JADE BANNED... Extra! Extra! Read all about it

[goose3]

Hey James. Couldn't you get a longer name on here??

 

When is your website going to be updated with the FULL story?

[BillJones]

Just a (sad) hunch, but what do you want to bet the percentage of coins, overall, that PCGS grades each month will not slip even by one coin?

 

This is a fun excercise and debate in ethics within our hobby but I doubt it'll have a negative affect on anyone's bottom line other than JadeCoins.

 

You are probably right, braddick. Those who think that PCGS is greatest grading service ever to appear in the universe will ignore this incident. Dealers call such people PCGS wiennies. They are so sold on the company that no one can reason with them.

 

No body is perfect. Mistakes happen, but in this case PCGS made a MAJOR mistake that effects the value of the coin and possibly the value of other pedigreed coins in the future, and they don't have the ethical standards to fix it. The trust factor at PCGS has certainly taken a big hit here with any thinking collector.

[JadeRareCoin]

goose, the ironic thing is that we had recently joined the Collector's Club at PCGS. Actually, it was the fact that HRH took our coin for the "Presidential Review" that we decided to join their club (way of saying "thanks"). Plus, we use their forum (until recently) and thought that we should patronize their business a bit more. We have never submitted a coin for a grading anywhere, but decided that we would send off a few once in awhile just for fun. Now we have 4 free submissions at PCGS and no plans to use them. Should I auction them on eBay? Buy-It-Now for $0.01??

 

Here's a poll for you: what grades do you think that Jade would get if we sent in a submission to PCGS today? My 1823 Bust Half in NGC MS-61 would come back as PCGS VG-8. Not to mention, I would probably get a nice HRH thumbprint on the obverse and reverse.....or worse!

[JadeRareCoin]

Dealers call such people PCGS wiennies. They are so sold on the company that no one can reason with them.

 

Bill, that's true.........until that person actually gets screwed by PCGS.

 

Maybe that's not true, on second thought. I received many phone calls from others who had been screwed by a PCGS "mechanical error" or "typographical error". I recall, through the course of conversation, that most were still dealing in PCGS products and even slabbing coins at PCGS. Hard to believe...... One guy told me that he had to because "PCGS was the most marketable slab" and that he needed to "play the game".

[lclugza]

I do not believe those members should have been banned. I think it is bad business for PCGS to ban someone just because they criticize PCGS' way of doing business or PCGS executives (unless it was something blantantly false, such as libel). The banned members will just post instead on this board, or some other board, or they will just post on the PCGS board under another identiity. Just because PCGS can do something, doesn't mean they should do it. Of late I have not been posting on the PCGS boards as much as I used do; it seems many of the interesting posts and posters are gone from the board.

[braddick]

Yes. Three coins I was going to possibly walk-through PCGS at the show will NOW go to NGC but that is THREE coins. PCGS grades something like 50,000 coins each month- month in, month out.

Sure, are there others, like me, who may send their coins to another Service now? But when you look at the statistical bottom line it is like a teaspoon of Sparkletts in a barrel of horse urine.

[James_OldeTowne]

Looks like Norweb-related threads are definitely petered out on that "other" forum. Maybe PCGS censoring them had the desired effect.

 

Anyone know if agentjim007 got banned from over there?

[goose3]

Looks like Norweb-related threads are definitely petered out on that "other" forum. Maybe PCGS censoring them had the desired effect.

 

Anyone know if agentjim007 got banned from over there?

 

He didn't get banned but the thread that he started got yanked after I posted to it.

 

He PM'd me earlier today.

[MAULEMALL]

Looks like Norweb-related threads are definitely petered out on that "other" forum. Maybe PCGS censoring them had the desired effect.

 

Anyone know if agentjim007 got banned from over there?

 

He didn't get banned but the thread that he started got yanked after I posted to it.

 

He PM'd me earlier today.

 

What did jim post

 

[Android]

Now we have 4 free submissions at PCGS and no plans to use them. Should I auction them on eBay? Buy-It-Now for $0.01??

 

What would be fun (but not necessarily appropriate) is to auction of them off on E-bay, with a detailed description of "recent events".

 

The only problem would be that I think that the free submissions are tied to your collectors club account and can't be transferred.

 

 

[sanmary]

I'm starting to feel left out....I'll see if I can get banned too. I'd like to be included in all of these reindeer games!!

[gmarguli]

Just a (sad) hunch, but what do you want to bet the percentage of coins, overall, that PCGS grades each month will not slip even by one coin?

 

This is a fun excercise and debate in ethics within our hobby but I doubt it'll have a negative affect on anyone's bottom line other than JadeCoins.

 

I disagree. Your couple of dozen coins won't make a big difference to them. Jadecoins's few coins won't make a difference to them. My few dozen coins won't make a difference. Goose3's coins won't make a bit of difference. However, after a while you add up all those coins and they will start to make a difference. Let me quote Mark Slazberg, "I believe we have graded more coins than all the other grading services combined over the last few years." Why?

 

There are quite a few people pissed off at them and submitting some or all of their coins elsewhere. I've think that David Hall looks at PCGS like a proud papa rather than a businessman. He looks at the submissions that PCGS gets and smiles as business is booming, he pats himself on the back for a job well done, brushes off criticisms (not my child!), and is happier than a pig in slop. He sees that submissions are up, but what he should be looking at is what level submissions should be at given the overall market demand for certification.

 

Think of it this way, suppose every month 100,000 coins get graded at all the services. PCGS grades 50,000 of them. The market heats up and all of a sudden PCGS is grading 75,000 a month. To DH this is proof that they are doing something right. He never looks at the big picture which very well might show that overall 200,000 coins were graded during that month. Sure PCGS got more business, but they got a smaller percentage of the overall business. I don't know that this is actually the case, but it is a possibility.

 

A good businessman would not look at the submissions they get, but would rather look at the submissions they don't get. They would analyze the criticisms and try to change the opinions of those people. They would fix the problems. They would look at the competition and demand to know why some submissions are going there instead of here. They would do everything they could to prevent submissions to go to the competition. They would fight for those submissions.

 

Recently NGC announced a Modern Tier and subsequently reduced the turnaround time for modern coins. They are taking aim at PCGS. How did PCGS respond? They raised prices and put a pop-up on their web site notifying submitters of the increasing delays in grading.

 

If you want to see what a bottom line looks like, take a look at this:

 

 

Read the headlines. CLCT seeks new financing. CLCT looks to break even. CLCT losses narrow. Look at some of the financial data. Negative ROA. Negative ROE. Negative profit margin. Negative revenue growth. Over a 90% loss in shareholder value. Hey, that only cost that proud papa 78 million dollars. Maybe those few submissions here and those few there would have made a difference?

[braddick]

Greg, you've given me much to think about. On a simple level though the right side of my brain reads PCGS's turn-a-round time is lenghty because they are receiving too many submissions. The left side of my brain reads that somehow PCGS is loosing money anyway (or, at least, not making it at fast as they used to).

 

What am I left with?

 

A headache.

[IrishMike]

PCGS isn't losing money CLCT has been. Besides having a strong group of managers in the past, this was a bad business plan. A bad business plan created with a lack of management expertise is a sure fire bet for financial problems. Throw iin the appearance of conflicts and walla, you have the current situation.