GoldFinger1969

Yeah, I think maybe Stacks (whose name has changed with additions/subtractions) comes to mind as a survivor from 1968. Maybe some LCS that changed hands from the parents to the kids but not many of the national firms. Someone should do a Geneology Thread on the big dealers from the 1960's or 1970's...names I've come across in reading books: Paramount....Superior.....Gillio.....Manfred Tordella Brookes....etc....etc. Heck, even having a list from a FUN show in the 1960's should be fascinating to look at and see who was there 50-60 years ago. Even maybe from the 1980's.

That's what I thought, Roger. Gonna re-read that section tonight since I've been posting a bit on it on some threads here and ATS.

Classic -- and recent -- example of the value of breaking up a proof set would be the 1995-W ASE with AGEs. The 1995-W sells for thousands because folks need it in their type set.

Yes, that sounds right -- I stand corrected. Thanks, Numis.

Any additional details in this book above and beyond what Bower's wrote in his GUIDE BOOK on DE's ? I was thinking of getting this book but it is pricey.

Proof sets have been notoriously poor performers price-wise over the decades so people will do whatever they can to maximize the value.

It's usually the case that when something is "broken up" the individual pieces are worth more than the whole. True in corporate M&A.....true in breaking up collections of tangible assets.

Been buying a few auction catalogs here-and-there the last few months.....the 2012 Duckor FUN catalog is 100% on Saint-Gaudens Double Eagles and has lots of commentary from David Akers (I think he passed away later that year).

Nice !! Roger's story on the 1928 Stolen Double Eagles is in my 2012 FUN Duckor catalog. I knew it was in the HA archives but it's nice to see it in the actual catalog for which it was written. Love that story.....

That was what I was thinking too.....I see nothing now on Ebay but maybe something will show up. Scan there.

I don't see the "wing"....you mean the vertical plastic that goes over the plastic and the label ? And this is a 1993 slab, so it isn't recent.

Thanks Cat.....I believe the 1st 1908 WF NM's were released in 1997 so they shouldn't have leaked out into the 1996 population report. BTW, what is that a picture of that has all the data ? Also, if you don't want double-spacing keep typing after each sentence. The way it looks in the REPLY box is how it will look in the post. You can always delete the spaces between the sentences to make it fewer paragraphs.

Does anybody have any books or sources which could give me the Population Census (by grade) for the 1908 No Motto BEFORE the Wells Fargo Hoard was found, like around 1997 or earlier ? I'm trying to see what happened to the price of (high-quality) 1908 No Mottos before/after the hoard was found and hit the market.

Beautiful coin, BTW.

(1) Agree with you on silver not being cheap OR expensive. (2) If you like research on (dividend-paying) oil stocks, check out SankeyResearch.com. It's free (for now) but Paul Sankey is probably the best oil analyst on Wall Street (well, was...when he was there ).

Silver ran up so much more in 1979-80 because of the Hunt Squeeze. It quadrupled in 5 months whereas gold merely doubled. You are absolutely right about silver -- and virutally ALL PM"s -- being lousy investments. That's one reason why I don't "invest" in silver but rather "speculate" in silver coins and commemoratives. I pay more, but I get something I enjoy looking at as opposed to the same old ASEs or a silver bar. If silver doubles or triples or quadruples from today's levels, I'll probably make money on them. If not, I don't really care.

Dissemination of INFORMATION is certainly more egalitarian....access to coin shows is easier than decades ago....the internet (Ebay, HA, GC, Stacks, etc.) is fantastic. And of course, sites like this are great, too. Certainly, some types of coins (gold, silver) are difficult to accumulate many of the years and mintmarks. Other coins, less so. Pretty much as it was 40 years ago and 60 years ago.

There actually was a "color plate" of all the coins with small color photos at the beginning of the catalog. But the larger ones inside alongside the commentary were B&W.

Great thread, worth re-starting.....Gillio has NEVER disclosed the exact location of where the coins were stored or who tipped him off. It does appear that the coins were NOT in the U.S. but probably a foreign country; they weren't in a U.S. bank and withheld from the confiscators of FDR's administration. And yes, the Wells Fargo moniker has nothing to do with their long-stored status but a holding spot after Gillio took delivery of the coins. It was where they were kept before they went to PCGS. They might have been at a central bank or money center bank in some Central American or South American country....or even a high-ranking military junta's private stache. Those names wouldn't have meant anything to most Americans. Hell, before I did some digging I too thought they had been in a Wells Fargo bank for decades. Apparently, they were there for days or weeks and only in 1998.

You'd have to check the LME and CME stockpiles for that. I'm not an expert.

BARRON'S didn't.

I originally thought that grading standards loosened in the early-1990's but I've been since corrected that it was the late-1990's or more so the early-2000's. 2004 is specifically given as the dividing line between technical and market grading.

I believe a cubic meter of water weights almost a ton.

I was too young at the time to focus on investing, but I doubt that supply was going to be a bullish prop for the price, since the high price would incentivize production and CAPX. I'm also not surprised it lost that much after a bubble-spike from $12 in September 1979 to January 1980. I still consider silver a speculation. Here's a recent BARRON'S abbreviated (need to pay) link to the solar and 5G case for silver: https://www.barrons.com/articles/silver-prices-are-set-to-benefit-from-surge-in-solar-panels-and-5g-51606474800

But I didn't say it.... The way the quote appears makes it seem like I said it. Kurt did.