How much has the market softened?

291fifth

Any comments? Will the market make a comeback at the ANA...or will the ANA become known as a turndown point for the coin market. Collector coins seem to be doing well, when you can actually find any to buy. The "high flyers" of the past two years seem to be softening. I talked with a former owner of the 1870-S half dime this week and he was surprised at how little the coin brought at its most recent sale.

roadrunner

While the 1870-s seemed to have brought too little, the 1853-0 NA half seemed to bring plenty. In fact the 53-0 half essentially doubled in 2 years over it's previous auction appearance, and this is for a well circulated rarity, not a choice UNC. Sort of implies that half dollar collectors far outnumber half dime collectors which makes sense to me. Bigger over smaller. The 70-s half dime had some lack luster sales during the past 20 years so there have been times when not everyone agrees that its in the same league as an 1804 dollar for example. Being a Johnny come lately who is "only 25 years old" also affects its value. Who knows, next year that could bring $1 Million.

The 53-0 certainly showed that the market for rarities is still there.
Both coins are certainly very desireable and major rarities.

roadrunner

BAJJERFAN

It would seem that the market for better date Morgans is hotter than a snake's as$ in a wagon rut hot. A tad over a month ago a 79-cc Morgan in 64 went for $8K and this un here is almost $11K with the juice.

291fifth

<< <i>It would seem that the market for better date Morgans is hotter than a snake's as$ in a wagon rut hot. A tad over a month ago a 79-cc Morgan in 64 went for $8K and this un here is almost $11K with the juice. >>



Increasingly, I see the Morgan market as a market unto itself. I don't collect them and really don't have much of a feel for their pricing.

Barry

<< <i>...I see the Morgan market as a market unto itself. I don't collect them and really don't have much of a feel for their pricing. >>


I thought I was the only one

GOLDSAINT

My opinion is that many of the sectors of the market will slow down during the remainder of this year, and here is why.
Not that there is lack of demand for rarer, scarcer coins. Not because there are not lots of mega-millionaires/ billionaires out shopping.
I think that the market is going to run out of new higher end material.
Fifteen years ago the Forbes 400 was populated with just a handful of Billionaires, to today that list is almost all Billionaires. These and all the new Mega-millionaires are generally the ones that sucked up all the profits from the stock market while the general publics retirement funds declined. I think that number is something like a Trillion dollars.
It is my opinion that many of these people that buy loads of the top end coins are at least somewhat trophy collectors, and being that they only want the very best or the very rarest, or the very scarcest material.
The question is then how many truly rare, scarce, and ultra high-grade coins are out there.
My personal collection is made up of mid range coins, none of which are worth more than $10,000 at this point, but I am already being offer many retreads from recent auctions.
Just yesterday I was offered several coins that I immediately recognized from recent Heritage sales. So dealers, as well as investors, are trying to churn this material in the hopes that they can pick up a few quick percentage points on flips. This is fine, but like so many other markets when things are being flipped constantly the slow down is near.
In addition as several of you pointed out in a thread last week there are only about 100,000 collectors in the market, perhaps only 20% of that spends most of the money, and most of that 20% has been filling up there holes for 2 years now.
I am most likely a good example of a profile for people in that 20%. I was out of the market for 25 years, I have worked very hard to get my collection slabbed, and weeded out. I have been fling holes in my sets, and extending my type set, but I am now getting to all the hard coins, many of which I will not own do to the price.
As for the top end of the 20%, those few hundred people who can write $500,000 up checks, many of them must be getting to the point where what they would buy just is not there because one of their buddies owns it, and is not a seller. I mean how many R7, R8, and R9’s can there be that are not already in STRONG HANDS?
When the 20% group slows way down so will the market, since it is very hard for larger dealers, and auction houses to support their staff and overheads from sales out of the 80% that is left.

EvilMCT

What segment of the market has softened? In my small arena, things are still moving up.

Ken

Russ

Softened? In my area of interest, values have skyrocketed this year.

Russ, NCNE

keets

it seems that to get an accurate guage of market strenght choosing coins such as the 1870-S half dime and the 1850-O NA half-dollar are very, very poor choices. they might be a good guage of how upper crust collectors/investors stock dividends are doing, but a good guage on average collectors??? very doubtful.

Russ' mention of Kennedy Half-Dollars---i assume that's his area of interest---is probably a better guage than coins that may have 3-4 people looking seriously at them. for that matter, any collector type coins/grades are probably better to get a realistic view. i haven't been to a show in a few months but from talking to people, visiting here and looking around on the web it seems that if nothing else things have leveled off or slowed their rise.

i would think we still have a ways to go yet.

al h.

ziggy29

I agree with keets -- One can't really draw any conclusions about the general strength of the coin market by looking at the 5- and 6-figure sales. It says nothing about what average collectors are doing. Commonly collected and highly sought *quality* coins -- such as MS-65 Morgans and key dates in popular series -- still seem to be red hot.

