Henri Charriere

I do not own any stickered coins so at the outset I have no axe to grind. The top two TPGS have been around for decades. My take on the recent development, which understandably would be of concern to the membership is it is provisional, subject to change. When a potential sea change in the market occurs, I would assume NGC is taking a cautious, wait and see posture. Any business would do the same. Now a CACG component has been added to the mix. We are not waiting on NGC to render a decision on policy so much as we are waiting to see how the market responds to the introduction of a new service and the effect it may or may not have on it. That takes time -- and patience.

It's a shame the influence of Forum's anti-YouTube lobby far exceeds that of its anti-counterfeiters. Who in coin collecting is unaware of Dubai's gold vending machines at ATMs and airport? It was all over the news. Everything from 2.5 gm 24-karat gold bars up to and including 1-ounce bars. Why would they be installed at an airport if not for the use of international travelers? I don't know what RWB's and VKurtB's stand is on this, but its best to get their permission, in writing, before you take the plunge into the notoriously persuasive, and sinister world of their videos. 🤣

I am going to use the 27,000 ANA member figure given earlier upthread, as my point of departure for the following facts and figures, as Rod Serling would say, "submitted for your approval." While figures regarding the top two TPGS are not exactly broadcast to the four winds, they can be found. Herewith, the latest as of this post's date. NGC has 30,000 members who own 280,000 sets on its registry comprising some 1.6 million coins. PCGS has 43,000 members who own 166,000 sets comprising some 2.6 million coins. The top Blue Whale appears to be an NGC member few heard of: "XIXIXI." He owns 395 competitive sets with an impressive total score of 27, 286, 886. The U.S. has the lion's share of sets on the NGC registry: 213,936. The smallest number of sets, just 1 each, is shared by two locations: Equatorial African States and South Georgia & South Sandwich Islands, off Antarctica. I do not have an accurate estimate of the number of regular Chat Board members but have noted that the figure fluctuates throughout the day and night, over a number of time zones with "guests" (formerly "lurkers,"?) predominating. Members are free to draw their own conclusions. 🐓

In all fairness, the United States may be first and second, but not all states have identical costs of living. New Hampshire has no sales tax, no state income tax and a whole slew of other plusses. Alaska and Hawaii may be expensive to live in, but there are a host of other considerations to consider. Delaware and South Dakota are favorable to banks and corporations. Florida is a popular relocation destination. Law enforcement personnel (FBI, DEA, NYPD, etc.) in New York City choose to live outside the five boroughs in neighboring counties. With an infusion of migrants and exodus of well-heeled taxpayers -- not to mention members' comments about the inordinately high state sales tax and undesirability of holding coin shows there, one cannot broadly cite New York on any list until we run it by the mbership's more vocal detractors most of whom would never entertain the thought of living here. I can understand why France is not on any list. I would have thought Dubai would have been a contender. Definitely an eye-opening compilation!

I do! And macular generation with a suggestion of Fuch's corneal dystrophy. I guess you could say I am flying blind.

That won't be necessary. Les etoiles dans mes yeux ont disparu. The stars in my eyes are gone. No Sale!

@ @powermad5000 : You are too kind! The unusual listing -- when's the last time SB or HA auctioned off a counterfeit? -- raises many more questions than it answers. What happened to your vow to destroy any counterfeit? The poor condition of the coin, unlike and contemporary counterfeit I am aware of, would deter the average collector. It is grossly unattractive, the entire series was demonetized in 1928, and for all practical reasons, is in no condition to be sold to anyone. Oddly, a dual listing for the company, Le Comptoir Des Monnaies, lists this coin for $650. though they are open to the Or Best Offer (OBO) option. Their adjectival grade, EF, to me is debatable. A fairer price would be little more than spot which hovers at $378.37 as of this writing.

I have my own theories and suspicions with the wayward parcel. Nothing is definite yet. Are the FedEx offices and transit hubs equipped with surveillance cameras? My biggest fear is any loss, insured up to a nominal amount, if unaccounted for, is treated as a cost of doing business. Too many possibilities. I hope to see feedback.

Not a restrike. It's an original. I use a term our Just Bob dislikes: genuine counterfeit. I believe it to be the work of an ex-Mint employee and the discrepancy in weight may be due to the facial injury it suffered which is identical to what you would expect to find when a glacial mass retreats. New York's Central Park is riddled with large rocks and boulders bearing identical striated scarring.

