Coinbuf

I like the coin and the series, your example does seem to have solid AU details but impossible to say if it has been cleaned or not from the photos. While the correct term is three cent silver, and regardless of what Roger wrote above, these coins have been the recipient of nicknames like trimes and as you noted fish scales by collectors and dealers. These are prone to displaying clash marks like yours, while I personally never consider clashing to be value adding they are interesting to view.

Yep an "Everything's Bigger In Texas" cent. I have read that some people have attempted this to try and trick a vending machine into accepting it as a nickel, doesn't work.

Bullet proof glass.

Pareidolia, that is not a die clash just damage.

Sure you can pay me $1000 and I'll dispose of that coin for you.

The photo is a bit blurry on my screen, however, it appears to go under the "T". If that is the case it cannot be a die crack as that would go over the letter, assuming it is not a stain or just some crud I am leaning toward a planchet flaw. But better focused photos are needed to say.

I'm not all that thrilled with any of the five, and I would never make a decision from looking at only one side of a coin. But if I were to pick it would be the Merc dime because it has the CAC sticker which means that JA has seen both sides and like the coin.

Sounds like you had a good time at the show, congrats!

That is a very lovely token @The Neophyte Numismatist

Bought this Barber quarter recently, while this does add a few points to my NOLA registry set I added this to my collection as I find this coin far more pleasing than the XF I had in that slot. Sellers pics as I have not attempted to take any myself yet.

If you live in a hot, humid, climate or you are a smoker, any coins you have are prone to developing toning faster than coins stored in a cool dry non smoking environment. If you are pulling coins from circulation those coins have been handled by multiple people and will have skin oil and other contaminates on the surface, the conditions I noted will hasten the tone those contaminates produce. To stop that from happening, you could give each coin a short bath in pure acetone to wash off the contaminates, pure acetone will have no effect on coins and evaporates without leaving a residue. Just use caution as acetone is very flammable. Bag marks are never worth a premium, however, that does not preclude some sellers who are either clueless or attempting to scam buyers from listing damaged coins for sale with moon money asking prices. You will see endless examples of this on sites like ebay, etsy, FB, IG, and hyped by bogus videos on you tube, this has become far more prevalent since COVID.

Agree that you have a business strike not a proof, it is a real luster bomb and very attractive. The bell lines are very good but would likely fall short of a FBL designation imo, however, the TPG's are all over the place when it comes to this designation.

As a general thought process, putting money into an index fund will grow your net worth faster/more than rare or bullion coins. This is because coins do not pay dividends, so the only value appreciation comes from rising prices. The coin market has been in a bull run for several years now and I would still only break even on some of the coins in my collection. But like all markets this bull run will end and prices will stagnate or even retreat as a possibility, the same is true for stocks but you still have the forward income stream of dividends to continue the value growth. Making money as a business in coins requires the right contacts, knowledge, and some luck, dealers make money on the buy side not the sale side. While not impossible it is tough to buy retail and sell for retail+, to make money you have to buy at less than retail to have some room for markup. Buying at close to retail and then holding and waiting for prices to rise can work, but you are tying up capital during the holding time and you have no way of knowing how long you will have to hold before prices rise enough. And you have to consider the selling costs for the venue you choose, it costs to sell through auction sites or venues like ebay.

The price guides are developed from auction data, usually from the auction sites like Heritage, and Stacks. GC doesn't share their closed auction data with the TPGs so their results do not reflect in the price guides. If you do a search of the GC archives you might find the data you are looking for. If there is no (or very limited) recorded auction data because there have only been private transactions or any auction data is so old as to be irrelevant, then the guides will either make an educated guess or have no price listed,

@NeverEnoughCoins09 the photo you posted of the 39 rev of 40 in MS68 FS is a coin that might appeal to many collectors of nickels, but due to the price tag it will only get serious bids from very wealthy collectors or a handful of very motivated registry buyers. Wide swings in price can come from several factors, usually buyers of coins like this will view the coin in person or have a representative do that for them. If that in hand view doesn't satisfy the bidders that the quality is all there you might see weak bidding and a low end result. I the coin is truly spectacular then the bidding might be more aggressive with a bidding war between two top registry participants. Another factor is if two of the same coin come up for auction in close proximity to each other, the winner of the first to auction has satisfied his need and thus there may not be the spirited bidding war for the second coin that hits the auction block. Also, this is the area where the brand of plastic really matters, like it or not in this top pop area PCGS coins often bring more at auction than NGC graded coins do, and while not a factor for Jefferson nickels, the presence or lack of add-ons like an eagle eye sticker or CAC bean can have a significant impact on auction results. I would also suggest that you widen your view of things outside of price guides, Great Collections has auctioned several MS68 examples of this coin (there are two current auctions as I type this), and using their auction archives can assist you in finding additional data as GC auctions are not included in either of the NGC or PCGS price guides or auction data. As you can see all of these sold for well less than the NGC price guide. I am still confused as you mentioned a PL coin which this nickel is not.

