Well now a 70 is no longer enough.... Reinvent the wheel.

[wdrob]

 

I use to post on my blog about a year and a half ago about my observation that third party grading companies are going to be the cause of their own demise. I even made reference here in a few threads of course they went un noticed.

 

My assertion was, and continues to be that with the current state of TPG companies marketing First Strike, First Day of Issue, and First of Everything, not to mention the dealer and collectors motivation for profit playing right into the hands of the TPG, that eventually, on all modern post 1964 coinage, essentially there are only two grades that matter. A 70 (worth a boat load of money) or a 69 (essentially worth nothing). Just throw the rest of the grading scale out. It may take another 10 to 15 years, but mark my word -- it will happen. Unless .....

 

Now I see that last month someone seemed to see the light. Apparently I missed last months "Approaching Terminus?" article in The Numismatist, but I did catch the follow up this month from the same men of vision. It would seem that they "discovered" last month that "grading has become a victim of its own success". Well no [cow patty] Sherlock Holmes. Glad to see the lights are on somewhere.

 

Now they have seemingly done the impossible. Sat down and seriously wrote an article questioning if it is possible to "go beyond 70" without breaking the current system.

 

Stamps anyone?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[cpm9ball]

Personally, I would rather see the TPG's get rid of the "First" junk. It's harder to justify a 70, or even an MS68 circulation strike, than it is to justify a "First". Unfortunately, the "First" is worth far more to the TPG than any 70.

 

Chris

[JKK]

I agree that in the long term, it will have an impact, but for those of us who aren't even interested in anything after 1964 (and not much interested in anything after 1947), it will have none. And I think there are a lot of us out there.

 

To me, it looks like the same 'ooo shiny' thing has happened to coins that happened to sports cards in the 1990s. Overloaded market, overdose of perfect pieces, designs ever seeking to stand out, where the graders and collectors seek some way to differentiate between perfect and ultra-super-perfect. A place in which people pay inordinate amounts of money for stuff that is the newest and coolest. Not judging anyone's collecting preferences--follow your passions--but I know what happened to the card market, with people now regularly dumping lots of ten thousand for $40 (if they can get it). Coins are not cards, of course, but when I see this sort of activity going on, I can't help but anticipate that someone other than the current buyers and collectors will make/has made most of the value.

[jom]

I really couldn't care less what other ways of marketing the TPGs do with modern coins. I knew 15 years ago the TPGs would run out of things to grade IF they stayed consistent. They didn't BUT they've created new revenue streams to keep it going.

 

To me they should concentrate on being more consistent with their grading (NOT necessarily more conservative but more consistent) rather than new "First Strike" non-sense...but new revenue streams are still needed I suppose if they fulfill the former.

 

jom

[BillJones]

If you follow product life cycles, the grading services now have a "mature product" at so far as classic U.S. go. In other words the U.S. classic coin cash cow has pretty well been milked, at least so far fresh material goes. Yes, there are still some raw classic U.S. coins with some value that are yet to be graded, but by in large the grading services are left with crack-outs and crossovers.

 

What to do? Come up with new labels for the new mint issues, and ride the wave when the promoters play games with them as they with the baseball commemoratives.

 

OR

 

Get more invovled with "the dark side" which includes foreign coins, tokens and medals.

[World Colonial]

OR

 

Get more invovled with "the dark side" which includes foreign coins, tokens and medals.

 

Yes, they have been doing that and are trying to grow it. I added my thoughts on this topic under the "WINGS" thread.

 

I don't see it expanding remotely as it has in the US, except proportionately maybe for some markets such as already exists with South Africa and Canada and maybe some series such as in China.

 

South Africa has the same preference for TPG as the US, except that the US probably has 200 times as many collectors. In terms of volume, the US probably has 10,000 times as many classics across all grades and possibly a 1,000,000 multiple in better grades that will actually ever have a realistic chance of getting into a TPG holder,.

 

In most other markets, the dynamic of a much smaller collector base and more importantly, far more limited supply is going to limit the opportunity, whether these collectors come to accept TPG or not.

 

The largest opportunity for TPG in world coinage is in moderns and NCLT, one that disproportionately I do not believe will be realized.

 

[BKW]

If you follow product life cycles, the grading services now have a "mature product" at so far as classic U.S. go. In other words the U.S. classic coin cash cow has pretty well been milked, at least so far fresh material goes. Yes, there are still some raw classic U.S. coins with some value that are yet to be graded, but by in large the grading services are left with crack-outs and crossovers.

 

What to do? Come up with new labels for the new mint issues, and ride the wave when the promoters play games with them as they with the baseball commemoratives.

 

OR

 

Get more invovled with "the dark side" which includes foreign coins, tokens and medals.

 

I'd love NGC to delve more deeply into the dark side; and there's lots of room to grow in exonumia. A couple of dealers have told me that more and more of their clients want graded material. NGC can start by adding in holder sizes between standard and oversized (which is ridiculously big and only needed for the largest of medals). There's probably room for 2. That alone would up submissions in my opinion.

[michael]

are there any proof or ms 70 coins

 

with the

plus +

or

star * ??

[RWB]

Why not add "!" and "?" to the list of absurdities? ....and other symbols could be used, too: @#$%^&*><~ ....

 

Heck, in some series, coins with obvious wear are labeled "MS63," so why bother with doing any of it consistently?

[World Colonial]

Why not add "!" and "?" to the list of absurdities? ....and other symbols could be used, too: @#$%^&*><~ ....

 

Heck, in some series, coins with obvious wear are labeled "MS63," so why bother with doing any of it consistently?