Maybe the very valuable coins are a bit soft because the super-rich who can afford them are on six-week vacations in the South of France right about now!

Placid

Prices always seem to go up at my local market. Sometimes they have 2-for-1 sales.

100proof1957

Esoteric coins that 99.5 % of us couldnt afford certainly dont fuel the broad market.
$500 coins would be a much better gauge,and perhaps even lower than that.
Im sure Russ sells plenty of affordable coins in that range.

mrearlygold

I think that some people are in for a rude awakening . Soon too.

Tom

ziggy29

<< <i>I think that some people are in for a rude awakening . Soon too. >>

Oh, I agree. Some of the coins are pretty common and are little more than "commodities" being driven only because very high demand exceeds a large supply. When the demand dries up, even a little, some segments of the coin market are going to drop pretty strongly.

I'd put the common date MS-65 Morgans near the top of that list, followed by modestly high-grade, certified moderns. I suspect other areas of strength, such as key dates in popular series, won't suffer too much from reduced demand because the supplies are so constrained that there will almost always be more demand than supply.

Placid

CU3000 ® $63,104 (-3.36)
Sell! Sell!

coinguy89

As a newbie, im still totally unsure of how the market is gonna turn out. I get the feeling that as soon as something goes up in value, it never comes down, but you guys are saying that doesn't happen too often. I would hope coins like the common MS-65 Morgan dollar would go down once the heat is down. Im also thinking that alot of stuff will go down after the State Quarter program is done, mostly modern and popular series, just an opinion.

LAWMAN

For my two cents, I think we are definitely headed for a crash of some kind. I see some real moon money being paid for wonderful coins, but, at prices that are rising too high, too fast. Part of it too is the new pedigree of registry sets; when those sets sell, and it seems more and more are selling, the auction buyers go nuts. If the comment about the billionaires is correct, then those folks can be very flighty about their interests (I've represented more than a few over the last 30 years and they can afford to be flighty). This year, it is trophy coins -- next year, when the interest rates tick back up, it will be other, more traditional things. There may be 100,000 collectors, but, how many people are going to be paying $20,000 - $100,000 for coins to hold and not try to flip fast? It feels like the Tulip mania dot.bomb bubble all over again here in the sleepy little field of numismatics. I think every time that the big investors have gotten hold of this market ('79-'81; '89-'91), it has presaged a big downward trend thereafter -- sometimes cooling off the market for a long period of time (like most of the 90's).

I would welcome a slowing down . . . coins I want will become more affordable. Sorry for everybody who will be hit economically, but, that's the way the capitalist ball bounces.

mrearlygold

Ok, here's an opinion which is a bit off the beaten path. Look at Coin World and Numismatic News for help wanted ads seeking "Coin Salesmen"

Prior to my arriving at Heritage in 1990(ish) and then quitting in 91 to head on down the road, there was a whole wing of the building allocated to "retail" sales. I got there and it was down to 5 ( including me), USTIC went down to 1. All anyone could say about the market in general was that it was crappola. The inventory in Dallas was as light as a feather.

I moved back to FLA and started my own company and let me tell ya man it was tough for a few years. Heritage's retail department became non-existent.

The better material will go into hiding and short money/collectors/investors will get shaken out real fast. Long money, real collectors and smart investors will watch the shake out and pick up some good deals along the way. Coin "salesmen" will go back to selling cars or whatever it is that will pay the mortgage.

We're not there yet. But it's coming.

My bet is that we're in the 7th inning.

Rgrds
Tom

cladking

There's still a lot of money flowing into the coin market from sources which didn't exist
several years ago. Sure there's lots of billionaires buying coins who weren't around in
the past, but there are vast numbers of returning collectors who in, aggregate, account
for much more of the money being spent on coins. Many of these people are "average
Joes" and are mostly buying $5 to $1000 coins, but they are buying a lot of them. There
are still millions of the newbies who are spending more and more money also. While it
may still be little on a per capita basis it is not so little when the numbers are considered.

The modern market has been a real entity for only nine years now and every summer it
has quieted down, and every fall it has come roaring back. The overall market has always
had a small tendency in this regard also. Yes, April is even slower but many hobbyists take
summer vacations or have other summer interests.

Let's see how it looks in the fall.

Fairlaneman

Soften, since when ? I cannot win a darn thing in a PCGS slab when it comes to Mercs and I am not talking key dates. Just about everything has went for way over Gray Sheet that has been bid on both at Heritage and Ebay. The early date mercs are still in high demand. They do not have to be super grades either. 64/65 stuff seems hot.

NGC slabed coins. Thats a different story. Five or six have been picked up at a very reasonable price. A couple of the coins were darn nice that were housed in the newer slabs. Hmmm......

Ken