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To Those of You Who Feel Jadecoin was Wronged by PCGS....

Started by dragon,

102 posts in this topic

Tradedollarnut

Tradedollarnut

Posted
Posted

Listing your phone number and then putting (if you care to call, Mr Hall) after it appears to be taunting in my book.

 

 

I miss any vague point you may have been trying to make with the other two comments.

 

You seem to be ratcheting up the bait to try to make this personal. I'll pass. I'm done with this topic.

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James_OldeTowne

James_OldeTowne

Posted
Posted

Tradedollarnut, I think it's rude to the other members of NGC's forum to clutter up any more cyberspace with this nonsense. If you wish to discuss further, it's toll-free:

 

866-Early-US (if you care to call)

 

James

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EVillageProwler

EVillageProwler

Posted
Posted

Maybe it sounds like taunting because of your totally pro-PCGS perspective!

 

Jade chaps:

 

I understand that you feel the need to defend your position, especially in light of how it's become a "public" issue. But, I think you've missed TDN's point. But, even if I were wrong about that, I still think it is very wrong of you to presume a pro-PCGS bias simply because you and he have a diametrically opposite view of the issue.

 

Before you start to come here and accuse folks of pro-PCGS bias, let me point out that you haven't made a presence here until after your banishment from across the street. It is wrong of you to trot in here and start bashing on a long-time member with a solid history of positive contributions to this place.

 

When this plays out, and you're right -- then great. If you're wrong -- then sorry! In the interim, don't come waltzing in here and playing up the storm and hurling invectives.

 

EVP

 

[edited to dial it back a notch.]

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James_OldeTowne

James_OldeTowne

Posted
Posted

EVP, then PLEASE explain TDN's point - I am not trying to be sarcastic or whatever when I say - I seriously do not understand what he's driving at!!!!! I don't claim to be the sharpest tack in the box, maybe I'm just dense, maybe I'm just too caught up in the events.

 

Also, I intend to post any of my comments on the Norweb thing in this thread exclusively, so as not to cluttering the NGC forum with anti-PCGS nonsense - it's not my objective at all.

 

Oh, and sorry to any and all old-timers. TDN asked a lot of questions, and I tried my darndest to answer them patiently and clearly.

 

James

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JadeRareCoin

JadeRareCoin

Posted
Posted

Hello everyone,

 

I am Dennis, the partner in Jade Rare Coin who started the marathon thread on the PCGS forum. We will have a very factual history of this entire fiasco added to our web site by next week. It will include images of original receipts, a timeline, a copy of the submission form, copies of post-marked packages, images of the coin in question, etc., etc. I am stating this only to let you know that we do NOT intend to clutter the NGC forum with this information.

 

To make a very, very long story as short as possible, we now have testimony from a person extremely close to the Norweb Hibernia issue. James has not directly stated this, but we are 100% certain that the coin was a doctored coin that was submitted to PCGS as a Norweb coin with the intent to commit fraud. END OF STORY. When I first approached Mr. Hall in person at the Baltimore ANA, my goal was to split the financial loss on the coin with PCGS. We admitted that we were responsible for being careless and not doing diligent research on that particular coin. The irony is that we always check our own variety attributions and we always render our own grading opinions. Somehow, I just never thought that an incorrect pedigree could be placed on a slab insert. I can understand incorrect variety attributions, but never the provenance of a coin. I was wrong and was resigned to a financial loss, but I also wanted the other responsible party to share in the expense. After all, we immediately gave our client a 100% refund. We are now out $3,500 and the loss of a major customer.

 

Through information generated in the thread on the PCGS forum, from archived email messages from a few months ago and from many lengthy phone conversations, we now realize that PCGS was not the only party with culpability regarding the erroneous attribution. Apparently the submission of the Hibernia as a Norweb coin was NOT an isolated incident. All that I can say at this time is "check your coins with pedigrees on the slab". We are being careful not to divulge the source of our information for a few reasons, but mainly to protect innocent bystanders who were brave enough to share the information with us. I have also received what we consider threats regarding this matter and I have been advised to watch my back and to expect trouble, including possible physical harm. We are not afraid and will push forward with our information. Our goal is to educate the public in an attempt to minimize financial losses that are almost always passed to the smallest collector or dealer. We also want tpg companies to be more responsible for what they are paid for: an expert, professional opinion. Companies and people in general must be more responsible for their actions.

 

In closing, I will say that we intend to provide our free (coin related) opinions to members of this forum, just as we did on the PCGS forum. We have always tried to help fellow collectors and dealers, and we are not shy about asking questions either. I hope that this Norweb issue will go to the wayside so that we can focus on coin collecting.

