What's your final verdict on the Long Beach Show?

dpoole

For you folks that went, how do you think the show went, and what did it say about the state of the hobby?

In reading the posts so far, the impressions I've gotten are all over the lot.

The general consensus, though, seems to be that the bourse was slow, and not a lot of good stuff was out there. Also that the dealers weren't able to buy and replenish stocks as much as they'd like. I gather the "waterfall" incident sort of symbolized the dissapointment and frustration. PCGS apparently was even tighter than Baltimore.

The auctions sound like they were on another planet. Hot prices for the good quality stuff, with some bargains to be had for the middle stuff. Seems to be the way things are going these days.

Were those summaries accurate, from your perspective? Is the heat and the quality moving more and more decisively to big show auctions, while everything else is quieting down?

DHeath

I'd also love to know what percentage of the auction buyers were from the U.S., but I doubt that information is available.

Mikey

As a rookie collector my observation is that toning and color equals value. An MS66 1953 quarter with color sells for 450, or at least is priced.

wondercoin

AS POSTED ON ANOTHER THREAD:

It was a great show for me as well from the standpoint of buying coins at auction. There were some spectacular bargains that got sold in the area of mid-20th century coins. One coin I had close to $35,000 to bid on at auction was sold for around $15,000. I mentioned a group of (4) Franklins on the Registry board that I had close to $9,000 in bids to place on that sold for around $2500 for all 4 coins and I bought another lot at a pre-show auction for under $2500 I had roughly $8500 to bid on. A very active Franklin/Wash quarter dealer couldn't make the show this time and I am confident that influenced prices in those particular areas at the auction.

Wondercoin

clw54

I noticed some dealers didn't have prices posted, some had prices that were ridiculously high, some were very overgraded (A Morgan listed as VG had no hairline and some of the rim was worn away), some just look shifty, and a few had coins that were graded correctly with fair prices. One suprised me so much that I searched out MrLee and and told him the dealer had a good selection of 1909-S Lincolns at good prices. That dealer also pointed out when a coin he was selling was cleaned. He was at Table 644 and the name had "RIver" in it. I'd like to see a list of straightforward dealers posted here just so we'll know where to go. No need to list the operators, just list the good ones.

My impression is that Long Beach is a show for the high-end collectors, which I am not. It's still fun, because I get to meet so many of the people from these forums.

tjkillian

I thought the show was better than average for folks like me as there were more collector coins, not just super high-end coins. I was able to get a 1872 PCGS MS-64BN indian that looked very nice for just under greysheet. I also picked up a very nice 1834 Quarter in PCGS XF-40 that had not been played with, i.e. was fully original and well struck, a beautiful example.

Tom