FUN Show Report
Proofmorgan
Posts: 715 ✭✭✭✭✭
This was my 3rd FUN show and I came from Weds through Saturday. We were happy to leave the 9 degree temp and 1 foot morning snowfall.
My dad came along as my “super secret buyer” and we split up to cover ground right out of the gate. He would text me constantly table numbers with coins of interest.
The primary focus: Early CAC gold.
The findings:
Nothing very exciting. Lots of “low end” CAC early gold. The kind of stuff that leaves you scratching your head. Maybe technically undergraded, but still processed. Some moderate CAC early gold surfaced on Friday at a couple large firms. The asking prices were 20% over guide/highest recent CAC auction result. Seemed insane. I could have bought nicer pieces at auction for 20% less that night. The coins were fresh to them and they were firm on prices. Mid AU pieces going for 62 CAC money. Famous quotes “I don’t need to sell it” or “I can’t replace it at the show”.
I checked out a couple pieces set aside by dealers for me that I saw online. Nice pieces but prices quoted should have been in Yen, not USD. They’ll stick around for a long time...
Stay close to your trusted and fair dealers and it’s hard to go wrong. The quality pieces will eventually end up with them when the big firms need to cut their losses...or gains should I say.
Striking out on that front, the backup plan was to pick up some quality bullion at as close to spot as possible. We snagged some Engelhard Silver and AGEs for very close to spot. Bullion seemed to be moving strong with the run up in spot.
The show still had a little buzz by mid day Saturday, even though 1/3 had packed up. A lot of large bullion movement at that time. People buying large bars or buying out cases for $10-20 over for gold. My guess is that these people only had $1100-$1200 into an Oz with the quick run up lately so they could afford to sell close to spot.
Auction:
Nothing stuck out. The 1834 $2.5 was nice. I loved the color and originality, but it was accurately graded despite the Fatty. To rich for my blood anyway. I did buy an obscure rare piece with dealer representation as we would have competed against eachother. Something to add to the “this is cool” collection.
Randomly picked up a couple Lewis and Clark coins with the Native American made pouches....I always wanted one. At two for $70, how could I refuse? To my surprise one of the pouch crafters had the same last name as my girlfriend.....the mystery of her olive skin has been solved!
Lessons learned:
-Don’t leave last years FUN badge at home ($30 for a new one)
-zig zagging through isles and turning your head from case to case as you walk can eventually lead to dizziness. Average daily mileage of 7 miles in the convention center from 830-1pm.
-don’t be afraid to ask for prices even if you think it’s overpriced based on other items around it in the case.
-quickly move on when insane prices are quoted......they didn’t move by Saturday and will come down or end up in auction someday at the right price.
Take aways:
-Quality and originality are alive and well
-CAC is king, but lower end CAC pieces can be found readily and dealers are asking top dollar.
-A lot of high end pieces are still in strong hands
-The auction and floor had less quality than past shows
I’ll be looking forward to the early bird and newps listings to come from all my favorite dealers......but not the snow and frigid temps at home.
Comments
Nice report, thanks for taking the time to post.
Sounds like solid coins are commanding top dollar, and no one feels compelled to give anything away, at least at in the arenas you discussed.
Thanks for the report any nice pl/dmpls around for fair prices?
Loved the father and son tag team aspect. Would be interesting to hear his perspective. Thank you for the report @Proofmorgan.
Nice report, lots of words of wisdom this crowd should pay attention to.
Low end CAC as in price range?
Low end CAC as in slab grade?
Low end CAC as in your opinion as to the merit of the CAC bean?
Or just cleaning in your opinion?
Good report. Pre Civil War gold seems to be doing pretty well now.
To answer a couple questions:
No out of this world PL/DMPL pieces that I could see. Maybe in the 66 and beyond range, which aren’t in my “cool stuff” budget. Plenty in older holders, even with CAC that I didn’t think deserved the designation of PL/DMPL.
By “low end CAC” I mean the following:
CAC at times endorses questionable quality coins that make you wonder why they were beaned at all. Similar to how at times a TPG coin appears overgraded. For most dealers....a bean is a bean. There are plenty of these examples around. Likely results of bulk submissions where a couple of bones were thrown at the submitter. The better pieces are likely off the market or scooped up quickly.
Most disappointing was a 1795 $5 in OGH 50 Gold CAC that may have technically been a 55, but was riddled with hairlines and had little/no original skin. Every once in a while one gets by....
Disclaimer: I love what CAC has done to protect the hobby.
nice reviews,,, one third of tables left by mid day ,, wow,,, what a disappointed to the crowd coming on Saturday
Thanks for the clarification. Sorry I missed you. I happened to pick up a couple of super nice one-sided DMPL Morgan’s .... one from Don Rinkor and one from Dan Davis.
And I saw a handful of others out there ... but perhaps not as many as one might expect for such a large show.
WOW. I forgot Fun was this week.
You would think at a big show thered be plenty of options with them. I hope to be at parsipanny next month Ian
Thanks for an interesting report. Based on your pricing information, I would say the market is not nearly as depressed as many have said. Otherwise I would expect prices to moderate. Cheers, RickO
I did buy an obscure rare piece with dealer representation as we would have competed against eachother. Something to add to the “this is cool” collection.
Great report!! Hope you share this NEWP with us when you can!!!
Thanks for the detailed report!
The best thing at the show was seeing the Taraszka $10 Eagle collection at the Stack's Bowers table.