1954-S Washington sells for $8800 on Teletrade

IrishMike

NGC has graded 3 1954-S in MS68 and this is the only one with a *. Link. PCGS has graded none in 68. I guess the combination of the grade, the toning and the * and the condition rarity experessed itself last night. I figured $4-5K max. I think it opened at $3200 if memories serves me correctly. I wonder how much of an effect the * had on the price.

Jamericon

Regardless of anything else, the coin is pretty ugly.

spadesjedi

<< <i>Regardless of anything else, the coin is pretty ugly. >>



no kidding! lord, how could such a coin get the star designation.

WWBillman

I hope it looks better in person, that picture does not look look very nice and it appears to be a really weak strike. Hope the buyer likes it.

dorkkarl

i wonder how much effect shillbidding had on the price ..........

K S

CharlieB

How foolish could someone be to spend that kind of money
on a coin as ugly and common as that. I don't get it, just
doesn't add up.

wondercoin

While I did not participate in this particular auction, I can tell you that I have seen the NGC finest known Wash quarters really "take off" in the past 60-90 days. As I have mentioned before, when you consider that a PCGS Wash quarter can have upwards of a 100x jump between MS67 and MS68 grades in some cases, it appears some serious Wash collectors have become comfortable capturing the very finest NGC coins at some point in between the 100x PCGS jump. This appears (to me) to have happened with this 1954(s) NGC coin last night.

I think it is great that interest in the Wash quarter series is expanding. Wondercoin.

IrishMike

Mitch, this was more like 146X an NGC67. ($60).

RLinn

I tried squinting, adjusting my monitor, downloading the images and adjusting the color, and you know what? It is still a mud ugly coin.

dorkkarl

prob. i have w/ this is that there must be tons of bank-rolled '54-s quarters out there. i've seen a lot of them. sooner or later, other ms-68's are going to hit the market, and the buyer is gonna be screwed.

WARNING: the market for plastic just has way to similar a feel to '89, when morgans and walkers were being pushed to excessive levels. i say it's gonna crash, and there's gonna be a lot of sorry suckers out there.

K S

BillJones

The obverse is passable, but the reverse doesn't do a thing for me. What did you say MS-64 was? The MS-65 price is $10 in the Red Book. I'd say this guy will move up the registry rankings, but come up a few dollars short when it comes time to sell.

gmarguli

The scan is probably bad. TT is so used to making bad scans to hide the ugliness that they probably forgot how to scan a coin normally.

I'll pay $50 for that coin if the new owner wants to sell it.

wondercoin

KS: I do not believe there will be tons of 1954(s) PCGS-MS68 quarters found of this date - my best guess (and don't rely on it) is there might be a couple (and less than a half dozen) found in the next 5-7 years (remind me of this prediction in 2010). And, if the pop stayed 0-2 in the next 5-7 years, I would not be the least bit surprised. But, let's discuss why I feel this way and if you "shoot me down" on this subject, so be it

The 1954(s) quarter has three huge problems going for it - STRIKE, STRIKE and STRKE. The reason your otherwise lusterous, beautiful 1954(s) quarters can't even achieve the PCGS-MS67 grade is due primarily to strike. PCGS hates softly struck reverses of this date and rewards them with MS66 at best nearly all of the time. Turn your coin over you think is MS67+ quality and study the reverse lettering - yep - WEAK.

I have handled all -3- PCGS-MS67 coins out there of this date in existence (one of the coins I actually slabbed for the owner but passed on buying when offered to me - a mistake of course). The coins, overall, are nice, but not of PCGS-MS68 quality in my opinion. I can't recall seeing but one or two PCGS-MS66 1954(s) quarters that had a good shot to go PCGS-MS67. That makes around 5 or 6 coins I have ever seen that could be PCGS-MS67 quality thus far in the past 10 years of searching (5 years of aggresive searching).

I am not too concerned dozens of PCGS-MS68 quarter specimens will start to appear, just like I am not too concerned that PCGS will ever grade a 1954(s) nickel higher than the pop 1/0 MS67FS. Hey, look how many Lincolns PCGS has graded in MS68RD while we are discussing this Wondercoin.

CLASSICS

<< <i>NGC has graded 3 1954-S in MS68 and this is the only one with a *. Link. PCGS has graded none in 68. I guess the combination of the grade, the toning and the * and the condition rarity experessed itself last night. I figured $4-5K max. I think it opened at $3200 if memories serves me correctly. I wonder how much of an effect the * had on the price. >>

did adrian buy it?

dorkkarl

hey wondercoin, points well taken. i am only trying to argue that statistics are against investment in such "pop" moderns.

if even 1% of the 12M are unmelted, that is 120K coins. if just 1% of those grade gem or better, that is 1200 coins. and if only ONE PERCENT of the GEMS are in that super category, we're talking at least a dozen coins that might be up there! i think the real problem is that to filter out those dozen coins, you'd have to spend $20 x 1200 coins = $24,000 to come up with a couple of $5000 coins, and nobody ought to do that.

