Vam books and Price Guides for Morgans / Peace Dollars

Nocerino18

Anyone have any suggestions for books / price guides? Does anyone know where to buy them? Anyone sell them?

Wolf359

Read this thread.

Prices are published quarterly for Top 100 Morgans and Top 50 Peace dollars. Hot 50 Morgans will be added soon as well. You have to join Dr. Fey's Insight's mailing list.

DennisH

Always keep in mind the limitation of Fey's price guide: It only reflects actual sales that he is aware of for coins in specific grades. Also, these sales do not impact the values in higher or lower grades on his list. It is entirely possible for the value guide to show a price for an MS62 that is higher than an MS63, because no MS63s have traded hands for ages. This becomes a problem with VAMs that are VERY rare and/or seldom change hands.

Here's an example: Fey's summer 2004 value guide shows the 1878-CC in MS61 at $160... but the current Grey Sheet Ask price for any old MS60 1878-CC is $185. He still shows $160 for an MS61 VAM 11 because that's the last/highest price he's aware of. See the problem?

Here's another: the 1880-O VAM 6B is regarded as ultra-rare in all grades, with fewer than 10 Mint State examples estimated to exist. These coins seldom change hands in any grade, so I can't even imagine how old the price data points on the current list are. It shows a price of $750 for MS63, which is the finest known... and which is absurdly low beyond any sense of reality I can imagine. Frankly, $2,500 seems like a bargain to me, and $5,000 might not be too much.

There's also the issue of trying to keep up with current VAM prices. Fey's list is issued only a few times per year, but VAM prices are changing virtually every day. Here's an example -- tonight on eBay a PCGS XF40 1903-S Micro-S VAM 2 sold for $1,201. Fey's value guide shows an XF45 value of $650. On January 30 on eBay a PCGS Good-6 example sold for $350. Fey's value guide says $125 for a Fine-15.

Vamsandmore on eBay seems to handle as many VAMs as anyone, along with mwabeep and vamit.