Significantly underweight? A tenth of a gram? I personally do not believe it to be counterfeit. But if it is, it is exceedingly rare. When's the last time you saw a Henning nickel for sale? I want something no one else has. The '33 DE is spoken for as are a number of other "unique" coins. Sell? If powermad5000 has his way, there won't be any sale. 🤣

If you can order a "Certificate of Authenticity or grading" for this, "if you so wish," that would appear to rule out it being non-authentic, no?

Who's going to mess with J.P. Morgan? 🤣

If that were the case for a U.S. coin, would we condemn it as a counterfeit forgery? Millions of gold roosters were melted and there have been reports of known examples of counterfeits being detected but this is a complete mystery. If you've seen one, you've seen 'em all. One can barely see the edge lettering which is decorative with high relief and presumably difficult to reproduce faithfully.

For sale, presently, on the website of a prominent and reputable coin dealer in Europe, www.numiscorner.com (Le Comptoir Des Monnaies) is the above-described coin. Its condition is pegged at EF (40-45). The price is €500, which is about $538. Its weight is 6.33 gms. instead of the standard 6.45 gms. There is an unusually garish abrasion on Marianne's cheek [which I suspect was inflicted intentionally in an effort to determine its authenticity]. Every detail is impeccable: even the finess of its gold content, while off by 0.12 gm, is identical to a genuine coin: .90000000000000002. So we have a legitimate, highly-regarded dealer offering what they term is a "counterfeit forgery," with a comment: "If you so wish, you can order a Certificate of Authenticity or grading for this collectible item after adding it to your cart." Just when you thought you'd seen it all and heard it all, when you believed everything was tickety-boo, something out of left field leaves you gobsmacked. I would be honored to acquire it but the anti-counterfeiting league on the Forum is strong, and I am weak. Malheureusement, there are no accommodations on the Set Registry for hits, runs, errors, varieties, proofs, essais, piedforts, oddities -- or genetic mutations. 🤣

@gmarguli : Respectfully, A comprehensive "List of Prohibited and Restricted Items for Shipping," can be accessed for FedEx, UPS and USPS on the internet. I typed in "prohibited items fedex," (20 finger strokes; 20 seconds) and the results were instantaneous and extensive. On UPS, they are listed from A to Z. A was ammunition. B was Bank bills, notes or currency (other than coin). and so on. It's clear and unambiguous.

I recognize these from the Links provided. Using my thumb and finger to enlarge the images on my cell, I see mottled fields (extensive pitting; uniform corrosion) and believe the coin to be overgraded. The date on the obverse looks like 1805 and the rest of what I know should be there is illegible. Plumbing the depths of my memory from the 1960's, I can recall no Red Book's definition of Fine that would apply to this coin. I would hesitate to contemplate how many decades of unremitting erosion, by any number of agents, would be required to simulate the damage exhibited by this coin -- and I am by no means a strict grader. To add insult to injury, the grade bestowed, at your expense, has effectively precluded this coin from low-ball consideration. It is eminently qualified to be what collectors who house their coins in albums refer to as a "hole (space) filler." IMNSHO. [Edit: My apologies to the gentleman from the Hoosier State for the harsh assessment. My thanks to Just Bob for providing photos from the Links. My appreciation to Sandon for the revelation that the cert. verifier can be used to look up coins marked DETAILS.]

Funny how nobody ever mentions that prominent die crack I see on all the Liberty bells. 🤣

The '94 on top is a masterful rendering of the engravers art. The nice thing about the -'93 is it gives the Jeff' collectors a good idea of what the reverse looks like at its best. They never did catch the guy who stole everybody else's steps; it's nice to see yours appear to be all intact. 🤣

@EagleRJO 🤣 Shame on you! Good thing I was lurking about... You, above all people, know that's a classified matter -- recovery of grading costs after sellers' fees -- you had implicitly agreed to never inquire about as per the Non-Disclosure Agreement you signed upon becoming a member.

I would hesitate to characterize this as "theft" in the absence of hard facts. What I would like to know is whether there are any markings [beyond a barcode for scanning] on the exterior of a package that would indicate there is something of value inside. This, to me, is key.

Makes me wonder why no one gold-plated it way back when and tried to pass it off as a three-dollar coin much the way the Liberty nickel 1883 NO CENTS was plated and passed off as a five-dollar coin. Nice catch, Ronnie!