although i like the bust coins, i do happen to have a wash quarter collection, every coin raw and handpicked. & i do mean i have been PICKY in the coins i put in this set, many were slabbed, many were raw. i try to cherry-pick from the raw coins, because that's obviously where the bargains are. i have looked through a lot of the 1954-S, and they are available w/ a strong strike.

i have utter confidence that every 1 of my washingtons is 65 MINIMUM, except for my 32-D and 34-D, which i grade 64.

so again, not saying you're wrong at all, only that i often question the statistics of pursuing those kinds of alleged "finest known" coins in a series that has so many specimens extant. i think if i were a coin dealer, i'd advise my clients to go hard after the ms-65's, and not even worry about "pop-tops", or anything hyped like that.

just my worthless 2c worth!

K S

edited to add: bear in mind that i got hammered in the plastic crash of '89, & i just gotta say that from this side of the dealer/collector fence, it looks awful similar.

BillJones

I agree with you, dorkkarl.

In the old days the die variety specialists like William Sheldon didn’t try to determine the finest known examples among hoards of coins like Nichols Find or the Randal Hoard because they realized that it was essentially meaningless. In these cases we were looking at populations of coins that numbered in the hundreds and only sometimes in the thousands.

Now we are looking at modern coins that number in the millions, and essentially ONE company has a near monopoly on picking out the best specimens. I would have more faith in these "wonder coins" if they could survive in the market OUTSIDE of their slabs. But like many viruses, they have market potency ONLY in a controlled environment.

Smart collectors should recognize that adding a very nice coin (MS-65) to their collection is the wise path. Others who are obsessed with becoming the king of the hill in a small pond (the registry) are headed down the same financial road as those who followed every .com stock to 401-K oblivion.

cladking

Dorkkarl:

You've had a lot better luck than I. Many years ago I tried putting together a silver
Washington set and gave up in frustration. Several of the later dates were fairly
available but I lacked the resources for many of the earlier ones. The 54-S was a
major stumbling block. I saw lots of coins from a couple dozen different sources, but
they were uniformly poor strikes. Nothing was better than about MS-63.

Do you have all the clads in MS-65 too? It's a tough set though of course it hardly
compares with the difficulty of the silver set.

dorkkarl

he cladking, my set goes through 1967 SMS. i haven't tried to pursue the clads, which i suspect are real tough because nobody cared to put aside choice rolls of those. i'd like to encourage your perseverance! bear in mind that it took me more than FIVE YEARS to complete my washingtons. i hope to someday upgrade the 32-D and 34-D. i'm always hoping to cherrypick an undergrade 1, but so far, ZERO luck. i suspect those coins get resubmitted often, leaving very few underrgaded beauties.

BTW, i also have a jefferson nickel set up through this year. i finished that set in about 1990 or so, & have continually added coins for each year. i did not even bother 1 bit with "FS" jeffersons. why? because it is a stupid descriptive IMO. they will call something "FS" where the rest of the coin is poorly struck. so what's the point? i went after surface quality for my set.

back to the quarters, i'm gonna guess that i personally examined at least a dozen or so full, original rolls of the 1954 S. i honestly did not think it was such a tough date in high grades, & suspect others out there felt the same way, & didn't bother to get em slabbed. i think bagmarks are more of a prob than strike on those coins.

strangely, i do not have any other "modern" sets. didn;t ever bother w/ licolns (i do have a few "types"), or mercs/roosevelts, or halves. but i have to admit to being fairly proud of my washingtons.

K S

cladking

The Jeffersons do usually look better with a uniformly good strike
and nice surfaces than the typical 6- steppers. - and they're much
less expensive usually.

Good luck on the 32-D and 34-D!

mnmcoin

I bought it and just sold it based on the tt picture for $15,000.

mo <><

jom

<< <i>they will call something "FS" where the rest of the coin is poorly struck. so what's the point? >>



That happens with Mercs and SLQ's also. FB Merc's with a weak perifery and FH Standers with a weak shield. People pay big money for this stuff...go figure.

jom

oldcameoproofsguy

I agree with the sentiment so far on this thread. It is madness to spend so much for a coin that is obviously not worth the price. I could see it if the coin had magnificent toning, a great strike and superb luster, but this coin has none of this. It is probably just a technical 68 with eye appeal just decent enough not to downgrade it to a ms67.

I just spent $800 less for an 1897 PCGS PR67DCAM 25c that is currently a pop 1(0) though there may be one or two examples that will eventually grade as nice or nicer. There will not be any hoards of 1897 Proof Barber quarters that will suddenly emerge on the market place. This coin is one of the finest for the year and will always be so and it is a beautiful coin.

I'll bet I got the better deal! Who knows maybe I didn't. Maybe I would have been better off spending my money on a brand new YUGO!

dorkkarl

you better not, somebody out there probably has a roll of BU yugos....

K S