Revenant

Yeah. Whenever someone comes out very strong with lots of (to me) expensive coins in a short span of time, that is a strong indicator that they're willing to outstanding me - willing to, not necessarily able to. I've seen plenty of examples over time of people debt financing hobbies. Which I'd never be willing to do.

A few months ago I posted about a new set appearing in the Netherlands 10G set that had a coveted MS64 example of the 1879/7. This left me with a lot of questions and now they've just given me a lot more information and a lot to think about. The member has added 5 more coins to the set, including all the rarer dates, including the 1885 and the 1886 I've long looked for... and they all have the same invoice number... numbered -001 to -005. They almost certainly submitted these themselves. So they're almost certainly building this set from scratch. Which I think means they probably made that MS64 1879/7 themselves. Which would mean this person has taken the path I have now long avoided taking to finish my set. They have subsequently upgraded/ replaced it but they had an 1887 coin that is a prime example of why I've been hesitant to buy raw and self-submit these - an Unc Details grade for cleaning. I can't speak for them, but that would have hurt. That would have been a disappointment to me. A big one. I'm guessing it stung them too because they already swapped it for an MS66 top pop. 🤣 I'm thinking they must be buying these raw now - possibly through European sellers on MA Shops like I thought I'd have to do. I have to think if they were submitting a raw set they've had for years then the whole set would have shown up graded all at once. Or at a minimum submitting the 1879/7 solo would feel a bit odd. But I could be wrong there. The more important question I feel this leaves me with is - what do I do about it? Because I have to think that with all the rarer dates accounted for now the rest of the set is coming and the pace of things definitely seems like they're gunning to win the category in 2022. And I'm going to have a hard time keeping the top spot if his set is 100% complete and mine is 72%. I've won with that set for 6 years - every year that Ben has been alive so far, and I'm keen to defend that title if I can. But even if I throw down the cash and send in the coins I'm not guaranteed to hold onto the title - especially if this person has enough cash to throw at the problem fast enough. And I'm not sure I'm eager to throw down hundreds if not thousands of dollars over this and completely abandon / derail other projects. So, the more I think about it, the more I think the better path is to stay the course, stay patient, do nothing, and let them take it if they want it this year, and maybe for a few after that. I've known for years there was a risk of a set showing up at the 11th hour in November and unseating my set. Props to this guy for doing his set building in the open early in the year and showing his hand. Edited to add: Speaking of Ben and 6 years. Today we celebrated Ben and 6 years of parenthood.

Ben has been off for Spring break all week and Shandy took him back to the zoo. While he was there, he asked for this "gold" "tiger" (Lion) coin, which she got for him, and she said Ben was showing some interest in the penny crushers again, but she hadn't brought pennies and quarters so they couldn't do that. The elongated cent albums kind of dropped out a couple of years ago when COVID hit and we stopped going anywhere, including the zoo, so we weren't getting any pennies. I guess we'll need to see if that / those make a comeback.

A month back I posted about starting to collect modern Venezuelan Coins and l.quintero shed some light / shared some information I didn't know including the fact that last year Venezuela released 3 coins and not 1, but the 1 Bolivar was the only one I'd seen get any press. I've been finding it hard before and since to find anyone selling even the 1 Bolivar online - much less full sets of all three coins. The sellers offering the 1 coin have been demanding $6-9 each for them even when buying multiples Earlier this weekend I posted about that dealer in Ukraine - from whom I've bought many of my Zimbabwean and Venezuelan coins from. I went looking to see if they had anything I could place and order for - just because. I was thinking maybe 5 more sets of those 10 to 500 Bolivar Coins from 2002-2004 that they have that hardly anyone else does. The ones I got from my last order looked pretty nice. I haven't picked through to see if any of them are really strong yet, but they seem promising - so why not maybe pick up a few more and see what I get? (If I get it.) When I looked though I found they were listing lots of 5 sets of the 3-coin sets with all the 2021-dated coins. They were asking about $45-50 for 15 coins, and that is higher than I prefer for these purchases - ~$3/coin when I like $1-2 - but still far more reasonable than what others were asking. I don't know when they listed these, but I hadn't seen this when I looked the other week. In normal times I would have ordered one of these 5 set lots for $48 ($40 + shipping) and been pretty thrilled. This is exactly what I've been looking for for weeks now, although I'd been hoping for more like $25-35 after shipping. But this seller offers the other Venezuelan coins and many others much cheaper, so they seem to know when the market rate for something is higher and when it isn't - they sell the 2002-2004 coins for $16 + shipping for a 25-coin lot - and they price accordingly. After giving it some thought I ordered two of the 5 set lots and got the 5 sets of 2002-2004 coins I'd originally thought of. Meaning I'll have gotten 10 of each type of set from them, 10 of each type of coin, if these make it out of Ukraine. It'll be fun to look through them all hopefully. With 10 of each I'll feel pretty confident I have a decent sample of what they have.

