PCGS – Do they know, what they are doing?

Udo · February 9, 2005 4:10AM

Yesterday my two purchases from HWCA arrived here in Germany. I`d like to show you one of the coins.

2 Mark Württemberg 1892 – King Willhelm II. – hard to find in this condition.

It was graded and encapsuled by PCGS and it is also hard to get a good photo of the coin in that plastic tomb. But see yourself:

What do you think, what grade did the give the coin?

Darkhorse · February 9, 2005 4:19AM

The fields look clean, I see no rim nicks. There may be a scratch along the eagle's right talon. To be conservative I'd might wager MS64.

XpipedreamR · February 9, 2005 4:27AM

AU63?

MacCrimmon · February 9, 2005 4:30AM

Are there some hairlines on the neck and in the field in front of the face? Or, are they just on the plastic?

If hairlines, then no more than an MS62, maybe MS63. No hairlines; then MS64.

It looks to have nice lustre......very nice images, BTW.

akdrv · February 9, 2005 4:39AM

MS65? Great images!

MSD61 · February 9, 2005 4:40AM

MS64

syraq · February 9, 2005 5:05AM

MS63. Is that a scratch below the letters (DEUTS) "CHES"?

traderdave · February 9, 2005 5:33AM

MS-65

MadMarty · February 9, 2005 5:38AM

AU58

Udo · February 9, 2005 5:39AM

Thanks to all for your comments.

<< <i>The fields look clean, I see no rim nicks. There may be a scratch along the eagle's right talon. To be conservative I'd might wager MS64. >>

<< <i>MS63. Is that a scratch below the letters (DEUTS) "CHES"? >>

In fact this is a little die scratch.

After I changed the lightning a bit, I took the next photo of the obverse and some bad "details" appeared then!

mrfred · February 9, 2005 5:43AM

I'll say MS-63.

ajaan · February 9, 2005 6:25AM

MS63 IMO. I think PCGS probably gave it MS65.

Udo · February 9, 2005 6:44AM

I will post the answer tomorrow, and maybe some of you can help me then to understand US-Grading.

For me it is time to go to bed now

danglen · February 9, 2005 7:45AM

Looks like some toned over cleaning in the right field. Could be a BodyBag

.

wybrit · February 9, 2005 8:30AM

I agree with Dan - BB

Nice coin nonetheless.

Aethelred · February 9, 2005 8:33AM

Sometimes the lighting you use can make the coin look worse than it does in hand. Given that I am going to say that PCGS either bodybagged this one or graded it MS-61.

Darkhorse · February 9, 2005 8:33AM

Well, I don't think it's bodybagged given that he stated it's slabbed by PCGS. The colour is natural and I don't think a few hairlines - which are fairly common in 19th Century German coins - would warrant a bodybag.

coinkat · February 9, 2005 9:43AM

A tough date but the lighting and the photography issues make offering an opinion all the more challenging. While I concede it is possible, I doubt that it was a BB. Based on the second picture, I do not see a grade higher than MS62.

XpipedreamR · February 10, 2005 4:52AM

OK...you can tell us now

Udo · February 10, 2005 9:00AM

I usually don’t like slabs and I have not much of them, there are 11 pieces in my collection, if I am correct.
Most coins I bought from ebay were trash, more or less. But I made good experiences with that plastic holders, the coins graded by a third party were quality coins.

But this one is confusing me! Today I examined it several times during the day, we had cloudy weather, the obverse fields looked OK to the naked eye. But under sunlight or using a good light bulb, these hairlines on the obverse are visible to the naked eye.

Well, as wybrit said, nonetheless a nice coin with good cartwheel-luster.

IMHO this coin was cleaned. Sombody cleaned the obverse and left that hairlines on it, he worked carfully and the hairlines are only visible to the naked with good light or using a magnifying glass.

I am not that familar with US-Grading, but my understanding is that Grading Services are able to determine if a coin was cleaned and will not slab it if so.

PCGS must have seen and determined the hairlines, but it is not a bodybag.

lordmarcovan · February 11, 2005 5:47AM

That is exactly the grade I had in my head.

Really. Like Aethelred, I leaned a little toward MS61 for a moment, and wondered if they had bodybagged it, but I eventually decided to go with my first impression, which was MS62.

They graded it exactly as I would have.

Nice lookin' coin!

<< <i>I am not that familar with US-Grading, but my understanding is that Grading Services are able to determine if a coin was cleaned and will not slab it if so. >>

PCGS will grade cleaned coins, as will most of the other services. They are candid about this in their Grading and Counterfeit detection guide. It is a matter of degrees. A coin that has been carefully "conserved" is a different matter than a coin that has been harshly cleaned. However, a cleaning must be very subtle and carefully done for them to grade the coin.

ccrdragon · February 11, 2005 6:36AM

Also (on the cleaning aspect), the older a coin is, the more likely it is to have been cleaned and the more likely that PCGS will slab the coin. This holds true for both gold and silver coins, but not for copper - PCGS has a copper guarantee and most ways of cleaning copper will make the coin turn wierd colors sooner or later - so PCGS is very very very very very very tight on copper.

