Have I lost the plot?

RobP

Watching tonight's Heritage online sale, I have just seen something that I am struggling to understand. The 1900 and 1901 pennies both made $850 hammer ($977.50 with prem). This is over £600 for what is probably the two commonest dates in the series. Graded 66 & 65 respectively, you could pick up a decent UNC 1901 for £10-15 only 5 or 6 years ago, or even less on eBay. Last year's Spink gave a price of £30 for an unc with full lustre, a number which has not unreasonably doubled in the past few years. I cannot believe that someone would be willing to fork out x10 what you could reasonably expect to pay for a really nice one without a label, or for that matter x20 book. As nice as they might be, I find it difficult to believe that they are $1K nice.

Perhaps someone on that side of the pond can rationalise this behaviour for me.

Thanks.

SaorAlba

Sorry, this Scot canna help you, because I canna understand the aythers.

RobP

And the silliness continues. About £400 for an MS65 1918 1/-. I've got a white coat if anyone can locate the patient(s).

coinkat

I am not sure what to say

OchoReales

This makes my two British Heritage wins from the NYINC auction seem to be complete bargains (1700 Shilling in 66 and 1797 TwoPence in 64BN (PQ)).

JCMhouston

I think the 66 Red is the highest grade for any in the series, and I believe it's a pop 1 coin. I believe what we are seeing is a group of people migrating from US coins, and that looks like a cheap price for a pop 1/0 coin to them, imagine what a pop 1/0 Indian cent would go for.

To be honest it's one of the reasons I branched out to other countries, the best British pieces are starting to catch up with their US counterparts. Coins that even 2-3 years ago were in the $150-250 range are now regularly selling for $350-600. I still pick up some British when the price is within reason, but when they aren't i work on my other sets. Also check out the 2010 SPink if you haven;t already, they discuss the huge increases in prices since 2000 for British coins. Several examples they show are in the range of 400-500% increases.

wybrit

There were lots of crazy prices out there. I can't really understand it. Some of the quality younger head Vicky pieces went at or below market values while some of the commonest material (1881 H farthing, 1900/1901 penny, Jubilee head small silver, Veiled head small silver, GV shillings), went through the roof. Some other silly ones: 1891 3d (NGC MS67) and 6d (NGC MS66) went for $460 for £80 of material and 1887 6d in PCGS MS66 hit $431.25 (£26).

coinkat

I would think one could go to the UK and find several of these dates that would likely grade 66 Red... Not that many have even been submitted in terms of the total red surviving population

JCMhouston

I just checked my records, last year I bought an 1891 ( I lnow it's not a Veiled Head but...) Penny in 66 Red, thought I paid moon money for it, and it was well less than 1/2 of todays prices.

Coinkat, I'm not sure there are really that many 66's still raw over there. I've looked through a bunch of pennies and 1/2d's, and submitted a few over the last two years, still haven't had a 66. The great majority of the red ones I see when I go over are in the 63-64 range, pretty obvious they wouldn't even make 65. Maybe they are scarcer than we think.

wybrit

66RD is going to be very hard to find in UK coinage. Constantly damp weather conditions, industrial age pollution and lousy storage practices (ie, PVC) over there have pretty much seen to that. There are some dates/denoms, though, where 66RD is possible, 1881H and 1882H farthings being two of them. Colin Cooke has a horde of 1882H pieces (actually from Laurie Bamford) which ought to be worth searching. My piece from the Bamford horde (which I did not choose, but bought on ebay) was only 64RD.

wybrit

The one that shocked me the most was the 1901 halfpenny PCGS MS64RD going for $299 (including juice). It's pop 8 with 1 higher in RD and 1 in 65RB. I paid $25.63 to have my example bought and slabbed.

AZLARRY

I was very surprised at the 1901 1 d in 65RD going for $977.50. I bought the same coin on ebay fourteen months ago for $159.00, and I thought I over paid for it.

SaorAlba

Actually the British Isle lot I bid on, well, namely Irish, went for a pittance, nothing BU though, all mid grade rather scarce coins. Three of the pieces I really want, one of them dearly so, the others will probably BST.

JCMhouston

coinkat

I am almost tempted to start a poll-

If you had 977.50 to spend, what would you buy?

a. 1900 MS66 RED 1900 1d

b. 1928 Wreath Crown MS65

wybrit

I would never buy a 1900 or 1901 1d for more than $75 in a slab. I'd spend that money (and a lot more) to buy an 1854 6d.

SwK

there does not seem to be logic, this usualy ends in "tears". there is another way to look at everything in a general view that 20 years ago many english coins were in reality cheap compared even todays prices. I never bought the dates in question but in 1980 i paid 400gbp for an 1864 1d upper seriff and 500 gbp for the crosslet. These were not BU they were just GEF british standard, I still have them, I never found better. Would u pay 8'000 and 10'000 for these two coins, I doubt it? tell me what u would pay, infact who has a choice speciman. The 1869 1d turned up but not the 1864?

what do u think?

br