By Laura Sperber – Legend Numismatics ……
ANA NOT DIGESTED
We all figured having a Long Beach Show only three weeks after the ANA Show in the same area would not have great results. As expected overall the show was slow. There also was a huge fresh gold deal in the Heritage Auction that attracted the majority of dealers attention and business. It seemed either coins UNDER $5,000.00 or OVER $100,000.00 were selling the best. A lot of coins in between just languished-unless they were gold. You can call it a “hang over effect”.
Our best day turned out to be Friday. Wholesale was non existent for us until midday Thursday. Not sure why. Then one by one we started to sell. Friday turned out to be a strong wholesale day and we even sold a few coins to collectors. As of 6 PM Friday the show was right at our expectations for sales. Thank you all for stopping by!
We’ve complained about weak buying before at major shows, this show set an absolute record for us. We did NOT even purchase $50,000.00 on the floor! That was unheard of. We wanted to buy. First, there were too many retreads and coins we just saw at ANA. Second, still too much dreck out there (NOTE: dreck is NOT about value or grade). We couldn’t even find freshly made coins NON CAC we liked to buy. At least we held back a group of NEWPS from ANA ready for this exact scenario to happen.
Last comments: the big money is still there and is still buying. In fact, we now know of even MORE NEW people starting to buy. The majority seem to be ferreting out the trophy gold (right before our eyes we saw a mid six figure gold coin sell), but we did see a couple of new players pop up for the 1794 1C pieces in the auction of which a few went went for sky-high record prices. Considering Early Copper was so dead the Pogue sale had to be postponed only a few months ago shows how quickly this new money is coming and buying what they want. The auction results are visible proof of the change in the market. If you are a contrarian, build yourself some sets in areas that there is little interest from these whales. We know of plenty of areas that with just a little TLC–the prices will really pop. Time will adjust the market cycle.
SUGGESTION: BUY ALL THE GEM PROOF BARBERS AND SEATED PIECES PR 65 OR BETTER (we do recommend building sets). THEY ARE SIMPLY TOO CHEAP. DEMAND IS NOT CRAZY. TIME WILL CORRECT THE PRICES AS SUPPLY IS EVER SO LIMITED!