 

BTW, we do not submit coins to any grading service and are unbiased. We appreciate companies that allow collectors and dealers to chat about coins, so "thank you" to NGC for providing this forum.

 

Dennis

 

 

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Tradedollarnut

Tradedollarnut

Posted
Posted

Dennis: Well written. In this light, I can see why you were overly defensive regarding my questioning the whole situation. Please remember that the full information was not available to me as I was attempting to devil's advocate your case.

 

I hope you are successful in rooting out this problem. I also hope that it can be done in conjunction with the TPG services to put an end to it once and for all.

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JadeRareCoin

JadeRareCoin

Posted
Posted

Thanks TDN. No hard feelings here. It is healthy to have differing opinions as it promotes thinking and helps to expose all sides of a story. Our first post to the PCGS forum about the coin was "Contest: what lot was this Hibernia in the Norweb sale". I can look you in the eyes and tell you that the first thread was a very sincerely appeal to the the experts of the PCGS forum to help us identify the coin. At that time, we were not 100% sure that it really wasn't a Norweb coin, but could not prove that it was. That thread died, we contacted the dealer and PCGS, and the rest is history.

 

Also, please consider that we were advised by other dealers to sell the coin in the Norweb slab, but that would mean that we now committed fraud as well, since we knew at that time that it was probably not a Norweb coin. That's the reason that we went to PCGS. The dealer did not want the coin back and suggested that we sell the coin or take it to PCGS. We stated to others that the right thing to do was to take the "mistake" off of the market before someone else gets hurt financially. I was actually quite pleased that HRH took the coin for a "presidential review" and was expecting a call a week or two later to say "you are correct, it's not a Norweb coin. Now, what do you think is fair in order to settle this?". We would have suggested a very fair settlement and had a few options in mind, but each option required that the provenance be removed from the slab. I received the coin a month later with the provenance removed, but absolutely no message, note, email, voicemail, phone call.....nothing. I attempted to call PCGS that very day.....nothing. That's when I posted my plea on the forum. We have never submitted to PCGS and I was not sure of the best way to communicate with them. I really did expect HRH to call me. I would call a customer of Jade Rare Coin in an instant if I knew that he/she was unhappy with our product or service.

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braddick

braddick

Posted
Posted

"We are now out $3,500.00 and the loss of a major customer."

 

Why? Why are you out $3,500.00? That was the selling price of the Colonial, but doesn't it have ANY value whatsoever without the pedigree? It's now worth zero?!

 

Also, why have you lost the customer? It would appear you bent over backwards to refund him. You would think he'd be loyal for life (as you could have "stuck" him with the coin regardless).

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James_OldeTowne

James_OldeTowne

Posted
Posted

You don't understand. We cannot in good conscience ever sell this coin in the slab! It is a heavily (in my opinion) doctored coin that is worth no more than a couple hundred dollars. OK, so maybe we're out only $3200 let's say, but the problem is, that unless JadeCoin decides that it's OK to inflict this piece-of-[!@#%^&^] coin on a subsequent buyer, we're stuck with it.

 

The guy is an absolute stickler for detail, and JadeCoin failed to ensure the most significant detail for this customer - that the coin was properly pedigreed. In a nutshell, that's the answer.

 

In all likelihood, I think Dennis will find a way back on the customer's good side (I don't actually work with him - he's local to Dennis), but it will require a great deal of patience to earn back his trust. In a word, the grotesque pedigree error embarrassed the he++ out of us.

 

Listen guys, I really want to encourage all of you to view the infamous coin in person. One quick examination is all it will take to convince you that the coin is doggy-doo. It is junk (at MS-64). You really won't believe it until you see it.

 

James

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braddick

braddick

Posted
Posted
You don't understand. We cannot in good conscience ever sell this coin in the slab! It is a heavily (in my opinion) doctored coin that is worth no more than a couple hundred dollars. OK, so maybe we're out only $3200 let's say, but the problem is, that unless JadeCoin decides that it's OK to inflict this piece-of-[!@#%^&^] coin on a subsequent buyer, we're stuck with it.

 

The guy is an absolute stickler for detail, and JadeCoin failed to ensure the most significant detail for this customer - that the coin was properly pedigreed. In a nutshell, that's the answer.

 

In all likelihood, I think Dennis will find a way back on the customer's good side (I don't actually work with him - he's local to Dennis), but it will require a great deal of patience to earn back his trust. In a word, the grotesque pedigree error embarrassed the he++ out of us.

 

Listen guys, I really want to encourage all of you to view the infamous coin in person. One quick examination is all it will take to convince you that the coin is doggy-doo. It is junk (at MS-64). You really won't believe it until you see it.

