Will the new So-Called Dollars book lead to a boom in modern medals as well?

291fifth

I'm guessing that the release of the new So-Called Dollars book will lead to a boom not only in So-Called Dollars but also in the later medals I refer to as modern medals.

Your thoughts?

Hyperion

why would the release of a reference book cause a boom in a segment ? I think this book would be of reference value to collectors only.
MHO

tmot99

It can generate more interest in the segment. Especially when the only previous reference is 40 years old.

I'm not sure it will generate interest in modern medals, but it may. There are lots of them. I think the exonumia market in general has been starting to go crazy. That's one reason why I've been trying to find out why PCGS just brushes off the question of grading SCDs, medals, and tokens. Just watch some of the prices on ebay for SCDs.

Shamika

I often suspect the reason why a particular series isn't so collectable is due to the lack of a reference guide. An updated edition may not lead to a "boom", but it certainly should lead to an increase in interest.

PerryHall

When the Breen-Gillio book on California fractional gold coins was updated and released a couple of years ago, the price of California fractionals went way up. The original book had been out of print for over 20 years and was very difficult to find. Used copies of this paperback book were selling for as much as $200 when you could find one. I'm sure the same will happen with the SCD's. Whenever a new reference book comes out, there seems to be an upsurge in interest in that series as a result of new information being available.

MrEureka

A true visionary would be buying current US Mint medals from the US Mint, waiting for the grading game to catch on in the same way it happened in the modern coin market. I'll bet some of the medal mintages are tiny.

NumisOxide

<< <i>I often suspect the reason why a particular series isn't so collectable is due to the lack of a reference guide. An updated edition may not lead to a "boom", but it certainly should lead to an increase in interest. >>


I agree.

carl

I predict this will end similar to the fantastic Bicentennial Quarters.

RichieURich

<< <i>I often suspect the reason why a particular series isn't so collectable is due to the lack of a reference guide. An updated edition may not lead to a "boom", but it certainly should lead to an increase in interest. >>




<< <i>Whenever a new reference book comes out, there seems to be an upsurge in interest in that series as a result of new information being available. >>



I agree with Shamika and Perry Hall.

cladking

I don't see much effect on modern medals and think it's unlikely medals will ever be collected by grade.

People collect modern coins in high grade because they are almost impossible to find. They were poorly
made and then went straight into circulation. Very few of most of these were saved and it is the propen-
sity for them to circulate which makes them interesting in unc. The few that were saved are so poorly
made that this drives collectors to seek nicer ones. Yes, this has spread to include other coins but it hard-
ly started in moderns. It was Morgans where people first became so quality conscious.

Historically a large percentage of medals pick up little or no wear and collectors hardly differentiate between
them. Certainly this could change if millions of people started collecting medals but this seems highly impro-
bable since few medals had mintages of this scope.

Modern medals will do fine in the long run for the same reasons the coins will; they are often scarcer AND
have higher attrition than the older ones. They can be just as "historic" unless you define the term only
by age. If "historic" only means age to you then you should be collecting ancients anyway.

Part of the reason that modern medals have done poorly is that there is a huge diversity of them. Instead
of a few hundred different issues per year it got up to a few thousand. There are relatively few cataloging
attempts and most of these are very specialized such as Cotes' work with municipal trade currency. In time
there will be more listed in a wider array of sources and this will create the specific demand which is required
to make anything go up in price. People won't bid up a modern medal if they don't have a "spot" in their col-
lection for it. Once it gets listed then people go out looking and have to compete with others for it. Then ev-
eryone will know that low mintage plus high attrition means that demand can push prices far higher.