PCGS also seems to include the fact that if a particular type of coin is cleaned more often than not then they will slab it as long as the cleaning is not too harsh.

coinkat · February 11, 2005 11:23AM

I do not think 62 is unreasonable. Was the coin dipped at one time? That is possible... Was the light hairlines due to a cleaning? That is possible but not likely. The light hairlines in a few areas were probably due to mishandling at some point. Overall, considering how tough the early 2Mark coins are in this state of preservation, it is decent example.

wybrit · February 11, 2005 1:49PM

Well, I have to admit that I was faked out. When I saw the hairlines from the second set of shots, I really thought it would have been BB'ed - and it could well have been if given another submission.

The coloration in the lettering and in the hard-to-get-at places on the portrait is usually a sign that the toning on the coin was gently etched off.

All said and done, it is a very nice coin - and a wonderfully taken set of pictures as well!

PuddlePirate · February 11, 2005 3:25PM

I'm unfamilar with those coins - I thought it looked like it was cleaned at sometime. Thinking ANACS (I have used them for years and only just started using PCGS) I thought a net grade MS61.

Udo · February 12, 2005 3:45AM

Many thanks, again I`ve learned a bit about US-Grading.

After all, I am very happy with my purchase, I never saw a better 1892 of this type before, it is a really nice coin.

I am also very glad about you like my photos.

Askari · February 13, 2005 12:44PM

I is indeed a very nice example, Udo -- and it's sad someone felt the need to polish it up a little. Still, it's a worthy addition and very well-struck-up. My guess with the first pic was that it wouldn't grade more than MS-63 and that given that they usually weight the obverse more heavily than the reverse. Given the hairlines, I think it did well with an MS-62.

Now how about a little "reverse education" -- how would Germans grade it?

Udo · February 14, 2005 1:16PM

<< <i>I is indeed a very nice example, Udo

Now how about a little "reverse education" -- how would Germans grade it?

>>

Thanks Askari, I would grade it "vorzüglich/stempelglanz" and with cautious optimism maybe "fast stempelglanz." In both cases with the addition "minimal berieben."

Due to the fact, that grading is always an opinion, me and some collecting friends have had several discussions on this theme. Finally we arranged an expert to give us a few lessons in grading. About 30 collectors from Germany and Switzerland will meet in two weeks and we hope to learn and learn and again to learn about grading.

Maybe I will change my opinion on this coin after that lessons, maybe not. But for sure, I am going to show this coin to the expert and ask him, how he will grade it.

Askari · February 14, 2005 1:31PM

I hope you will share what you learn with us. German grading standards seem to be changing a bit in recent years, mainly in the higher circulated grades. One dealer's vz.-st. is another's f.st., some use f.st. and prfr. interchangeably, and so on -- and then trying to relate them back to US grades just exacerbates the challenge.

MacCrimmon · February 14, 2005 2:54PM

I concur with Udo's German grade assessment in that an auction house such as UBS would tend to list it as VZ-STGL, whereas a majority of fair dealers would come down between there and fast Stgl. As to STGL, many dealers will call it just that and the 'incremental' grade by PCGS will run between MS64 to MS67 about 95% of the time.

So, the old adage of buy the coin is quite true with these Germanic coinages, at least those from the 1850 - 1940s period. I don't buy to many Kanton issues, so that's a bit harder to gauge.

Udo · February 15, 2005 12:34PM

It is always the same

Making cash, cash, and more CASH is what counts for some dealers. So why not sell a vz-st coin as a f.st, or even stgl. in the hope that the customer is not familar with Grading.
You would not believe, what some dealers tried to sell to me as Stgl. on coinshows.

Selbstverständlich

I will share my knowledge after that lessons.

Udo · March 24, 2005 11:07AM

Hmmm... Sometimes they miss

Linky

SYRACUSIAN · March 24, 2005 11:11AM

Heh. This is probably worth more now,( to slab collectors)due to the mistake, because the coin is certainly not rare.

cacheman · March 25, 2005 12:55AM

" That is exactly the grade I had in my head.

Really. Like Aethelred, I leaned a little toward MS61 for a moment, and wondered if they had bodybagged it, but I eventually decided to go with my first impression, which was MS62.

They graded it exactly as I would have."

I always wait for LM's "after-the-fact" grading opinions....heh

cosmicdebris · March 25, 2005 1:02AM

MS62 here too. Nice pictures.

Gallienus · April 8, 2005 9:11AM

This coin's at least an MS-64. Not looking too carefully, I'd say the reverse is even better (although that doesn't govern). I really don't care too much about slabs: this one does seem to be a nice coin though. If you told me MS-65 I wouldn't complain too much unless you tried to charge me a 65 price on something I really wanted.

Opps, didn't notice it was a 2 marks & not a 5 marks. I'd be a bit tougher on the smaller denom & say a 64 without too much likelyhood of a 65 grade. Still a very nice coin though. Also I don't collect/ know about German

PCGS – Do they know, what they are doing?

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