Spectrum needs to buy millions of dollars of raw moderns?

DHeath

I was thumbing through the NN, and saw the most recent Spectrum ad. Spectrum is a Manning subsidary. The ad says since they've added Lee Cook, they urgently need to buy all the modern coins they can accumulate. They say, "While Spectrum has always bought Modern Coins in limited quantities, we now need to spend millions of dollars on Modern Eagles, Proof Sets, Mint Sets, BU Rolls, and all your modern issues"

Looks like some of the larger firms are fast becoming aware of a market. Looks like they're also buying raw. I'd say the casual afternoons cherrypicking sets in dealer inventory are growing shorter. I'd say modern grading times may soon regularly exceed economy.

majorbigtime

I understand all of the highly coveted moderns are in very strong hands!

If this rectum (oops, I mean Spectrum) speculation is valid, the top pops could become common!! Perish the thought!!

DHeath

MBT,

I've collected them so long if they dropped to $1 each, I'd still enjoy it. I never have worried too much about that. I do however see my playground being rezoned commercial.

bullseye

Don't get too exceited. I'd try selling to them forst to see if they are really "paying up" for the coins.

I've watched many dealers claim they need Moderns only to offer cents on the dollar.

I highly doubt there are any major dealers who are legit major two way market makers inthe stuff. They all just want to buy raw and sell at the stuff slabbed for the max...

I quit collecting the suff long ago when reality hit me.

Mike

prooflike

Well, they should at least pay face, right?????

orie

I've been watching ms70 modern commems on TT and ebay for about a year. In the last two months there are about 8 guys driving them through the roof. At least 3 will be on every coin.

cladking

They might be surprised when they learn how difficult it is to buy mint sets. The demand
has always been anemic and indirect for these. Not only have large percentages been de-
stroyed but few of the remaining sets are actually for sale at any given time.

The implications of this are that they'll have to offer at least ask just to get a few flowing in.
Offering double ask would have a very small effect on the number they recieve. So long as
demand for these keeps growing it should very soon bump up against the upper limits of the
supply.

There are other moderns which have the same precarious balance between supply and demand.

wondercoin

"I've been watching ms70 modern commems on TT and ebay for about a year. In the last two months there are about 8 guys driving them through the roof. At least 3 will be on every coin."

The modern Commem series are very exciting these days. I really enjoy the (3) Registry sets (Half Dollar, Dollar & $5 Gold) I have been putting together this year along with my son. I posted a thread this week showing just two examples of Modern commems which have seen significant rising trends over the past 5 years despite the rising pops. There are more examples as well. I have also seen demand pick up a bit, especially over the past couple months (even more surprising during "Summer Duldrums".

Wondercoin

cladking

<< <i>I understand all of the highly coveted moderns are in very strong hands!

If this rectum (oops, I mean Spectrum) speculation is valid, the top pops could become common!! Perish the thought!! >>



There are few people who have been collecting moderns for very long and these people
are mostly forming collections and tend to be younger than most collectors. Many of these
are not going to be coming on the market for a very long time.

It would appear that Spectrum is attempting to service a rapidly growing market by buying
and then selling coins much as a company might do that was getting into Morgan dollars or
V-nickels for the first time. This would hardly constitute speculation.

As far as pop tops becoming common, this would actually have the opposite affect on most
of the older moderns. As the raw material for submitting these disappears from the market
there will be fewer to slab in the future. It has been pointed out in previous threads, due to
the reduction of sets on the market and previous floods of coins being submitted there are
few of even the common high grade coins left to be submitted in many cases. Collectors who
are familiar with these coins have a pretty good idea of what's out there.

DRG

I do not see MS66+ Clad Ike's or MS67+ Clad SBA's becomimg common ever.

I have been searching raw examples of both of these for several years (SBA's for 10yrs) and they simply are not common in these grades.