I agree with you that there's a good chance they'd accommodate me and adjust the set / make a new one, but I'm not even going to ask until I'm ready to submit coins and I actually have skin in the game. I'm not going to bother them and then not follow up and leave the set they made for me empty.

There's a couple of dealers in Russia that I have bought pre-painted scaled minis from before for some fun macro photos and just goofing around. I'd been wanting to place an order for a couple of things to go with something else I had but I dragged my feet and then this broke out and I just looked at Shandy and was like, "Well, that's dead." But there's another seller in Lviv Ukraine that sells similar things and they may get the order / money instead. I may take a look later and see if there's something I can order off Lemberg.

They also say "Strength invites challenge."

I'm not sure that saying war in Europe or war in general is bad counts as a terribly controversial or political statement. But the whole situation is a disaster. It isn't a crisis. It's a disaster, from start to finish, and it should have never have gotten to this point.

So, I thought about tacking this onto the other post, or about delaying the other post to another day and talking about this, but this is something I've been thinking about a lot lately... and I felt like it deserved its own post and not being tacked onto the other. One of the dealers I've been using a lot, a dealer Mike and I have both liked using and discussed in the past, a dealer that has supplied several of the coins in my Zimbabwe coin set and has sold me many raw Venezuelan coins for that new projects... is in Ukraine! I did some looking online and they list their location as Zaporizhia, Ukraine. I decided to Google where that was, hoping, for their sake, that it was in the Western half of the country. It turns out they're almost directly North of Crimea and the Sea of Azov, Northwest of Mariupol - the area that has been getting shelled so bad, and South of Kharkiv - where I think that nuclear plant got shelled and taken over. So they're right in the middle of all of it, with conflict on 3 sides. It has me wondering how they're doing out there.

So, this entry is going to lack the length and the narrative of many of my more recent posts and just be little, “Look what I got.” But… I snagged a 1980 Zimbabwean proof set, in the original Royal Mint Packaging. Mike had asked me a few months back if I’d considered getting into proof coins as I was getting the first round of grades back and ramping up my purchases of raw mint state coins. I’d initially just shrugged and said “Nah,” because I was focusing on the mint state / circulation strike examples, which seemed more appropriate for a hyperinflation themed set, and because I assumed the proof coins would be hard to find. They’re not. If you're interested in the 1980 sets anyway, they're quite easy to come by. Several sellers have had them listed on eBay for a while in the range of $40-45. Which isn’t terrible honestly, but also it felt a bit steep. This set popped up and looked in good shape and after shipping it was only going to be $22 if no one bid against me on it - it was an auction and not a BIN like the $40-45 listings. But no one bid against me, so I brought it home for $22, which is a price I’m very happy with. $20 is good for a zero-guilt impulse purchase that doesn’t have to live up to anything or become anything. I’m a little undecided on if this is going to stay in the original packaging or if I might send it in for grading one day to expand the work I’m doing in the Zimbabwean Registry - to have a proof set to go with the mint state type set. If I do break it out to submit, I may try to get another set to keep in the mint packaging. I'm also thinking I'd be tempted to get a 2nd set and submit two complete sets on different - but closely numbered - invoices and so I could cobble together the best set of the two and have them all numbered -001 to -006, like what I did with my Traveler's Cheque submission(s) on the PMG side. I like the look / feel of having the cert numbers go from -001 to -006 in a set. Although I suppose there could be a "Two, Four, Six, Eight..." joke in there... So... Yeah. Maybe I need 3? I'm not a hoarder though. I don't buy more for the sake of more. Stop looking at me in that tone of voice. One thing that does give me pause on turning this into a registry project for now is that NGC has only one type of Zimbabwean proof set that includes the 1997 proof coins (only 2 years they made proof sets) and the S$10 NCLT coins from 1996. I haven’t been able to find any 1997 proof sets - I would very much like to - and I don’t really want to get into those Silver NCLT coins, which people like to demand frankly silly prices for in most instances. I’d probably be more inclined to submit a set for grading and making a registry set if I could have a complete set with just the 1980 proof set. I’d probably be more inclined to submit if I could get a 1997 proof set or 3. The current approach / category feels too cobbled together and the set feels like it’s trying to include too much and do too much - and too much of what it’s trying to do is stuff I can’t do! I’m in no rush there though. For now, I saw something I wanted that fits with my current collecting interests at an attractive price and a got it. I'm also giving some thought to branching into Pre-1980, Rhodesian coins. But, unlike Zimbabwean coins, the older Rhodesian coins can get rather... expensive.

