EagleRJO

I just found out that HA does, which is usually like a 5% to 10% seller fee on top of the 20% BP. With a 10% seller fee and hammer bids at 0.83 x FMV (1/1.20 for BP adjustment), I think it would leave the seller with like 75% of FMV ... offff. I don't know how much GC charges as a seller fee below $1k, but the 10% BP with GC is much more reasonable.

Yea, GC seems to have better fees in general, and it seems pretty well run. That's nice that they waive the seller fees over $1k which a lot of desirable and less common coins probably go for, as well as gold eagles and double eagles. I posted another thread about finding other auction services like GC, particularly for raw coins which I prefer and which it seems GC doesn't carry, but so far nothing similar. Is the seller fee generally 5% on GC if not waived? Also, do you buy/sell on any other platforms, and how about raw coins (forget eBay )?

Thanks for the feedback. The 1903-S is one of those semi-key dates/mints that gets a little pricy for the higher grades, like around $2k for an AU which is over my max target for each Morgan at about $400 to $500 (I know, I haven't gotten there yet ... ). So, I am looking for an XF at around $500 (valued at $550 per Coin World and $500 per RB) and probably will have to wait for prices to come down. In the meantime, I am keeping an eye on prices, where grade really matters for that one and some other coins, and then making a note of grade and price for reference. I know there can be a fine line between like a higher VF and a lower more common XF, particularly when grading Morgans. For the VF-35/XF-40 I posted I will offer a little more of what I see, because that one threw me off more as it actually seemed like a solid XF-40, maybe even XF-45 after looking closer and at the ANA Guide. So, maybe a little more feedback would be helpful. I rough graded from RB and picked an XF, then went to that in PCGS Photograde (attached), as well as focal areas and grade pic/description for an XF-40 & XF-45 in the ANA Guide. * Obverse: I don't see much wear of the cotton leaves near cap, hair near ear or the ear itself which actually seems more defined, but some flat spots of cotton leaves expected. High design points (ANA & Coin News pic) such as hair whisps in front of ear and above back of eye, as well as the eye (bot particularly), ear and cap act appear more defined. Rim. letters and fields have similar wear. * Reverse: Some more wear of eagles' neck, and similar wear on upper wings and head (expected). Some breast feathers remain (expected to be gone) and some expected wear of wing bottom half, leg tops, talons and tailfeathers (above and below arrows) not present. Less wear of clutched arrows and branch, as well as the wreath below the eagle. Seems like there was some more detail than expected on obv and rev, which might be a little offset by a few dings near "A" and on edges on rev, as well as a few marks/scratches in fields. Overall, there is expected to be a little mint luster left with an XF-45, but I couldn't tell from either pic. So, it seemed to me like (2) actually had less wear than expected or what is shown in the PCGS example as well as the ANA focal points, descriptions and photos for an XF. Okay, fire away.

I can't comment on selling coins there, but as a buyer I had been trying HA out for a while, but recently gave up. My hammer bids were fairly lower generally speaking relative to FMV using RB, Coin World or NGC/PCGS guide prices. I mean fairly lower considering I adjusted my desired max hammer bids for HA's 20% BP, which is 83% of FMV or total of what I was willing to pay in general. I'm sure many others do the same. I understand they charge a 5% to 10% sellers fee on top of that which further reduces the bottom line for a seller. I have been sticking with bidding at Great Collections which has a better selection at least for the coins I am interested in, and they have a reduced BP of 10% which significantly bumps up my hammer bids. I don't know how they fall with seller fees which like HA are tacked on or deducted also. Just my 2 nickels

Almost looks dipped with too much time in the acid, but why would somebody dip that coin?

I was mostly looking at coin (2) for pricing, but yea I guess the second one could be an option if at a good price. I was looking for an XF, but I think that one is at least close and doesn't look like it was dipped or harshly cleaned. I don't plan on sending sub $500 value coins in for grading anyway, so I wouldn't have to worry about it coming back with the dreaded "Details - Cleaned" label. And along those lines I could even give it a quick acetone bath and clean it up with some MS70 coin cleaner with a Q-Tip to try and get rid of some of the leftover smutch and brighten it up a bit, so it fits better in my Morgan collection which is mostly AU/BU/MS coins. For a higher-grade coin, I understand that either an acetone bath or MS70 cleaner, even though not considered harsh chemicals, can remove some of the mint luster even if you are super careful and don't cause any surface damage, and result in a details-cleaned even if it's just an acetone bath. So, for a circulated VF+ to XF coin that has already lost much of the mint luster I would be less worried about that anyway.

