotten to this point.

Weakness invites aggression...        I've heard that somewhere before.

Ever have a problem with a school yard bully?  Just like a world dictator, they only understand two (that's 2) things!  The two things that get their attention very fast is force and money!

You smack him in the face and take his lunch money!.....   The bulling will stop!

On 3/11/2022 at 6:27 PM, tj96 said:

Weakness invites aggression...  

They also say "Strength invites challenge." 

On 3/11/2022 at 8:00 PM, Revenant said:

They also say "Strength invites challenge." 

Not in this case.

I went down the same path you did William, checked to see where the seller was, etc.. I can say that to a person, everyone I have emailed back and forth with in Ukraine, since the invasion, have told me it ain't looing good. This is one of the few sellers that I have not been in contact with directly but I decided to make a purchase from them a few days ago, knowing full well that there is pretty much a zero chance that I will see the item. I look at it similarly to everyone renting houses in Ukraine via Airbnb that they will never go to. A donation to my numismatic brethren.  I've since done this with all of my Ukrainian sellers, most say that they still "can and will ship" the items, some say that there is no guarantee or that they can't. To all of them I say don't worry about it, take care of your families, yourselves and do what you must.

Below is a list of some of some sellers ebay stores, sadly some of them have pulled all of their inventory or closed their store. Vitaliy, Dmytro, Svetlana and Oleh be careful my friends. 

https://www.ebay.com/usr/lemberg-zp?_trksid=p2047675.m3561.l2559

https://www.ebay.com/str/antiquesandphilately?_trksid=p2047675.m3561.l2563

https://www.ebay.com/str/banknotesandbonds

https://www.ebay.com/str/ukrainecoins?_trksid=p2047675.m3561.l2563

https://www.ebay.com/str/megasellercoins?_trksid=p2047675.m3561.l2563

https://www.ebay.ie/str/sellsvit?LH_BIN=1

I'll have more on the situation in some upcoming Journal entries over on the PMG side.

I own one Ukrainian coin. It's a 2009 5-hryvnia International year of astronomy commemorative that I bought from a Ukrainian e-bay seller in 2012. I bought it raw and it is the highest graded foreign uncirculated coin I submitted to NGC, grading MS-69. It appears that today he has some of his items located in the United States. It probably makes for easier shipping to US addresses. Another possibility is that he pulled his listings of Russian origin. Perusing his current listings, he is making an impassioned plea to not buy from Russian sellers. I am listing his e-bay store below and posting a photograph of the coin I purchased in solidarity to the Ukrainian people. 

https://www.ebay.com/usr/novinka62

On 3/12/2022 at 8:17 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

but I decided to make a purchase from them a few days ago, knowing full well that there is pretty much a zero chance that I will see the item.

There's a couple of dealers in Russia that I have bought pre-painted scaled minis from before for some fun macro photos and just goofing around. I'd been wanting to place an order for a couple of things to go with something else I had but I dragged my feet and then this broke out and I just looked at Shandy and was like, "Well, that's dead." But there's another seller in Lviv Ukraine that sells similar things and they may get the order / money instead.

I may take a look later and see if there's something I can order off Lemberg.