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Have auctions gone too far?
pruebas
Posts: 4,356 ✭✭✭✭✭
I have always been impressed with Noonans, but for this group, the consignor should just have taken a vacation to Mexico and spent it.
Seriously, who would bid on this with a 24% BP and a 1% insurance fee, plus shipping?
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I should mention these are current coins with a face value of about USD58.
They are circulated and have zero numismatic value.
Only thing I could imagine is a parent or family member (or a friend) buying this type of lot for a young collector in their family (or friends family). So some young collector can have fun going threw the lot and try and find some varieties.
Parent bidding with their young kid just to have some fun together and get into auctions together.
Otherwise it is pretty useless as you have mentioned.
Coin collecting interests: Latin American early pillar 1 reales
Sports: NFL & NHL
Pruebas - I saw this other wacky lot yesterday and had the same thought. Not sure why a SUD 2 reales is in with some state quarters, lol.
https://www.numisbids.com/n.php?p=lot&sid=7583&lot=968
Also Noonans. And they show the hacienda tokens behind all the crap. Probably to entice bidders with “hidden” value?
As service to the consignor, wouldn't everyone have been better served if Noonan explained these coins were only face value? I know most banks avoid taking foreign exchange in coin, but it would seem that Noonan might still be in a position to make something happen instead of taking these to auction whereby there are simply no winners?
Experience the World through Numismatics...it's more than you can imagine.
Ironically, this thread has already given it 10x more thought the Noonan's cataloguer ever did.
Where's Dix and Webb when you need them??!
Current coins are not as worthless as they seem. I often sell my change after coming back from somewhere more unusual than the Eurozone or the US. People will pay $10 for half a dozen coins that you could technically get for $2 in the country, but you'd need to pay for a flight to get them.
indeed many of the coins on that lot are simple current coins that circulate and do not have any other value/price than the current one. A 2 Pesos coin worth now about 13Cts.
The lot have some coins with the center of silver, and also some 5 pesos that worth around $10 or $15, I marked the ones I found:
Those are someone’s pocket change after returning from a trip. I HIGHLY doubt there are any silver-center coins, even the ones you marked. They were removed years ago (Gresham’s Law).
And those famous people 5P have numismatic value? I just spend any that I get in change.
Edited: I stand corrected. The 100 Peso coin has $12 worth of silver.
If I happened to be at the sale, I’d bid on it, bring them home, and sell them to you. And you know it!
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
The auction houses miss sometimes. They're only as good as the people they have preparing these things.
IG: DeCourcyCoinsEbay: neilrobertson
"Numismatic categorizations, if left unconstrained, will increase spontaneously over time." -me
From the item description, "from various properties", I would assume that it's all the Mexican coins taken from several lots of mixed world coins, and bulked together. If just one of those original lots came from a vacationer who was in Mexico back in the 1990s when the silvers were actually circulating, then it's perfectly reasonable such coins are present.
Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, "Meditations"
Apparently I have been awarded one DPOTD.
Auction companies do not mix property from multiple consignors in one lot. (How would they be properly paid otherwise?) So all that change came from one consignor. The whole auction sale is from various properties, rather than a single person sale, which Noonans does a lot of.
But you are right, they could have silver, I just bet they don't. Except the 100P. We could write Noonans and ask the dates?
If it was my auction company, I would just pay the consignor 80-90% of face and deal with them wholesale privately. My reputation as an auctioneer is worth more than a loss of $60 or so for an otherwise good consignment (which I assume it was) that I will make money with overall.
The only pesos that went to circulation, was the 10 Nuevos Pesos back then, any other one with silver in the center a 20, 50 or 100 Nuevos Pesos, you need it to buy it on different forms.
Then came the Peso without the N. And incertain time there were available 100 Pesos, 50 Pesos, etc. again with the center of silver. These were or maybe still are sold via a Bank or as Sets, but not as a circulated coin.
I do not collect them, btw.
Some of these auction houses aren't used to handling this type of material.
IG: DeCourcyCoinsEbay: neilrobertson
"Numismatic categorizations, if left unconstrained, will increase spontaneously over time." -me
It looks like a clean up lot to me. Taken as part of a larger consignment of more desirable material by the auctioneer.
It's like discount postage in stamps. A hassle to deal with but someone will handle it if the modest profit is enough. And if the consignor wants EVERYTHING sold and his/her time is of substantial value, maybe the auction house is doing the consignor a service.
The proper way to handle it is to ask the consignor if he wants property that he is likely to get less than face value returned, considering that they are foreign coins that cannot be easily exchanged. It is some houses policy to just refuse this material in order to preserve the quality of their offerings.
Disposing of foreign exchange coin at 80-90% of face should be considered a big favor from the auctioneer to the consignor in most cases, if the auctioneer is willing to provide this service. It would help entice me to consign.
Noonans won't let you see the current highest bid online, which is a bummer for me. However, they often have very good commerative medals (e.g. city of London series), which are hard to find elsewhere
Yes, and they had that complete set a couple of months ago. I bid on a very choice one with original case, but was blown out of the water.
Even though they are super expensive now, if you think about their ~300 pieces mintage, they are of very good value. Imagine a coin from19th century that only has a mintage of 300. People would go craaaazy about it.
Just a follow-up on this lot.
It hammered for £110 + 24% [=USD170] (possibly + 1% + shipping OR + 5% VAT).
As I said in another thread. I am no longer surprised what prices are achieved in numismatics.