By Laura Sperber – Legend Numismatics …………..
This show was a teenie bit feast, but in the end more famine. Our expectations were very low. Surprisingly, golds crash did NOT affect dealer spending. We did come home having a decent show (our expectations were very low anyway).
As always, David Chrenshaw and gang delivered a first class show. HOWEVER, this show was only at best 2/3 the size of the regular ones. They really need to reconsider holding this summer show-especially if they are going to do a Sept Philadelphia show. This time, clearly a majority of West Coast dealers did NOT attend. And even worse for the first time-BOTH PCGS and NGC were NOT grading on site. That to us spoke volumes about expected show traffic.
On Thursday public attendance was surprisingly decent. Unfortunately, it seemed most people were lookers vs buyers. There were a few die-hards spending, but we’d guess the majority of money went to items BELOW $1,000.00.
We arrived late Tuesday and hit the ground working. We saw our #1 “secret agent” buyer and sold him a fair amount. We’re both so used to each others habits, he can tell what we’ll buy from him and we think we can guess what he will pick out of our boxes. There were no surprises in that meeting!
The next day we started out early and went lobby leaching. Did extremely well with the first two dealers we showed our coins too. Dealer traffic in the hotels was moderate. Mean while, our lone “stealth team ” seller ran into us and was grinning how he was having an incredibly hot hand selling-and he was just getting started!
Selling was way too easy for us because we had interesting better coins. Our inventory was what is in demand and you can’t find-better CAC coins. Just look at what CAC coins (especially better coins) are selling for in any major auction. We’re not talking about average widgets, we’re talking about coins like H.01 1833 PCGS MS67 CAC , a 25C 1914 PCGS PR68 CAC, or a $20 High Relief PCGS MS65 CAC (we could badly use one right now).
We liken buying at the show to picking through the remains of buffet after a hungry football team has attacked it. We did get lucky and have TWO very small deals from collectors come to us (thanks guys)-but they had NOTHING for a huge Want Lists. Dealers just had retreads and not much else. We could buy a few coins, but they are not the ones we really need. And we found NO Early or better GOLD (save for the piece we discuss next). As we mentioned in last weeks Market Report, we’re in that dead period for finding great coins and experiencing a ton of action. Demand certainly has NOT faded.
One coin we did buy (we think this is a good learning experience about stepping up)-finally was for a Want List. It was the $20 1907 HR FE PCGS MS67 CAC Dukor/Akers. Its really the ONLY High Relief we have ever seen with real heart pounding ORIGINAL colors. At the Dukor sale it sold for only $172,500.00. We were busy worrying about bigger coins in that sale. At that time Saints were in a rut and prices had been weak. We pursued this coin for THREE major shows. We had our number, The stubborn as all hell seller was stuck on his. Then a Wire Edge PCGS MS67 CAC OGH coin sold for $217,500.00 in New Orleans ANA auction. We were the under bidders. Then we started thinking, hmmm there are NO CAC’s around in ANY grade right now. We don’t really see any in the span of a year or two. We doubt more will be beaned as time goes on. Our MS66 HR got snapped up pretty quick. Look what the Wire Edge just sold for. And of course, the Dukor sale was 18 months ago-different much dryer market today. So we plunked ourselves down for the battle. We lost on the fact the seller wouldn’t budge, but we WON on the fact we bought a MONSTER coin for $210,000.00. We knew we had a Want List-but were were prepared to buy the coin solely for inventory. We KNOW (not just believe) that as time goes on, truely great coins like this will not be floating around a bourse floor or be in any auctions! To get the great coins like this you really have to overpay a bit and be in uncharted territory for a short period of time. We do believe that by the time the FUN Show rolls around, this coin would warrant a higher price.
GOLD
While it definitely affected generics, the huge drop in the price of gold did NOT effect the prices of better gold coins. Real simple as to why-there are still NONE around. There will always be a quotient of wealthy collectors want their cool coins and will pay up for it. As you can see, we did drop our MS66 Saint buy price buy $100.00. VERY minor. As of this show, we did NOT see any negatives fro BETTER GOLD pieces.
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