The Fairmont Collection

dsessom

I bought this 1845 $5 gold piece for my girlfriend for Christmas, and was trying my hand at imaging it. It's apparent that my time away from the hobby has rendered my photography and Photoshop skills pretty rusty! I will have to work on my techniques to get better. Anyway - what is known about The Fairmont Collection? I can find very little information about it, and there seems to be a huge mystery as to their origin. I guess they all made their way to market through Stacks and Bowers, but nobody seems to know where they the hoard came from.

Any ideas?

PeakRarities

I think it was a European bank vault type deal, more of a “hoard” than a “collection”. I’d be curious to learn more, however the allure is fading imo. They just keep coming and coming with no end in sight. As Doug Winter put it, “Fairmont Fatigue”

Here’s my 1855-D from the last stacks auction, 50cac

HillbillyCollector

Consensus seems to suggest Europe. Stacks has really kept it quiet, though.
Funny that you mentioned Fairmont. I have spent all weekend going through those coin!
I love the Fairmont coins, so original and fresh.
Next question, can I sneak in and grab two or three of those $20s.😂
Time will tell.

coinkat

Both coins posted look nice-

dsessom

@HillbillyCollector said:
Consensus seems to suggest Europe. Stacks has really kept it quiet, though.
Funny that you mentioned Fairmont. I have spent all weekend going through those coin!
I love the Fairmont coins, so original and fresh.
Next question, can I sneak in and grab two or three of those $20s.😂
Time will tell.

They are nice for sure, and I am thinking that in the long run, they might bring the prices down a little due to flooding the market (at least increasing supply, which tends to bring prices down generally). I was surprised to find one that I could actually afford! I have never spent over $2500 for any single coin, which shows you where my budget is. I got the 1845 AU50 for $900. @DeplorableDan paid over 6X that amount, so I am guessing it's a date rarity. I am thankful that they are now on the market personally.

HillbillyCollector

@DeplorableDan said:
I think it was a European bank vault type deal, more of a “hoard” than a “collection”. I’d be curious to learn more, however the allure is fading imo. They just keep coming and coming with no end in sight. As Doug Winter put it, “Fairmont Fatigue”

I am hoping the allure IS fading. I read that from Doug, as well. Did you notice he suggested that Stacks needed to put up more detail histories of the coins, and they sure took his advice!😂
Makes it a lot easier to research the coin.
Several of the coins date, grade, etc sold in multiple sales last year and for several coins, the November sales numbers held up just as strong as the April sales. I’m not looking at the high grade consensus ones, however.

GoldFinger1969

@dsessom said:
Anyway - what is known about The Fairmont Collection? I can find very little information about it, and there seems to be a huge mystery as to their origin. I guess they all made their way to market through Stacks and Bowers, but nobody seems to know where they the hoard came from.

Any ideas?

As I understand it, it's a bank or building or hotel or group or some other name over in Europe that has no connection to the coins per se...but they decided to just use that as the name. It could be an amalgamation of several hoards.....including large numbers of private bank holdings and/or SDBs. But there's no Fairmont Collection or Bank or other entity as I understand it (if I'm wrong, someone correct me).

The reason why many of these hoards have such secretive backgrounds is that you can influence the prices if the size or specific years/mints come out, especially for rare or semi-rare coins. Even if they are commons, you don't want to reduce even small numismatic premiums by announcing you've got hunreds or thousands of them to hit the open market in coming months. This is what has happened in Europe ex-Fairmont with lots of MCMVII High Reliefs and other Double Eagles (Saints & Liberty Heads) basically trickling out monthly the last 5-7 years. Not a huge 1-time thing like the SSCA but just a slow...steady...trickle....month after month after month. It eventually satiates dealer and public demand and lowers prices.

You don't want that coming out if you come into possesion of anything market-moving. The secrecy behind the well-known 1908 NM Saint Wells Fargo Hoard comes to mind.

The other reason I've read that hoard backgrounds are secretive is that someone might have been unaware of the FMV of the coins and got bought out on the cheap or entirely left out. Or a bank person was induced to part with the coins at below FMV. In South and Central America, many times the stashes were controlled by off-shoots of military juntas and/or government regulators. Could be an extended family where someone is getting stiffed.