 

Come now, you are being "negative". Don't you know that the differences represented by the "+" and between two and sometimes multiple MS grades are so important?

 

A "+" represents a (66).7 to (66).9 right? Or is it something else? But regardless, it makes perfect sense that this minutia is a lot more important than the difference in quality between a VF and XF or for that matter, a G vs. VG? The differences on these circulated coins are discussed on this forum and PCGS all the time, aren't they? Somehow, I must have missed those threads and posts.

 

The good news is that you can be assured it doesn't have much (if anything) to do with money and everything to do with collecting. At least, that's what I hear.

[RWB]

Ahhhh....now I am reassured and content. Thank you!

 

I'll go back to quietly building a numismatic Ark -- let's see two of every type....

[jom]

are there any proof or ms 70 coins

 

with the

plus +

or

star * ??

 

No...that would be taking it too far...oh...wait

 

 

jom

[Star City Homer]

 

...

 

I'd love NGC to delve more deeply into the dark side; and there's lots of room to grow in exonumia. A couple of dealers have told me that more and more of their clients want graded material. NGC can start by adding in holder sizes between standard and oversized (which is ridiculously big and only needed for the largest of medals). There's probably room for 2. That alone would up submissions in my opinion.

 

 

I've always seen NGC as the initiator with darkside and even farside (medals/tokens). PCGS seems to be following more and more now, but it's only recently I've noticed an uptick in slabs. As an example, there is a price sheet (every other month) for the pandas/modern Chinese and the prices are quoted specifically for NGC slabs vs. 'other slabbed'.

 

Also, there used to be an intermediate size slab. I have a medal, and recently sold an oversized coin (2-3 ounce-ish--the Albanian Sword Dancer) which were in the intermediate slabs. Not sure of the dimensions off the top of my head, but basically a bit larger than half the size of the newer biggies, and would be too small for the ATB types IIRC. I can dig out my medal and give the actual slab dimensions if anyone really cares. I agree though, it would be nice to have the intermediate slabs.

 

While at Baltimore I saw two things that I can quickly recall off the top of my head, showing NGC is thinking a little outside the revenue stream box. First, was a medal with an attached ring (like for a military ribbon) and they had made a cutout for the ring. Cool looking and the seller said he'd seen it before (and the NGC version was superior to the PCGS in terms of fitting). I also saw a slabbed US coin for some rarity/note (I should remember it) and with it was a letter documenting it as a gift to someone (? daughter). The letter was 'slabbed' to, well it was encased and sealed in an archival sleeve alongside the coin. THAT seller had it in a nice display in his case and IIRC, NGC did that for them. Kinda cool--the coin and the provenance linked.

[cpm9ball]

 

...

 

I'd love NGC to delve more deeply into the dark side; and there's lots of room to grow in exonumia. A couple of dealers have told me that more and more of their clients want graded material. NGC can start by adding in holder sizes between standard and oversized (which is ridiculously big and only needed for the largest of medals). There's probably room for 2. That alone would up submissions in my opinion.

 

 

I've always seen NGC as the initiator with darkside and even farside (medals/tokens). PCGS seems to be following more and more now, but it's only recently I've noticed an uptick in slabs. As an example, there is a price sheet (every other month) for the pandas/modern Chinese and the prices are quoted specifically for NGC slabs vs. 'other slabbed'.

 

Also, there used to be an intermediate size slab. I have a medal, and recently sold an oversized coin (2-3 ounce-ish--the Albanian Sword Dancer) which were in the intermediate slabs. Not sure of the dimensions off the top of my head, but basically a bit larger than half the size of the newer biggies, and would be too small for the ATB types IIRC. I can dig out my medal and give the actual slab dimensions if anyone really cares. I agree though, it would be nice to have the intermediate slabs.

 

While at Baltimore I saw two things that I can quickly recall off the top of my head, showing NGC is thinking a little outside the revenue stream box. First, was a medal with an attached ring (like for a military ribbon) and they had made a cutout for the ring. Cool looking and the seller said he'd seen it before (and the NGC version was superior to the PCGS in terms of fitting). I also saw a slabbed US coin for some rarity/note (I should remember it) and with it was a letter documenting it as a gift to someone (? daughter). The letter was 'slabbed' to, well it was encased and sealed in an archival sleeve alongside the coin. THAT seller had it in a nice display in his case and IIRC, NGC did that for them. Kinda cool--the coin and the provenance linked.

 

NGC also makes a standard sized slab (height x width) that is thicker for high relief coins or medals. Some of my ANA medals are housed in these.

 

Also, NGC adds an arc-shaped cut-out on the over-sized slab for medals that are numbered on the edge.

 

http://www.ngccoin.com/certlookup/index.aspx?CertNumber=4179378-003

 

Chris

[michael]

[quote

I also saw a slabbed US coin for some rarity/note (I should remember it) and with it was a letter documenting it as a gift to someone (? daughter). The letter was 'slabbed' to, well it was encased and sealed in an archival sleeve alongside the coin. THAT seller had it in a nice display in his case and IIRC, NGC did that for them. Kinda cool--the coin and the provenance linked.

 

 

here

 

http://www.ngccoin.com/news/viewarticle.aspx?IDArticle=4553&

[James_OldeTowne]

Why not add "!" and "?" to the list of absurdities? ....and other symbols could be used, too: @#$%^&*><~ ....

 

Heck, in some series, coins with obvious wear are labeled "MS63," so why bother with doing any of it consistently?

Roger, there are easier ways to accomplish what you propose without going to extremes. For example, "MS-70" could take on a whole new meaning given these following simple changes:

 

MS-70

 

MS-70

 

MS-70

 

MS-70