Home World & Ancient Coins Forum

World Coin/Ancient category growth at Heritage

Article link

"A tremendous year was also had by Heritage’s World & Ancient Coins category, which grew its 2013 total auction sales of $36.9 million by 65% to more than $61 million, the most significant growth seen in any category of the company for the year.

“The popularity of World & Ancient Coins has skyrocketed in the last few years,” said Ivy. “Between the global reach of Heritage’s Internet platform and the use of reliable third-party grading you have a formula for tremendous expansion, which is exactly what we saw.”

Comments

  • they are certainly giving NGC ancients a lot of business lately, I see I entered ancients right where we transition into needing every $30 constantine bronze follis in plastic
    =Recipient of the coveted "You Suck" award 4/28/2014=
  • MrEurekaMrEureka Posts: 23,892 ✭✭✭✭✭
    It's a big world, and it's filled with coins. $61 million seems like barely a start.
    Andy Lustig

    Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.

    Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
  • nicholasz219nicholasz219 Posts: 1,386 ✭✭✭
    You know, I really like Heritage's presentation, the want lists, the ease of use and the overall website. Unfortunately, when you collect on the lower end of price points for ancients or world, you have to be more resourceful and discriminating with each dollar since there are more limited dollars available for collecting. It seems that everyone on the forum here does try to work smart and spend wisely, so understand that I do not think that because any one person may have more disposable income than me that they dispose of it indiscriminately. What I am saying is that there are plenty of coins on Heritage that could fit into my monthly budget for collecting. They start cheaply enough, are on the more common side of the rarity scale and are definitely of a nice quality. The problem is the fees, not to mention the shipping. Since I have to pay shipping on most of my purchases, I will not even consider that into my comments any further.

    But if you have to pay 12-17% in buyer fees, even on a $20 or $40 purchase, those add up and feel like a tremendous waste of money when you are collecting Constantine copper (to use NiceCurrency's premonition). Ebay and some very great dealers on VCoins and on personal business sites really fill the void for collectors like me. I've been working to develop more personal and extensive relationships with some dealers over the past year and I feel that I have made some good business friendships along the way. I lay out my realistic goals and budget and so far everyone has been happy to work with me. My repeat ebay sellers are in the same vein because I buy maybe only $20 of items a month from them maybe, but I do it every month. And frankly, inventory sitting in inventory does no one any good, so knowing you have a buyer for all price points of your business makes good business sense.

    I can not claim to know all of the particulars of the auction house business model, basically speaking. What I am thinking though is that if Heritage really wanted to grow their market and future long term buyers, it might behoove them to explore different aspects of growing their business base. Something like a $15-20 a month fee for members who spend under x amount of dollars per year (to stop folks from registering a thrift account to make a large purchase and waive percentage point based fees and therefore make out like a bandit) might bring folks like me who like and want to use Heritage to buy coins but just can't make the math work.
  • NapNap Posts: 1,702 ✭✭✭✭✭


    << <i>“The popularity of World & Ancient Coins has skyrocketed in the last few years,” said Ivy. “Between the global reach of Heritage’s Internet platform and the use of reliable third-party grading you have a formula for tremendous expansion, which is exactly what we saw.” >>



    How much of this is Heritage's international presence vs increasing popularity of world and ancient coins amongst American collectors?

    I suspect more the latter, given the explosion of slabbing among these coins, something that American collectors, rather than international collectors, are demanding.

    Another question, does NGC (or PCGS) provide a guarantee authenticity with their slabbing? I thought not but perhaps this has changed?
  • ZoharZohar Posts: 6,629 ✭✭✭✭✭
    These are good points. I find auctions being helpful to access a broader selection of better quality. More commonly available coins tend to flow through dealers, yet knowing some of the coins listed on the recent auctions, they came from dealer inventories which I assume exhausted their efforts to sell on their own. I also saw less higher quality material on the NYINC floor when compared with auctions. Better access for buyers better liquidity for seller.

    Regarding fees, I view these as part of the price. Hammer plus fees are what you pay.


    Lastly, as much as there is pushback to slabbing, it's a way to facilitate global sales and credibility of a sort. I can not buy based on European Auction house descriptions as they dismiss problems with coins that grading services would flag. It's another opinion. I personally don't need to touch the coin to enjoy it, yet do care about authenticity and issues. As Andy noted, coins are out there and auction/grading will only expand their reach which educated the collector and expands options. It does add competition yet doesn't the Internet do this for pretty much everything?

  • 7Jaguars7Jaguars Posts: 7,228 ✭✭✭✭✭
    Z is quite right, interestingly I have noticed this even with the odd Spink bit. I do think that even if 60+ mill is a "drop in the bucket" that is more the RATE of growth that is important and IMO reflects growth in interest of World coins of higher quality.
    Love that Milled British (1830-1960)
    Well, just Love coins, period.
  • nicholasz219nicholasz219 Posts: 1,386 ✭✭✭
    Well Z and 7 I agree with you both that auctions typically are offering a better quality of material in a place where more people congregate looking for the same sorts of items. Individual dealer stocks are fine but in terms of reaching mass numbers of people, they do miss the mark. I am speaking from the perspective of a collector who would like to participate in the auctions but also as one that has no great rarities that I am currently seeking which would drive me to do more buying via auction. I do think that slabbing, while unromantic and industrial in a sense, improves liquidity like Z said. I don't know if increased liquidity for people thinking of coins solely as an investment vehicle is good at all, but in order to facilitate trade, having standard metrics for folks to rely upon when possibly the seller is unknown to them may facilitate easier and a larger volume of trade.
  • EVillageProwlerEVillageProwler Posts: 5,859 ✭✭✭✭✭
    A word of caution about relying overly much on the slab for many types of world coins...

    The US TPG's have woefully little knowledge about too many areas of world coinage. Greek, Roman and those that intersected heavily with the Greek and Roman worlds may be fine with NGC, but I've seen them (NGC, PCGS as well as others) seem like too much of an exercise in humor than anything else. I say this not just about areas like early Islamic or pre-Islamic Central Asian, but also more main stream areas like British (Anglo-Saxon and later) and Italian States.

    Using the US TPG's as a means of liquidity makes sense, but don't lose sight of their imperfections.

    EVP

    How does one get a hater to stop hating?

    I can be reached at evillageprowler@gmail.com

Sign In or Register to comment.