LOTS of reasons for keeping it secret beyond price-movements. Sometimes the person who gave someone the heads-up about a hoard might just want anonymity....other times, someone is getting something they shouldn't and/or someone who should have gotten something didn't.

And if any of these were kept hidden and/or "off the books" -- for a family or a bank -- it just adds to the need for secrecy.

pcgscacgold

Here are my two Fairmont coins. I have had these for for about 3.5 years.

dsessom

@GoldFinger1969 Thank you for the explanation. That makes a lot of sense, and apparently this "hoard" consisted of thousands or tens of thousands of coins, and all gold from what I have seen so far. If they were in the possession of a foreign entity, then I am thankful they were brought back to the US. I'm sure other collectors outside the US have purchased some as well, but at least US collectors now have the opportunity to purchase them.

dsessom

@pcgscacgold said:
Here are my two Fairmont coins. I have had these for for about 3.5 years.

Holy moly, those are nice! Did you buy them from Stacks originally? They have both appreciated in value over the past few years! It's cool that they are not only sequential years, but the cert numbers are nearly sequential as well.

pcgscacgold

@dsessom said:

@pcgscacgold said:
Here are my two Fairmont coins. I have had these for for about 3.5 years.

Holy moly, those are nice! Did you buy them from Stacks originally? They have both appreciated in value over the past few years! It's cool that they are not only sequential years, but the cert numbers are nearly sequential as well.

.
.
Thanks. I like them a lot too.

I was looking for less common $10 Indians at the time. It has become my favorite coin design so I have added several others to my collection.

I picked them up a few months after the auction so most likely from the person that won them at Stacks in Fall 2018.

Desert Moon

skier07

I’m speculating that the Fairmont Collection had something to do with the Fairmont Hotel in Ottawa where the European hoard somehow wound up in a Canadian bank vault close very close to the hotel.

GoldFinger1969

@dsessom said:
@GoldFinger1969 Thank you for the explanation. That makes a lot of sense, and apparently this "hoard" consisted of thousands or tens of thousands of coins, and all gold from what I have seen so far. If they were in the possession of a foreign entity, then I am thankful they were brought back to the US. I'm sure other collectors outside the US have purchased some as well, but at least US collectors now have the opportunity to purchase them.

I haven't read up too much on the Fairmont Collection, just glanced at the DE coins. As I understand it, the gold coins span the specturm to small fractionals up to the larger DEs. That would account for the great numerical quantity, somewhat less in total gold ounces compared to the WF NM or SSCA Hoards (but still impressive).

GoldFinger1969

@skier07 said:
I’m speculating that the Fairmont Collection had something to do with the Fairmont Hotel in Ottawa where the European hoard somehow wound up in a Canadian bank vault close very close to the hotel.

That would make sense. Somewhat similar to the Wells Fargo 1908 NM Saint hoard which only kept the coins in a local Wells Fargo branch when they were negotiating the sale to Ron Gillio.

They should have named the hoard after the bank or country they came from....or the original trade deal that brought them to South or Central America (?). Instead, if they did all meet at that Fairmont Hotel that would be a good way to give it a catchy name and keep hidden what was required to not be disclosed as a condition of the deal.

ricko

They are very nice gold coins indeed, and good to see them come to market. Congratulations to those above who acquired some. Cheers, RickO

Vasanti

@GoldFinger1969 said:

@skier07 said:
I’m speculating that the Fairmont Collection had something to do with the Fairmont Hotel in Ottawa where the European hoard somehow wound up in a Canadian bank vault close very close to the hotel.

That would make sense. Somewhat similar to the Wells Fargo 1908 NM Saint hoard which only kept the coins in a local Wells Fargo branch when they were negotiating the sale to Ron Gillio.

They should have named the hoard after the bank or country they came from....or the original trade deal that brought them to South or Central America (?). Instead, if they did all meet at that Fairmont Hotel that would be a good way to give it a catchy name and keep hidden what was required to not be disclosed as a condition of the deal.

Nope. Fairmont Le Montreux Palace in Geneva.