I think a type set in PR01 could be pretty awesome and cool in its own way, but coins that bad are only graded when the coin is super rare and valuable. So someone wanting a super-low grade set like that would have to get many of the coins graded themselves, which would make it expensive and so I don't know how many people would undertake it, no matter how much I would think that would be cool and look at that and think, "Darn, that's neat." But I think it's unavoidable here that any coin that is going to be too low in grade to make back its grading fees and / or be competitive in the registry is going to be thought of as a "bad coin" because part of being here is usually going to be wanting to be competitive here. The custom / signature sets and the things that are undertaken for "style points" are of course an exception.

This is making me more hopeful about getting a Venezuela + Italian Lire finisher submission in, and also making me feel less pressured / less rushed at the same time. I think I'd pass on submitting Modern Silver unless you feel like it just really needs to be in a slab. Old silver is kewl.

World modern turnaround times are now down to 56 business days.

I thought I'd take a minute and belatedly share some progress on the 500 Lire set. A few weeks ago I won (unopposed) an auction for an MS68 1985. It is the only one in the grade currently with none finer. The seller chose to highlight and play this up in a somewhat over-the-top way that gave Mike and I a laugh. This is the same seller that I got the 1982 MS68 from, but there is an MS69 1982, and 1982s are far more heavily graded and in high grade than the later years. Just something about that visual of the globe behind the coin... Somehow I doubt that in all the world there isn't another one of these that would grade MS68 at NGC. They just haven't been sent in yet - probably just because the owners don't feel the need or see enough market demand for these things in certified high grade to make it worth the risk and grading fees. I think if anyone else believed otherwise I wouldn't have scored this for under $50. Grabbing this did have me thinking about the future look and make-up of the set. I'd thought the set would be mostly self-graded but if the coins come on the market in higher grades than what I have I think I will buy them. I even have a 1985 500L at NGC right now, waiting to be graded, but I know enough to know that coin isn't going to get an MS68. Only the 1990 and 1991 are really "safe" to me in terms of wanting to keep those special coins that they brought back with them in the set. Of course, I do have other coins for other years that I didn't send in for grading - I think from the 1980s. But those coins are so clearly circulated and so clearly won't grade well that I just can't bring myself to grade those. It would cost too much and I would like this set to be reasonably nice and competitive long term and those coins just aren't really. They're far better left in a raw state. Speaking of the 1990, when I started down this road the set did not have a slot for the 1990, which had me concerned that I might not get to add that coin to the competitive set at all. But I put in a request to Ali and the Team and they added the slot for me. So I guess that's one slot filled and one slot added. While working on this I also put in some orders for a few Italian Franklin mint sets, getting 3 total for about $9 each. I think 2 have 1983 500L and 1 has a 1987... or the other way around... Anyway... Those 500L coins look great and at some point two of those three sets will probably be broken up so I can have a good 1983 and 1987 to plug some holes with another submission down the road. I have not had the same luck finding sets with or individual 1986 coins that look good, and that is really frustrating given that 1986 is "our year."

