GoldFinger1969

deleted mistake

Is there a book solely on Proof Gold Coins ?

On 1/24/2024 at 12:05 AM, VKurtB said:

The ANA’s standards for judging rarity in exhibits completely ignore grade scarcity. Rarity is rarity, whether the pieces are PO1 or MS67+.

So they go by total population census then ? 

Apparently, "person" meant ANYBODY -- even kids.  I think it was interpreted like that.

$100 was a decent amount of savings in 1933....if you had a husband and wife and a few kids...plus some other family members like in-laws living with you (say, on a farm)....it wouldn't be a stretch to see some housholds easily be able to hold $500-$1,000 in gold....assuming they had it and could afford it.

The numismatic exemption was the loophole that allowed "gold bugs" or those who wanted to own gold to hedge inflation or economic problems.  The collectors in the 1940's and 1950's (i.e., Eliasberg) took advantage of this (maybe it was in Roger's book, I can't remember).

Didn't matter if the numismatic premium to gold was 20% or 2,000%.  I'm kind of suprised that Spencer Marsh (1932's) and other high-profile gold folks (like the guy who sued Chase Manhattan when they seized his gold) didn't have their lawyers use this loophole.

Just say you were a collector and/or the coins were not pure bullion, but part of a collection.   

Roger.....on Page 151 you have FN 188 saying that until RoAC it was assumed that Barber changed the date from MCMVII to 1907.  You say that was an error but the text attached to the FN doesn't imply anybody else worked on the coin. 

Under COMMENTARY, you mention Barber fiddling around with the design and deviating more from ASG's vision.  But no other name is listed.

So who are you implying was responsible for the change from the Roman to Arabic date numbers ?

Here's the EO and the exemption is listed in Section 2(b):

On 1/22/2024 at 7:32 PM, J P M said:

I also am always looking to pick up the classic silver commemoratives. But within the last year the prices are going way too high for what they are. In 2021 I passed on a MS63 Pilgram at $75 thinking I could get 64 or 65 for only little more. Well, that day has come and gone... LoL

Are these commemoratives down in price from the 1980's bubble prices ?  Have they come back a good bit or what ?

Here is the link, hope that linking ATS is permitted here:

https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/comment/13643555#Comment_13643555

I commented that it was a spectacular coin....and FFL commented about the SP designation and the coin's pedigree.  It's about 2/3rds of the way down the thread....make sure to check out the pictures of some great coins, including the MCMVII HR discussed here. 

On 1/23/2024 at 10:07 AM, RWB said:

That is a false assumption. ALL the HR pieces were struck with that collar (it was the only one) until a second pair of dies and collar were added in late November 1907. The UHR pieces are patterns, not coins, and were struck with more blows of the medal press and more annealings. The dies/design differs from HR MCMVII and  patterns are closer to pure gold color (yellower) because the 6 annealing and acid dipping cycles depleted  copper in the surface.  (See Renaissance of American Coinage 1905-1908 for facts, not fantasy.)  If the PCGS Board poster's comment is correct, then the designation is false. Why was a change made from accurate attribution to a lie?

Let me find the post, get more info.  It was a few weeks ago and I forgot about the context but should be able to find the post again.

On 1/22/2024 at 4:48 PM, RWB said:

Sounds like a meaningful project. (My comments are probably very different than the others -- I have no business or selling interests in the coins.)

Unfortunately, it looks like many of the coins in Bower's book don't have definitive opinions on all 3 variables.  Akers book does....yours certainly does.

Well, I'll see how it turns out. 

Strike vs. Luster vs. Eye Appeal:  Doing a little project....I'm comparing the rankings and comments on Strike, Luster, and Eye Appeal on all the Saint-Gaudens DEs from 3 of my Double Eagle Books:  Akers (2008), Bowers (2004), and Roger (2018).

If anybody wants me to post the sheet when I'm finished, let me know.   It's not an exact science, I'm using letter grades and sometimes they aren't directly commenting but you have to read related commentary to fish it out.

On 1/22/2024 at 11:58 AM, numisport said:

Just completed my questionnaire for a Federal jury trial summons. I don't know how I could possibly keep a straight face during a federal trial knowing how deep the swamp really is ! What a joke. I've been called several times and have sat one local trial for State crimes but that is different I feel. I just don't think I could sit in front of a group of fruadsters at my expence just to render an opinion that is meaninless.

If you want to get out of Jury Duty, just take Homer Simpsons' advice :

From what I have seen, he's clearly not trying to counterfeit -- his coins are like those round tokens that are given out at all kinds of venues, some plastic... some wood....some metal..

Not my cup of tea, but I think we have more evil criminals out there to worry about.  

On 1/21/2024 at 5:13 PM, RWB said:

It took a couple of months to locate the data in my database, and about 3 weeks (overlapping research) to write and edit. I guess locating data took maybe 3 hours; correlating about 20 hours; verifying another 2 hours; rechecking database another hour; writing and editing abut 10 hours. Obviously, this was done as time was available with thought and reconsideration in between. However, my database goes back 20+ years and is fully searchable. If it had to be done from scratch, the basics would have taken every day for many months --- and there'd be a lot of gaps.

I have taken to saving interesting articles on coins in PDF format or cutting-and-pasting into Word and saving it that way.  

I've done that for Heritage Auction commentaries on Saints and other trophy coins....and internet articles/legal mumbo-jumbo on the 1933 Double Eagle. 

