It's a jungle out there- bad coins, slabs or labels.
burfle23
Posts: 2,323 ✭✭✭✭✭
Not all of the recent fakes and slabs are as easy as these to spot. It does make one wonder what they are thinking when they chose a TPG cert to duplicate.
I advise folks when considering a purchase of a "certified" example to always check the on-line cert as a point of reference. Many of the fakes use a correct and active cert number, but that is the 1st check, does the number actually exist?
From there it is helpful if there is an image of the coin, preferably in the slab for better comparison. If no image on the cert look-up itself there are at times a link to a recent auction where images can be found.
Also, the noted latest auction appearances in this cert are an indicator something is terribly wrong!
And then there are the slabs themselves- several of the top TPGs have good images of genuine slabs to aid in detection.
Certainly knowledge of how the genuine slab should look and a quick look at the on-line cert would make seeing through these latest ones. One of the latest scams is to "upgrade" a lower grade genuine coin in a higher graded labeled holder!
Not sure what to even say about these two, but the cert numbers were reported and the certs deactivated!
And of course the latest deceptive struck counterfeits in genuine top TPG holders are the worse, but that is a discussion better served in another forum...
Comments
My daughter-in-law has a MA in digital photo manipulation (not the exact wording), and there are schools offering PhDs in that. I'm sure she could doctor any image to say what she wants, so people need to check everything that's checkable.
@burfle23 This kind of post is greatly appreciated.
The $20 1856-S is obviously hinky, the others are better. I guess we have to keep up our guard!
I dropped the 1856-S onto a table and the holder cracked Bill! Coin scanned at 4% gold/ mostly Copper and Zinc...
Very interesting material. Thank you.
Spooky stuff to be sure.
My War Nickels https://www.pcgs.com/setregistry/nickels/jefferson-nickels-specialty-sets/jefferson-nickels-fs-basic-war-set-circulation-strikes-1942-1945/publishedset/94452
Thanks for the warnings and the pictorial examples. It is getting nasty out there.... I appreciate the efforts of PCGS to combat this scourge. Cheers, RickO
@burfle23 thanks!
Another bad group of slabs, this time on Craigslist; love the comment about “no scammers”…
All have been reported to the TPGs.
A little levity this afternoon- one of the worse I have seen. I have included the obverse image and the on-line cert. It is interesting they went to the effort to try to create similar toning
!
Wow! MS 612+ to boot. Where do I sign up?
TurtleCat Gold Dollars
Anyone who'd buy that should themselves be certified!
hehe. i wouldn't have given it a point over 412; no matter HOW much i love flowing hair coinage!
in all seriousness, ty all very much for posting some of the newer bad holdered coins. i haven't seen most of the ones posted so far but thankfully those numbnutzes still make it quite apparent even to my rusty trained eyes.
the authentic coins in over-graded spurious holders are the ones that spook me. if they get those holders dialed in. yikes.
i am for the public sharing of these types of threads too. the shared knowledge will make us stronger and us all working together with the tpg against these frauds WILL help to thwart their efforts.