TurtleCat

I didn’t read all the responses but dealers I know who know other dealers say that Fairmont came from a hoard in Cuba. Stacks made a major acquisition and have been very careful in managing the sales to maximize profits. And apparently, if true, the only acquired the better pieces of the board so there may be others sitting there.

GoldFinger1969

@TurtleCat said:
I didn’t read all the responses but dealers I know who know other dealers say that Fairmont came from a hoard in Cuba. Stacks made a major acquisition and have been very careful in managing the sales to maximize profits. And apparently, if true, the only acquired the better pieces of the board so there may be others sitting there.

Possible...but there wasn't much trade per se with Cuba, it was done with Spain and other countries which had interests in Cuba. But who knows.......

Vasanti, thanks for the heads-up on Fairmont Le Montreux Palace in Geneva. Makes sense -- European, neutral company, and a hotel. They can just get lots of coin accumulations and mini-hoards and combine them into one big one and give it the Fairmont name.

Classic auctions (and maybe even modern ones) will sometimes have just one name, the main collection, but key coins or difficult-to-sell coins that the auction house has can be piggy-backed alongside, even if not belonging to the main collector selling. For instance, I understand that many coins not owned by Buddy Ebsen were sold along with his after his death (he was a legit coin collector, AFAIK).

Vasanti

@GoldFinger1969 said:

@TurtleCat said:
I didn’t read all the responses but dealers I know who know other dealers say that Fairmont came from a hoard in Cuba. Stacks made a major acquisition and have been very careful in managing the sales to maximize profits. And apparently, if true, the only acquired the better pieces of the board so there may be others sitting there.

Possible...but there wasn't much trade per se with Cuba, it was done with Spain and other countries which had interests in Cuba. But who knows.......

Vasanti, thanks for the heads-up on Fairmont Le Montreux Palace in Geneva. Makes sense -- European, neutral company, and a hotel. They can just get lots of coin accumulations and mini-hoards and combine them into one big one and give it the Fairmont name.

Classic auctions (and maybe even modern ones) will sometimes have just one name, the main collection, but key coins or difficult-to-sell coins that the auction house has can be piggy-backed alongside, even if not belonging to the main collector selling. For instance, I understand that many coins not owned by Buddy Ebsen were sold along with his after his death (he was a legit coin collector, AFAIK).

Just to clarify, that’s just a guess. There’s lots of American gold in Switzerland. Or, at least there was.

GoldFinger1969

@Vasanti said:
Just to clarify, that’s just a guess. There’s lots of American gold in Switzerland. Or, at least there >was.

QDB went to Switzerland in the early-1960's and was given a price for Double Eagles (probably mostly Saints)....he asked how much quantity that price was good for....and was told up to 100,000 coins !!

If he wanted more, the clerk had to check with his manager to see about the price for more than 100,000 DEs !!

Vasanti

I can’t even imagine how amazing that would have been to sift through and cherry-pick.

DisneyFan

@dsessom said:
I bought this 1845 $5 gold piece for my girlfriend for Christmas,

And how did that work out for you?

dsessom

@DisneyFan said:

@dsessom said:
I bought this 1845 $5 gold piece for my girlfriend for Christmas,

And how did that work out for you?

Pretty damned good actually.

DisneyFan

@dsessom said:

@DisneyFan said:

@dsessom said:
I bought this 1845 $5 gold piece for my girlfriend for Christmas,

And how did that work out for you?

Pretty damned good actually.

LUCKY GUY!

dsessom

@DisneyFan said:

@dsessom said:

@DisneyFan said:

@dsessom said:
I bought this 1845 $5 gold piece for my girlfriend for Christmas,

And how did that work out for you?

Pretty damned good actually.

LUCKY GUY!

You can't go wrong giving women gold!

DisneyFan

@dsessom said:

You can't go wrong giving women gold!

I thought it was diamonds.

fathom

Getting back on topic it appears to me key dates are less likely to appear in the later batch releases.

That's just my perception.

dsessom

@DisneyFan said:

@dsessom said:

You can't go wrong giving women gold!

I thought it was diamonds.

I guess it all depends on the woman. Mine loves silver and gold.