 

James

Other than the Pedigree issue, what changed about this coin to make it worth selling the first time to the Collector for $3,500.00 (after you examining it and buying it yourself for resale) to now being worth "a couple hundred dollars at best. It's doggie-doo...it's severely doctored..." Boy, I sure hope you don't think I'm picking on you James, I'm not. I'm just the inquisitive type and the above question jumped out at me after reading your response.
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coinman1794

coinman1794

Posted
Posted
You don't understand. We cannot in good conscience ever sell this coin in the slab! It is a heavily (in my opinion) doctored coin that is worth no more than a couple hundred dollars. OK, so maybe we're out only $3200 let's say, but the problem is, that unless JadeCoin decides that it's OK to inflict this piece-of-[!@#%^&^] coin on a subsequent buyer, we're stuck with it.

 

The guy is an absolute stickler for detail, and JadeCoin failed to ensure the most significant detail for this customer - that the coin was properly pedigreed. In a nutshell, that's the answer.

 

In all likelihood, I think Dennis will find a way back on the customer's good side (I don't actually work with him - he's local to Dennis), but it will require a great deal of patience to earn back his trust. In a word, the grotesque pedigree error embarrassed the he++ out of us.

 

Listen guys, I really want to encourage all of you to view the infamous coin in person. One quick examination is all it will take to convince you that the coin is doggy-doo. It is junk (at MS-64). You really won't believe it until you see it.

 

James

Other than the Pedigree issue, what changed about this coin to make it worth selling the first time to the Collector for $3,500.00 (after you examining it and buying it yourself for resale) to now being worth "a couple hundred dollars at best. It's doggie-doo...it's severely doctored..." Boy, I sure hope you don't think I'm picking on you James, I'm not. I'm just the inquisitive type and the above question jumped out at me after reading your response.

 

One way to look at this is to say that because the coin was pedigreed, and pedigreed coins are typically overgraded, that it was acceptable. And, once the pedigree was gone, its just another overgraded coin. (Thats not my opinion though, I think an overgraded coin is always overgraded. But, I wanted to stress that many pedigree coins just come that way)

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braddick

braddick

Posted
Posted

1794- I 'll go along with that reasoning, but only to a point. It is difficult for me to believe that "overgraded" means this coin went from a value of $3,500.00 (sight seen) to $200.00.

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JadeRareCoin

JadeRareCoin

Posted
Posted

I don't think that the coin is a $200 coin, but it is certainly worth less than a $1000. We never purchased the coin on the merits of condition. The whole story will be on our web site soon and it will explain that we had a standing order for a "nice" Hibernia that was from the Norweb sale. We paid strong money to fill that order. Our cost was $3,500. We sold it to our client for $3,850 (we work on a 10% commission for buying). B&M had a much nicer 64 RB at $2,800 (approx.) in stock at the time, but it was not pedigreed and did not meet our client's buying criteria. We explained in detail accross the street as to why our client is so fascinated with the Norweb pedigree, and for now I will spare you the details (see our web site next week). The coin was actually taken on memo from a dealer, shown to our client, and he bought it. We did discuss the condition/pedigree/price and the client made the decision to buy it.

 

The coin is probably a high-end AU by today's standards (in terms of detail), but it is obviously doctored. It was professionally "adjusted" and is not a horrible looking coin, unless you know early copper and are a numismatic purist. It is a "pink" looking coin. Furthermore, the obverse has no luster, but the reverse has approximately 50% of it's luster remaining. I mentioned that to HRH in Baltimore and he became very agitated with me. He said, "this coin is a choice original coin and has never been messed with.....it's a rock-solid 64 Red" (paraphrased). I responded by saying, "Mr. Hall, we are not going to agree on that issue, but let's focus on the issue at hand, and that is that this is NOT a Norweb Hibernia".

 

 

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oreville-migration

oreville-migration

Posted
Posted

I maintain that in order to seek any reimbursement based on a erroneous pedigree/provenance on a coin that you first have to show that there is some kind of standardized price list for pedigreed coins slabbed and unslabbed.

 

Since there is none that I know of how can anyone calculate the value of a pedigree? Many Norweb coins have actually sold for less than a similarly graded coin without any pedigree.

 

Example; I purchased the finest (tied with about 7 others) graded PCGS MS-67RD PEI cent for nearly 50% less than the same PCGS MS-67RD PEI cent. (PEI stands for Prince Edward Island).

 

Now, why did it not sell for more (not to mention even the same) than its sister coin? Well, first of all, the coin has toned slightly to a superb possible Red-Brown but nevertheless, it remains visually the most gorgeous PEI cent I have ever seen!!!!

I have other examples in which Norweb and Eliasberg coins have sold for less than the non-pedgreed coins of the same grade.