You find it "difficult to believe," but nowhere have you mentioned any of your mailings specifically involving FedEx. That's at the heart of the matter here. These postal employees, on both sides of the aisle, public and private, engage in a practice I disapprove of: wearing earbuds (Bluetooth?) that makes conversing with them difficult and delivering a distraction. I have seen boxes fall of their dollies they are oblivious to because, facing forward, they did not see or hear them fall. As with anything else, I have to accept a posted topic at face value. I know if it were my coin, I would be heartbroken, doubly so if I were a newbie and submitting for the first time. I guess we will just have to wait and see what happens.

Precisely. I put my stock in you because you routinely engage in transactions that involve volume unlike the back-pedaling four-flusher, a self-described scrap/junk dealer who speaks in broad generalities, does not cite specific sources of information and fails to realize the impetus for prohibiting cash and currency transactions was to address the demand side of drug trafficking and not Johnnie and his modest Indian Head cent collectibles of numismatic value. He offers no explanation as to why the delivery by FedEx of a shipment of coins, he deems are first on the list of "prohibited" items was cleared for delivery to me choosing to resort to personal attacks as a defense mechanism instead. I did not call FedEx. I made an unannounced visit in person and spoke to a manager. I was shown their operating manual. I do not know that a police report can be filed nor in what jurisdiction, in the absence of knowledge that criminal activity was involved and where it is alleged to have taken place. Hopefully, the OP will apprise us of future developments.

No, they have managed to retain their sanity. No fanaticism over this; no obsessing over that. Just normal everyday people. That's the way it used to be here. You had your circulated coins and if you sought something better, you got 'em every year for a nominal sum in Uncirculated Mint and Proof Sets. Your proof set had a carbon spot? You'd be told that's normal and to be expected on an older set. Recently, on the Rooster thread I reported the first instance I had ever seen of an example baldly described as a Counterfeit Forgery. It's beautiful. The only anomaly I recognized right away was a discrepancy in weight, 6.33 vs 6.45 grams. The fineness of the gold is identical to that of a genuine one. It's listed exactly like every coin listed. They even offer a COA! Picture Stack's Bowers doing that! Price? Same as a genuine. $500+. The only question I have is why would anyone bother when the only difference is some 0.12 gram of a 90% pure gold coin that was then (1904) worth 20 French francs? To go through all that trouble, for what? I'd love to own it, but could I convince a TPGS here to accept it? RWB is busy researching stuff. Just Bob is hunting elusive tokens down. My one and only problem would be watching my back to make sure powermad5000 doesn't sneak up on me, demand I surrender it, and take delight in destroying it i/f/o my eyes. That's Europe. Laid back. Civilized. No agonizing over minute, imperceptible without a loupe, surface "damage." If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't. "DECADES behind us"? No. coins are not just a commodity to them. It's just a hobby they've been pursuing at their leisure for many many centuries longer than we have. It's not all about the Benjamin$ overseas and I thank Kurt for bringing this unique perspective to our collective attention.

I take it you are dissatisfied with the quality of photographs furnished by the respective TPGS, by whatever name known. I do not have an answer for that. I would imagine the universe of all owners of these very specific, limited number of examples would be small, but how would one reach them all? On the other hand, I believe member @Buffalo Head is uniquely qualified to capture the essence of every coin but he is all the way up in the Pacific Northwest. So this is logistics problem. Have every owner, whether a member of other TPGSs, or not, the solitary individual who seldom follows threads -- and those deathly afraid of the I.R.S, somehow coordinate with you to bring the job to fruition. That's a tall order. I have no idea how you would be able to get the word out to all applicable parties. I don't know if every TPGS routinely photographs every coin submitted to it, but if their quality does not meet or exceed your standard, you are back to square one. I am frankly surprised all of these years displaying the features you are interested in, differ so markedly as to warrant so many different photographs: Seven dates, 14 images, front and back. You don't specify a particular denomination of interest. Any way you look at it, that's potentially dozens of examples. Gratuitous editorial comment... it seems we have trillions to defend some backyard in Bakhmut and hundreds of millions to fund two failed missions to Mars but collectors with legitimate research projects are stymied in their efforts to get statistically insignificant sums of money to help broaden the hobby's body of knowledge. For shame.