Depends on how you define it. "Great Zimbabwe" was the name of the culture that existed mostly from the 12th to 15th century and collapsed well before the arrival of the British in the late 19th century. "Great Zimbabwe" is where the name of the modern country came from after ZANU-PF took power in 1980.

Supporting Zadok's comment, World modern times have turned back down to only 62 days, which might put the coins / grades back in May.

Didn't think about this before but I take it you got yours? Congrats to you and I wish you luck for 2022!

They seem to just be getting faster and better over time. I waited much longer in 2008 / 2011 if I remember right and they were sending out fewer awards back then.

Type 2. The new one.

I checked the mail Saturday, expecting to find something else and found a package from NGC that I immediately realized had to be the new award plaque. It turns out it included the coin too. We were outside with the boys and I showed the package to Shandy and she initially, seeing NGC, thought it might be the Zimbabwe and Italian coins.. somehow. I don't know why. She's seen the boxes from NGC before when coins come back and this padded envelope looked nothing like that, but, as she put it, the coins are just what she thinks about when she sees "NGC." The package didn't get opened until late that night. If I look tired in the shot, it's because I was. Saturday happened to be a very big Pokemon Go event - a game I started playing with Ben, Shandy and my mother in law a couple of months ago and that's been eating up a lot of my normal social media, writing and coin time. I started playing it with Ben in part because I knew he'd need friends and allies to get the full game experience and It has also allowed me to learn the game and then teach those things to him to help him and my mother-in-law as she's gotten into it. It has turned into quite the bonding thing for all of us. Saturday turned into hours of trying to catch legendary Pokemon in group fights called "raids" and that turned into a teaching moment about community and teamwork and working together to do things no one could do alone. But... I was tired when it was over. I couldn't help but chuckle at the coin choice this year - a 2021 MS70 ASE. This is exactly what I expected last year and then they really surprised me with the Morgan dollars. But, because of last year, I hadn't been expecting it necessarily this year. I was thinking it might be another Morgan. But, now that I have this, I have the twins - The two Zimbabwe plaques. Yup. Shirts changed. I didn't get the PMG plaque down from the office and take this one until the following night. Kids are exhausting. I have some things I need to post about when I can get a couple of hours to write one of these days / nights. I also need to stop trading with my wife at night and get us looking at those Venezuelan coins to get those lined up and ready. As always, I'm very grateful to NGC (and PMG) for the awards and the recognition, and I am still very much excited about some new sets and new projects in the pipeline that I hope will prove worthy successors to this Zimbabwe project.

I hope that's true just because I'd love for the turnaround times for everyone to come down, and for NGC to finally get room to breathe and end the 60 hour weeks they're pulling.

Depends on what you're submitting/ what tier.

This has also been my experience- with 1 notable and much talked about exception. All I can say is we'll see. 🤷‍♂️ I would love to have those 500 L coins / grades back for my wife's bday in mid-June, but we'll see.

I would be overjoyed to get them back sooner, but I'm still not getting my hopes up. 😅 I need to work on another submission to finish / round out some work with my 500 L set for Shandy.

I thought it was worth an update to say, I got the email from NGC this week saying that they acknowledge the receipt of my 29 coin submission (22 Zimbabwe Coins, 7 Italian Coins). So the timeline so far is: 1/14 - Package Mailed 1/26 - Package Delivered 2/22 - Receipt Acknowledged and Submission entered as received by NGC 2/23 - Payment Acknowledged Looking at it, since I sent this box in, World Moderns have increased from the 71 business days they were at in January and are back up to 85 business days. So, 85 business days from 2/22 is Monday, 6/20, excluding Saturdays and Sundays. So, I'm thinking I might get grades back in the July to early August time frame, because I'm not going to get my hopes up for late June..