These are not "impressions" the coin has been carved. Why the person that did the work chose these designs and the placement of those carvings is a mystery to all but that individual. Your microscope will tell you nothing, google love tokens and you will be able to see multiple examples of coins that have designs carved into them.

Is the line raised or incuse? I'm not sure it really matters as a coin in this poor of condition would have to be a major error, and even then the value would be significantly reduced.

There are some variables to consider, is the holder an old holder that carries some value just because of the age of the holder for one. How bad is the crack or damage is also an important consideration. A minor corner chip or tiny crack just off the edge may have zero effect on the ability to resell a slab. And of course, who the potential buyer is can be a factor as well. For the coin in your op, this is not a generation of holder that carries any value, and the crack is rather distracting so in this case sending the coin into NGC using the reholder service is a good option.

Hmmm where to start, welcome to the forum. There is no requirement to have coins graded and slabbed by a TPG (third party grader) anyone can if they choose to but it is an expensive process with no guaranties as to what grades you might receive. From your post is seems that you are concentrating on modern and US mint products be it proof or circulation coinage. Yes, as a general rule a coin that approaches or achieves the highest possible grade might/will command the highest prices. However, is it not easy to get a grade of MS70, very few coins receive a grade that lofty, even for modern mint coinage. Most of the coins which are blessed with the highest grades are submitted by dealers who submit thousands of coins via the bulk submission process, or by experienced submitters that pour over hundreds of mint sets looking for the very best coins. Buying a roll of coins form the mint, submitting them and receiving even one MS70 grade is not very likely, that would be somewhat like hitting the lottery, possible but the odds are against it. Proof 70 (PF70) is a different story as a decent percentage of modern US mint proof coinage will be graded PF70. If you buy 10 proof coins from the mint it is very likely that at least a few will grade as PF70. Problem is you will lose money and have a hard time selling off all the PF69 or lower graded coins, and you will receive a few of those too. As to what to read, well there is not much literature that is dedicated to modern mint products, there are tons of books on classic coinage. The best you can hope for when buying mint products is that you happen to buy something that years later is considered to be a key or low mintage coin. The problem is that even if a particular coin is produced in low mintage most of the production of mint proof products are saved so it will never be scarce or truly rare, this is really again much like playing the lottery and hoping you get a winning ticket. You are indeed lucky if your heirs are truly interested in coins or holding onto your collection, I would say that close to 80% of collectors end up selling their collections prior to passing because they have no heirs that ae interested in the collection aside from what they can sell it for. I hope you enjoy collecting, it is the study, history, and collecting of knowledge about coins that is the major driver for many collectors.

Agreed all are large date coins.

Hard to know, it was like this when I bought it, but a warm moist windowsill is a possibility. I've seen other examples of coins that look similar to this in other cracked holders, either slabs or mint holders of some type.

The tone streak is on the coin not the plastic, after all this time (I've owned the coin about 20yrs now) I very much doubt it could be conserved which would not leave some portion of the streak without stripping the surface completely. At this point it is a fun conversation piece, which was really what I bought it for anyway, paid $10 for it in the early 2000's.

Are you selling these?? This section of the forum is for selling or trading coins, you should post questions in the newbie or US coin sections of the forum. If you are selling then there are rules posted at the top of this section with what needs to be included in a for sale post, not the least of which is a price and the grade you deem it to be if raw. As to your question about grades, both the dimes appear cleaned/wiped and would likely receive details grades. The 1906-S has a moderately low mintage I see no luster in the photos so I'd say XF details, the Merc is a very common coin and I would say Unc details. The 1913 type 1 Buffalo photos don't make the coin appear cleaned but there is some lite wear so I'll say AU55 for a grade on that one.

I never met Alan Hagar (I think I spelled that correctly) but have heard that he is an exceptional grader. He was very good at grading other people's coins, the issue was that he became a very generous grader when he graded and slabbed his own coins. So I think it is fair to say that many of his problems were self-inflicted, but no doubt he wasn't able to keep up once NGC and PCGS geared up. I actually have several of the old ACG slabs, much like the old ANACS holders I like the compact design. These are all listed in my custom set, but unfortunately due to the rules of the registry only the NGC and PCGS old holders are able to be viewed by the public, I really wish that NGC would change that for the custom sets. Not to hijack the thread but one more for old times, I crossed this over many years ago and it now has a green bean to boot.