There is some money to be made searching raw coins and grading the best, but it is not easy money. As the POP's slowly grow on most of the Modern issues the demand seems to outstrip the supply.

I think that once more of the major players realize just how difficult it is to find these TOP POP coins they may actually get the respect they deserve and begin to command even higher prices.

earlwbollinger

Oh I suspect, if you offered them 100 rolls of Kenedy Halves, for example, that they'd cherry pick through them,
and want to buy only the handful they found interesting.
It would be ineteresting to see if they'd want to buy a few "unopened" $1,000 bags of some type of modern coin.
Would they cherry pick or not? That is the question.

RegistryCoin

I remember going through a very large number of Kennedys, when I had a set, (and good eyes). It was not easy, at all. I found (2) ms67s, and felt lucky to have found those. Some coins/dates/MMs/series just don't come nice enough to get large numbers of high grades.

MadMonk

Too scary for me.

cladking

Raw moderns have been good sellers for years now. Buyers do want nice choice original rolls
or coins cherry picked from mint sets but so far as I know there are no buyers who cherry pick
anything and return the lower grades.

While the highest grades may get most of the attention in moderns, there is activity in these
coins all the way down to MS-61 and in a few cases even MS-60's and AU's have a market. It
is the lower grade coins which are supplying the burgeoning markets. In many cases nice choice
original coins like the typical collector wants in his collection are getting tough to find because
there were few ever made and most have long since been lost to circulation.

These markets have been stifled for years by ridiculously low prices quoted in most of the price
guides. This had the effect of curtailing demand since buyers couldn't find the coins at anywhere
close to the quoted prices. Now even The Redbook has somewhat more realistic prices quoted
for some of these. This should help to revitalize these already active markets and to encourage
more dealers to stock the coins to capture some of this market.

It is this process of "filling the pipeline" which is going to drain much of the available supply for
large segments of these emerging markets!

stujoe

<< <i>The implications of this are that they'll have to offer at least ask just to get a few flowing in.
Offering double ask would have a very small effect on the number they recieve. >>



Maybe they can work out a deal with Shop At Home.

tgilliams

i wouldn't put much credence in SPECTRUM'S offer. they are looking for specific coins and if it;'s not on Lee's list, he will not even contact you, was contacted about a yeae and a half ago when I was selling my lincoln collection by one of the principals. he was excited and told me LEE would contact me. I'm still waiting.

the gentleman from SPERCTRUM contacted me about 3 weeks later to see if lee had contacted me. i told him no, a few days later he contacted me and said Lee was not interested in any of the 40 coin PCGS PR69DCAM Linc's. not even the courtesy of an email from Lee, don't put alot of faith in their offer. they only want certain moderns and if it's not on your list. they will ignore you.

cladking

<< <i>

Maybe they can work out a deal with Shop At Home. >>



Shop at Home is one of the largest "consumers" of mint sets but even a thousand of each
date of these can be purchased for less than a half million dollars. Most proof and mint sets
reach the market from estate sales. This supply has been decreasing for years because the
population of old timers who bought these sets has been decreasing. Most of the other sets
are tied up in collections or belong to people who are outside the hobby and don't care what
the sets are worth.

Offerring higher prices simply will not have much effect on the number of sets coming on the
market and the number of sets actually available for sale is not very great.

DHeath

It's pretty interesting that they define modern in the ad as post 1949. It would appear to me (on the surface at least) that a pretty good business could be built around buying raw material for 10% back of bid, submitting the quality material through TT (also a Manning Co) at bulk rate, and selling the remaining lots to the dealer community. If they were able to purchase much at all, the program would more than pull it's own weight. There are certainly several smaller companies doing just that, and they don't have the same relationship with Teletrade. Maybe I'm reading too much into the effort, but I thought it interesting they'd decided to advertise to buy that much raw material.

Catch22

They're getting ready for the release of the California quarter and the demand caused by lots of new collectors. Following on the heels of the Texas issue, this is a lot of new collectors.