Yea, and not only were the domestic gold miners not producing very much gold because of losing money at the current fixed price here, but foreign gold miners/refiners were not exporting any gold to the US because the fixed price here was $20.67/oz, compared to the low $30's/oz elsewhere w/o a gold standard. Where are you going to sell your gold, here @ $20.67/oz or like Switzerland at $33.60/oz ... hmmm, let me think about that one. Btw, did you know that the FDR EOs were issued with authority granted by the Trading with the Enemy Act of 1917?

Oh no, not THAT designation! And I love the way a bunch of the eBay coin scammers like to word the description for cleaned/dipped coins they are trying to pass off for not being cleaned, just to cover themselves from complaints/returns, like "Nice Details Coin", "Great Coin Details" or "Excellent XF Details". So, when someone gets the coin an actually sees how it looks in their hand or when Billy's coin comes back TPG slabbed with "XF Details - Cleaned" they can say "I told you in the listing it was Details".

I plan to, starting on page 1 like with the Red Book. So, if cleaning was done by just "washing" the coins would it still come back details only - cleaned from a TPG?

I do use PCGS Photograde as well as the descriptions for specific coins in the RB. I start with the coin specific descriptions in the RB to get a rough idea of grade and then I go to Photograde to look at specifics within maybe one grade on either side of that. I did just get a new book that came in the mail (photo attached). I'm sure @RWB will be happy I got the ANA grading guide, others maybe not so much.

I'm still finding decent raw coins in the XF to BU range that haven't obviously been dipped/cleaned for some of the more common years/marks for my Morgan collection. It's when I get to coins like the 1903-S (or 1879-CCs on the other end, which I have also skipped over for now) where there is more of an incentive to try and make coins look better than they are. These insufficiently_thoughtful_persons are ruining perfectly good coins just to try and make a buck.

I might actually be okay with a lower grade dipped Morgan for some of the more expensive ones as an option, where I really have to go with a lower grade anyway not to break the bank. That is as long as I was aware it would grade details, and it wasn't overdone with a good appearance still. I think it was Sandon who mentioned in another thread that he has gotten some good deals with problem coins for some of the more expensive years/marks knowing it would grade lower or details.

Doesn't make it right, taking the potential value of that gold from people.

I tend to think it was more of an issue or actually taking from people because gold (that was fixed at $20.67/oz since 1834) was way undervalued at the time vs world markets, and they knew that. If they had first raised the price of gold to something reasonable like $32/oz or $33/oz, which is still a little less than what you could have sold it for in the open world market, and then required people to turn in their gold, I would be okay with that under eminent domain with "fair compensation". And it didn't affect most people, so they just either went along with it or didn't turn in the gold coins they had stashed at home. Not many people had more than five 1-oz gold coins then too. It mostly effected wealthier people and businesses who kept the gold in banks, with the banks not letting people take it out after the EO's, and some of them got really screwed. Like there was one Swiss company that had like 62,500 gold coins in a bank worth $2.10M in their home country (~$33.60/oz). I think it was held in trust by an individual for some reason, even though it was for business use. The US took all their coins and gave them $20 per coin or $1.25M in paper money. They lost $850K ... talk about having a write off that year. I understand why they had to do it, greater good of the people and all that. Even the part about first taking the gold and then raising the price because it wouldn't have worked otherwise. But I don't think the ends justified the means in that case, and they should have come up with another way to issue the money they needed, maybe deferred compensation like an Uncle Sam IOU or something, which the paper money was anyway at that point. In any event, I don't look at gold prices before the early 1970's because it was fixed, including by FDR at $35/oz even though we were off the gold standard, which is where I think this whole discussion started. And talking about that, does anyone think that gold at $1,695/oz on July 20th is a low pivot point? Gold has been tanking along with the market, which may continue, but then again now might be a better time to scoop those double eagles I am looking at if that does turn out to be relatively low.

The EO's in April 1933 where just about confiscating people's gold, which they had to turn in by May 1933. In Jan 1934 the Gold Reserve Act was passes to create a slush fund, allow FDR to raise the gold price (the whole plan), and repeated some of the EO provisions as there were some challenging the constitutionality of the EOs, but they already had their gold confiscated for paper money. wow

Need confirmation of what I am seeing for these two coins. They appear dipped/cleaned so likely details graded, and I was just trying to figure out the Adjectival grade. I'm not sure if you would drop it down one additional grade (e,g, from AU to XF) compared to the wear because they were dipped/cleaned which effects luster. (1) I'm thinking the first one is VF - Details (dipped, with that whitewashed appearance), and not XF because I am seeing wear on the hair and eagle wings, along with scratches. (2) For the second one I'm thinking XF - Details (cleaned, with dark areas within letters they couldn't get to) because I'm not seeing a lot of wear but there are some scratches in the fields from likely being cleaned. Any feedback would be appreciated.