 

Finally.......... if the coin is overgraded then the coin may very well be discounted even if it is a pedigreed coin. Only in a superheated environment when the buyer(s) really wants a coin with a provenance is it possible or conceivable that an overgraded pedigreed coin would sell for a premium and in that instance, the only remedy is to seek a grade review.

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gmarguli

gmarguli

Posted
Posted
The coin is probably a high-end AU by today's standards (in terms of detail), but it is obviously doctored. It was professionally "adjusted" and is not a horrible looking coin, unless you know early copper and are a numismatic purist. It is a "pink" looking coin. Furthermore, the obverse has no luster, but the reverse has approximately 50% of it's luster remaining. I mentioned that to HRH in Baltimore and he became very agitated with me. He said, "this coin is a choice original coin and has never been messed with.....it's a rock-solid 64 Red" (paraphrased). I responded by saying, "Mr. Hall, we are not going to agree on that issue, but let's focus on the issue at hand, and that is that this is NOT a Norweb Hibernia".

 

 

Two Long Beach shows ago I showed a coin to David Hall. It was an 1872 Indian cent. I was doing a favor for someone. The coin had been shown to ANACS who said AU50. The coin was then showed to NGC where two people (I presume David Lange and Brian Silliman) gave their opinion of AU50. I was then given the coin and I waited in line and showed the coin to David and he gave his opinion of AU50. I specifically asked if the coin could possibly be bodybagged. I wasn't really concerned that it would be, but the owner didn't want to spend money on slabbing if it would be bagged and he would have gone to ANACS instead. David said no it was fine. Unrelated issue, a few days after submitting the coin I am banned from the forums. A few months later the coin comes back from PCGS in a bodybag for environmental damage. mad.gif

 

Next LB show the coins owner takes it to David and asks for an opinion. Same opinion. Tells him the story and David says he will take care of it and it goes thru the Presidential Review. (Foolishly, the guy tells him that I submitted the coin the first time and mentions my name several times. He didn't know what happened to me shortly after the original submission).

 

At the same time this is happening I am talking to "someone who knows things". When I relate the story of the bodybag he mentions firmly that David isn't a grader. I understand what he is saying smile.gif

 

A few weeks ago the coin arrives back from PCGS after the David Hall special treatment Presidential Review.

 

Here is the coin.

 

1872centsmall.jpg

 

 

Any guesses as to what happened? The owner told me that it slabbed at VF25. He wasn't 100% sure of the number (might have been VF30) because he was a little shaken and disoriented at seeing a VF on the insert, but he was sure that it was a VF something.

 

Now, does anyone think this coin could be a true VF something? Anyone think that David Hall played games and gave it the special treatment? Perhaps he walked into the grading room and winked at the graders and asked them to see what they could do? I don't know, but I do believe that something funny was going on and that you can't trust David Hall to do the right or smart thing ever.

 

I'm strongly thinking of going back again for another grading opinion. Maybe I can get this coin in an AG03 slab this time. 893censored-thumb.gif

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braddick

braddick

Posted
Posted
I'm strongly thinking of going back again for another grading opinion. Maybe I can get this coin in an AG03 slab this time. 893censored-thumb.gif
Greg... that will be the finest coin Braddick ever owns wink.gif

 

Jeremy

893whatthe.gif
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James_OldeTowne

James_OldeTowne

Posted
Posted
Other than the Pedigree issue, what changed about this coin to make it worth selling the first time to the Collector for $3,500.00 (after you examining it and buying it yourself for resale) to now being worth "a couple hundred dollars at best. It's doggie-doo...it's severely doctored..." Boy, I sure hope you don't think I'm picking on you James, I'm not. I'm just the inquisitive type and the above question jumped out at me after reading your response.
No problem - Dennis picks on me all the time! Let me explain just how bad this coin is in my opinion. After Dennis picked it up, he immediately sent me a 300dpi image of the coin - both sides. Included was his letter telling me how lucky we were to locate a Norweb coin for the client. I remember getting excited as I read Dennis' description of the coin. Then, the image popped up (I have a slow dialup), and my initial excitement deflated. I immediately wrote back to Dennis - "Dennis, that coin isn't even Unc!". It was bad enough that I could tell from a 300dpi image that the coin was not even Uncirculated! So, Dennis and I may be at odds here. I honestly believe this coin is an AU Hibernia with a polished and recolored obverse, and a dipped reverse, which in my mind is a net grade of VERY-FINE. And it is ugly to boot. So yes, to me, it is a crummy $200 coin.

 

The only thing that might have added value - IF you happened to care - was the Norweb provenance, which turned out to be bogus.

 

James

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