gmarguli

It's very difficult to tell from these pictures, but the 1936 looks low MS, the 1942 AU58, and the 1943 cleaned. 20X magnification is perfect for looking for authentication markers. Not much need for magnification when grading Walkers.

This looks like dip residue. It'll likely come off with a quick dip.

I've always found these interesting. Some meaningless facts I found when looking into them: Minted by Osborne Coinage. They were produced 24 hours a day with as many as 80 million being made in one day. 5 billion total tokens were minted. There are 30 red and 24 blue letter combinations. What the letters mean has never been divulged. While some people think they were random, the fact that it has never been publicly stated leads many to believe there is something behind the lettering. They are made of vulcanized fiber. Blue tokens were used for processed foods. Red tokens for meats and fats. At least one TPG will grade them:

It's been a very long time since I bothered to send a coin back to a TPG for review, but in the past both NGC & PCGS have removed contaminates on coins for free. Only once was I told that I'd have to use their conservation service to remove PVC. When I pointed out that I'd just allow the PVC to etch the surfaces and then the TPG could buy it back in a few years under their grade review, they magically decided to do it for free.

Probably XF Details, Environmental Damage.

Are you saying that Eastern Kentucky isn't a popular tourist destination for world travelers? Los Angeles, circa 1990, I met a guy selling world coins by the pound. It was heavy in Mexico, stripped of Canada, and the rest was an extremely wide variety of countries. Turns out that he was buying it from the City. It was all the foreign coins that were put in parking meters, thrown in fountains, etc. He told me they held sales fairly regularly, whenever they accumulated enough. He would buy a couple thousand pounds at a time.

My guess is that coin never saw the Turks & Caicos islands. The county only mints NCLT. This and the same date 1/2 Crown are the only coins that come close to having the appearance of actually being able to circulate. I find their designs very generic and rather dull. This is actually one of their nicest design, IMO.

Article should read: Jeff Garrett: The World's Most Valuable US Coin There are many world coins that have sold for $1M+ and with the extreme wealth being created outside this county, there is no reason one of these super rarities couldn't surpass the record for the 1933 $20.

Even unknown examples have one thing in common, they tend to be somewhat similar in characteristic to known examples of type/date. The writing and symbols on this "coin" are gibberish. No date, denomination, or anything to indicate a country of origin. Clearly cast (XF condition with no wear), not to mention the seam. And anyone who has experience can instantly tell that this "coin" is not old based on its look. Based on the attempted style, it should be 300-500 years old. My guess is that it was produced post 1960.

Or possibly he just hated the job. A prior PCGS President told me he hated the job.

Did any of those shops want to buy it? Because if they did, I'd sell it to them ASAP. Nothing about it looks authentic.

AU Details, Cleaned.

This coin and the one linked to the Met site do not match. The borders don't look anything alike. Lots of other areas don't match up. Immediate gut feeling when seeing the pictures was that the coin looks modern in strike. I suspect you coin is counterfeit.

I meant that those people who actually want to invest serious money in gold aren't going to want old coins. Ma & Pa America may buy a coin or two, but most will lean towards modern AGE or other pure items. Those with significant assets to invest will not want to touch physical gold at all. No need to. They will purchase derivative contracts, futures, options, EFT / mutual funds that track gold, or even stock in gold mining companies. And I'd never invest in cryptocurrency. I'd sooner invest in a Beanie Baby because at least I could burn it to keep warm if the world went to hell. The crypto crash is coming.

Anyone who wants a cheap hedge and quick liquidity is not buying physical.

As much as some dealers of high priced coins would like you to believe, it says nothing about the coin market. Money is super cheap right now and investors are begging to find places to park it. It'd be very interesting to know the motivation for the bidders. We don't know if any of them were actual coin collectors.

Same here. I'm pretty sure it only takes credit cards now.

Vending machines used to take coins? How'd you fit them in the credit card slot?

I think this is country specific. In my experience I've found the Swiss to be able to grade consistently. Germans are far less consistent, tend to micro-grade by focusing on one flaw, and are not good at detecting cleaning or PVC. Italian grading is all over the place. French are optimistic...

Doubtful modern stuff like this would ever reach the eyes of most coin graders. They are likely graded by modern-only graders. And even if every single 2021 Morgan were submitted to NGC, the modern graders blow thru these type coins at an amazing rate.

That $5.25 in quarter planchets is roughly equivalent to $150 today. Tax free. He stole more than most people make in a day working 8 hours.

Most likely you're placing bids close to market price. If a coin is worth $1000 and I place a bid of $825 (+20% BP for $990 total), the fact that I would win the coin at my max $825 bid should not be a surprise. I've placed many bids where I won the lot for significantly less. And I've placed bids way above market where I have still lost.

Sad? He was a thief. He worked there for 22 years. Wonder how much he stole before he was caught.

I did not know that. Every Board member that voted that way should lose their seat and be permanently banned from the ANA.

Maybe we now know why the Colorado counterfeiter, D.C., hasn't been arrested. The Secret Service doesn't have the ability to tell that the coins are counterfeit. And given the quality of the counterfeits pictured in the article, no expert would be needed. They were bad fakes. Anyone with a tiny bit of knowledge about coins would have spotted them as fakes instantly.