Danged good 92-S $5 Lib counterfeit.

DHeath

I put these pics up a few months ago when I bought this coin, and revisiting it would be useful. There was a thread the other day discussing counterfeit gold. A dealer local to me bought this and quite a few other gold coins from the same source. All weigh correctly, all are gold, all are struck coins, and all have very natural toning and color. All are fakes. NGC bagged this one for me, and a few others from the batch were bagged by various services. My dealer immediately repurchased the coin from me, but I felt really bad for him, as the seller was a walk-in customer. I'm not a committed Lib collector, so I have little knowledge of die markers, but I'd imagine that's what caught this one. I thought it quite credible.

coinbuf

Hmm is the mintmark too strong and thus added?

Chris

darktone

The seller might have not known they were bad either. Don, can you get some bigger pictures?

MSherman

I think the coin has more problems than the mintmark. Adding an "S" does very little for the value of this coin. (An "O" would be a different story.) After over 30 years in the business, I've generally found that the people who REALLY know bad gold, know if from two feet away. It's the color, and the overall "look." If they pick up a glass, they might be able to tell you. If they tell you from a distance, count on it.

Russ

This is why I would never buy raw gold. I'd be dead meat and easy pickin's.

Russ, NCNE

darktone

I know what you mean Mike abou spotting certain fakes from several feet away just from the color/luster. mike

goose3

<< <i>This is why I would never buy raw gold. I'd be dead meat and easy pickin's.

Russ, NCNE >>




I hear you!

sure looks good.

LanLord

A 92s is not all that much more valuable than a 92p, why go to the effort to add and s rather than an o?

Was the coin a real coin, just added mintmark, or a fake coin all together?

rhedden

You might find this story amusing. In my old home town, a college student brought some coins to the local coin shop for sale, including an 1862-S quarter eagle in AU (roughly $10,000 coin at the time). The dealers in the shop and the regular customers (including myself) all thought it was real, so we sent it to ANACS. They bagged it as "struck copy." I had looked at the coin for about an hour and I couldn't see anything suspicious about it. When the original owner of the coin came in the shop a few days later, he confided that he bought it at a flea market for $35! Well, we all had a good laugh and learned something valuable about raw gold.

fcloud

I guess I was lucky back in the mid to late 70's I picked up a few gold coins at reasonable prices (gold was pretty cheap then). I sold most and held a few. The one I did send in to pcgs came back as MS62.

I know I couldn't tell a fake from the real thing, and I doubt if I could tell fake from real after looking at that photo. I guess if I ever buy any gold, it will be certified already.

DHeath

Mr.Sherman has it right. There's more wrong than the MM. It's a struck counterfeit. When it came home, we compared it to several holdered coins, and it's VERY good. The color isn't bad to my untrained eye, perhaps because of the toning. For me, it was an inexpensive lesson. I reminded me of what I didn't know.