You're right about having to organize the stuff.  My 1933 Word piece containing all kinds of articles and relevant and not-so-relevant articles was over 320 pages at one point ...but cutting out dupes, eliminating excess spaces, etc....I've since cut it down to about 270.  

It might pay to save stuff you KNOW you will use in Word or PDF format -- as opposed to stuff you may just find interesting and/or fear it might depart the Internet or some database and not be retrievable again -- because then you can use the FIND feature to look it up. 

The workload for your Saints book must have been astronomical compared to 1 small 2-page article in CoinWeek. 

Those of you reading this, consider this for anything of interest TO YOU, too.  This site underwent a major renovation over a decade ago I believe -- some threads and posts may have been lost, or just more difficult to find.  You never know when a Thread or post will be locked or deleted, a website gets a DOS attack, the entire company folds up, etc.  If it's critical or unique information here or elsewhere, save it to YOUR PC !! 

On 1/21/2024 at 1:21 PM, RWB said:

Yeah....well, that sounds like a nom de plume, or maybe a nom de nom.

(This was prepared by popular request. Took quite a while to find and correlate all the pieces, then craft a clear story line so it would be easy to read.)

I love "fill-in-the-blank" articles or books that go into more depth and detail on something we just have surface knowledge about (i.e, gold ownersip prohibited).  Hope you write more about these.  For me, stuff from the 1900's onward is more my interest but I get how some people like stuff about the 1700's and 1800's.

Just curious....any idea how long it took you to do the article, both on the research gathering/double-checking...and then the actual writing of the article ?  Myself, I find that about 10-20% of the time is spent on writing and re-writing and trimming, cutting, re-wording, etc....and the other 80-90% was the actual gathering of the facts, outline, footnotes, etc.

Your article was well-written.  An article can interest me...it can have interesting ideas....but if it is poorly-written or laid-out, it can defeat the whole purpose and make reading it a chore. 

Same thing with speakers, of whom I have booked many:  I've seen boring, confusing topics done top-notch and keep an audience on the edge of their seat....I've had great topics I thought would be of interest with simple easy-to-understand facts and slides...and people doze off because the presenter is a bad speaker, all over the place, and doesn't have a good layout of his or her material.

On 11/11/2023 at 11:05 AM, numisport said:

Very nice collection of DCarr Peace Dollar overstrikes and appears to have nearly all (if not all) die pir offered. Do you own these coins ? 

For the uninformed....so he specializes in re-creating old favorites with minor changes (so as not to be accused of counterfeiting, I take it) -- do I have that right ?

I'm really not that familiar with Dcarr's works, though we have sparred on other issues ATS.  I'm pretty much agnostic on what he does.

Are his works considered commemoratives ?  I would think not.

They're not NCLT, but I do really like some of the private-issue creations like the National Park Foundation Saint-Gaudens coins, silver and gold.  Kind of nice to see ASG's various designs and sketches come to life.

On 1/16/2024 at 9:58 AM, Just Bob said:

I imagine everyone who buys gold and silver as an investment is looking for that. Whether they will see it is debatable.

But I think most of us aren't looking at gold or silver as "investments" -- we enjoy the hobby but do keep track of the underlying PM prices because many of the coins we like/buy are directly tied to the metals.

If somebody I knew said they wanted to buy an MS-65 Saint (common) for one of their grandkids and said they had the $$$ now but might also just get it for them in 10 or 15 years, I would probably tell them that the coin will cost alot more then since it tends to move along with gold bullion.  Not so with more numismatic Saints or coins.

Is there anything to the registry game that I am unaware of, aside from completing the task and the competition that I see with points tabulated ?

Are there prizes or anything ?

duplicate

On 1/20/2024 at 10:39 AM, RWB said:

Here are my buying criteria. They are likely very different than those of others.  1^st – Is the coin special in some way relating to numismatic research? 2^nd – Is it unique or readily available?  3^rd – Is it of superior quality with respect to the features that make it a research subject, or supporting evidence. 4^th – Cost to acquire. Is this possible?  5^th – Is it likely to increase in value or should it be disposed of quickly?

HAVE you bought any coins that met those criteria lately ?

If not, what coin would you like to buy that meets them ?

Whip Inflation Now (WIN):  Apologies to Gerald Ford and Arthur Burns , but I came across an interesting tidbit while scanning Aker's 1907-33 Gold Book.

At the time, the book said that PCGS and NGC had certified only 3 coins from the 1909-D Saint series as MS-67.   I then checked the current population census, expecting to see a nice increase in the 15 years since the dated information appeared in the book.....NO increase !!  2 PCGS, 1 NGC. 

NGC has 6 MS-65's and 1 MS-66; PCGS has 25 in MS-65 and 4 MS-66's and another 3 MS-66+.  Nice to see time hasn't led to any gradeflations in this series.  Maybe the absolute low number there made it harder to increase the total over time, unlike a larger population.

Obviously, depends on the premium to numismatic value and the total cost I am paying. 

I bought a common Saint at FUN 2020 after a few minutes of perusing.  I think it sold for spot bullion.  Was looking at buying an AGE and figured "why not?" in buying a common Saint in MS-63.  No downside price-wise.

OTOH, I spent YEARS researching the 1923-D while saving up for the coin.  At FUN 2020, I probably looked at a dozen or so 1923-D's...and waited 2 days to pull the trigger on the 1923-D.  Probably 4-5 trips to the coin dealers who had the coins I narrowed my final choices down to.  Probably spent 1-2 hours looking at all the coins before finally taking out the Benjamins.