And while I'm looking to scoop some early Double Eagles and Half Eagles, I might as well scoop one of these 1841 (P) circulated Quarter Eagles. Circulation Strike 1841 Quarter Eagles from Philadelphia Mint Recognized by PCGS | CoinNews Glad I'm not collecting Quarter Eagles, offff.

Even if I cracked the holder and re-slabbed (keeping the label), it would fit right in with the gold eagles I have. Plus, my TPG membership is with NGC where I plan to submit any coins that may need TPG grading, so they would probably start over anyway.

@RWB I don't know if these articles that were in CoinNews.net a while back are what you may be referring to as far as info on the minting process, but it's a series of articles about the how the Philadelphia Mint makes coins with a lot of good pictures, which people are apparently usually restricted from taking. They are pretty interesting anyway. And the series includes one dedicated to how the Philadelphia Mint makes hubs and dies, which I also linked since that may have the info at hand, as well as the next in the series on making the coins Intro: Public Tour of US Mint at Philadelphia, Photos and Tips | CoinNews Hubs & Dies: How the Philadelphia Mint Makes Hubs and Dies to Produce Coins | CoinNews Making Coins: How the Philadelphia Mint Makes Coins for Circulation | CoinNews

Does anyone think that the minor damage to the holder is really an issue (chips on the sides as noted, and maybe a few dings on the face), because it sounds like the holder is intact and just has some minor damage.

Kewl ... I'll keep an eye out for those. But it looks like the last ones they had at Mt. Kisco and Westchester were in 2021 before the pandemic, with none scheduled. Had one near me too, bummer.

And when exactly has that happen, that's not just an isolated incident? There are occasional issues with our system like where people are charged/prosecuted for a crime they didn't commit, which isn't perfect, but still the best system in the world imo. I don't know how you are missing this, so I will try one last time. You lost ~40% of the value of any gold confiscated. The US knew they had to raise the fixed value of gold from the then present $20.67/oz, fixed in 1834 almost 100 yrs. earlier which they knew was low compared to its value, to the subsequent $35/oz. ("fair market valuation" at that time) to issue more money. But the gold they had on hand was not enough (due to "hoarding") to print the amount of money they wanted, which had to be backed by gold at that time. So, they forced everyone. even some businesses who had a lot of gold, to turn it in at $20.67/oz and were given paper money, and then raised the gold price to a fair valuation. If you had for example 10 1-oz gold coins (rounding) or 10 oz of gold bullion at the time that had to be turned in you were given $206.70 in paper money, when it was actually worth (what it was subsequently raised to) $35/oz or $350.00. If you tried to get your gold back after you could, that $206.70 in paper money would only buy 5.9 oz of gold at $35/oz. So, they would have taken 4.1 oz of your gold (~40%) or $143.30, the difference in value. [And that is why it's called the Great Government Gold Heist of 1933.]

Here is one from GC that might go for a good price with the damaged holder, which I don't care about. I can crack that puppy out with a pair of snips and just keep the label for future reference.

Bingo! This time you win the kewpie doll! I don't know if either the FDR gold heist or asset seizure is constitutional or not, particularly for the latter considering there are restitution and challenge provisions which the FDR gold heist did not have. And with the FRD heist it was taking (the value of personal property) because they did know the gold price would be raised from $20.67/oz ($433/oz in 2021) to $35/oz ($733/oz in 2021), as that was the whole plan to increase the money supply, which could not have been done without that bump. And they used a wartime provisionto do it, even though we were not at war. I will leave it up to layers, judges and civil liberty orgs to figure out if either is constitutional or not. But the bottom line is I think the FRD gold was worse because it applied to everyone, regardless of who had more than $100 in gold coins at the time, and not just criminals. Yea, I will keep looking, but I think JP is right that when those deals do come up there will be others looking for the same deal, and it just takes one knucklehead to overbid when it just started out as a good deal. In the meantime, I will also keep one eye out for the slabbed one with the "Prospector" label I liked which maybe will come down in price as gold continues to drop or at least stay relatively lower.

Unfortunately, I am in NY just outside NY City where due to the COL the LCS's are typ. 15% to 20% higher than what I can get coins for through one of the larger online dealers or what some coins have been selling for on GC if I wait. There is a local coin show locally once a month, but from speaking to someone the selection of coins is pretty limited and, except for an occasional deal, priced around what a LCS may have them for. I am still planning on checking it out, but that's not looking like a good prospect ATM. So, I have been mostly looking for online solutions for the coins I am interested in. I am starting to get the feeling I should just stick with GC since they have a good selection and only have a 10% buyers' premium if you pay by eCheck so I can make reasonable hammer bids. Still doesn't solve the issue of not being able to find any good online solutions to finding decent raw coins, which is my preference and GC doesn't carry, other than the larger online dealers. Idk, I might get lucky with some raw coins thru eBay, although it's mostly overpriced/cleaned garbage so far.