An Emphasis on Old Holders?

Catbert

For those who collect coins in slabs, do you see a trend to collect those coins in old holders due to perceived gradeflation by the TPGs?

If you are one of these collectors, how much of a premium (on top of what you think the market value is if regraded) are you willing to pay for the surrounding plastic?

I see that CRO as decided to emphasize this of late, perhaps since they want to add to their premium cachet:

"You may have also noticed that we’ve ramped up our old-holdered US coin inventory in recent months. How come? Several reasons:

We like choice, original coins in old holders. A lot. In fact, we would collect them ourselves if we were collecting.

We are less enthusiastic about coins that have just been regraded or upgraded (sometimes multiple times). We prefer coins that have some upside potential over those which are maxed out.

If we buy a coin in a 20+ year old slab, we can be confident that it is stable and will continue looking exactly as it does now for years to come. Less true for coins in new slabs, unfortunately.
For the avoidance of confusion, and before we get 823 emails on the topic, we acknowledge that there are also terrible coins in old holders. We don’t buy those. We recommend that you don’t either."

coinraritiesonline.com/index.php?page=mkt&id=331

What say you?

EXOJUNKIE

All good reasons, but FWIW this is probably the most important reason for me:

"If we buy a coin in a 20+ year old slab, we can be confident that it is stable and will continue looking exactly as it does now for years to come. Less true for coins in new slabs, unfortunately."

messydesk

Aye. Stability is the #1 reason to feel good about buying an attractive coin in an old holder.

It's a pity that the TPGs haven't figured out a way to reholder a coin while providing assurance to the next buyer that it is a reholder of a coin that was graded some number of years earlier. Some nice coins are trapped in ugly and/or banged-up holders for this reason.

ricko

My cynical side says they are seeking them for upgrade and profit..... Cheers, RickO

Kove

As someone who built a 144-piece silver commem set 100% in PCGS rattler holders, 90%+ CAC'd with plenty of gold stickers, I must say I completely agree with their focus.

I approach many newly-graded coins with a suspicion that they are maxed out, until I'm convinced otherwise.

Walkerfan

Although there is some dreck in old slabs and one must certainly be careful, there is still a lot of good material out there to be found, as well. I also like the nostalgia, looks & stability, too. I have fun finding them on my own, though, rather than paying a company a big premium for them.

steveben

if the coin is nice, i prefer an old holder. just because the holder is old, does not mean i am a buyer.

Numiven

I am putting together a morgan date set of OGH only... most ogh morgans are undergraded compared to today's standards.

CoinPhysicist

The only reason that I think I would like an older slab if possible is that it means the coin hasn't been through the re-submission game 20 times. Now that doesn't mean it's a choice coin for the grade necessarily or a coin worthy of upgrade or anything, maybe that's why it hasn't. But at least I can know the game [edit: Crackout game] hasn't been played with it yet.

TommyType

I think it's instructive to realize that the term "OGH" is so well known! A LOT of sellers and auction houses take the time to put that in the description.

But in the end, the coin has to do it's own talking. I've seen, and own, some really nice OGH coins. I've also seen some that I didn't bother to look at a second time.....

Broadstruck

Over the course of the last few years I have gotten to the point that I rarely even bother taking a closer look at coins if I see prongs. I will check out pronged exonumia though.

roadrunner

@TommyType said:
I think it's instructive to realize that the term "OGH" is so well known! A LOT of sellers and auction houses take the time to put that in the description.

But in the end, the coin has to do it's own talking. I've seen, and own, some really nice OGH coins. I've also seen some that I didn't bother to look at a second time.....

The difference being "picked through" OGH's and old fatties (ie bourse floor, auction, and dealer retreads) and those that are 19-30 years off the market. The difference in quality between those 2 groups is significant. I've yet to see a fresh group of old holdered coins that I wasn't impressed with on how they compare to today's standards.

Stuart

@Numiven Your following quoted post is not necessarily true for PCGS PL & Especially DMPL designated Morgan Dollars, for which Grading standards have become more stringent, possibly in reaction to significantly increased PL/DMPL market values over standard MS examples.

Seems to me that as specific coin Grade & Designation Market values significantly increase (i.e. “Jump Grades”), grading standards react by becoming tighter & more discriminating further segmenting that specific portion of the market.

That is likely also exacerbated by TPGS Commercial Risk assessment in compliance with TPGS Grading Guarantees.

@Numiven said:
I am putting together a morgan date set of OGH only... most ogh morgans are undergraded compared to today's standards.

shorecoll

Stability is #1. If you see one in a dealer case it's likely a dog. If you see a batch that looks they came from a long time off-the-market collection, my heart goes pitter-patter.

10000lakes

Don't shoot the messenger, I will just give you my own experience and you can form your own opinion

I sold 39 Morgans last November (valued between $200 and $1800 each).

17 were in older holders and 22 in new holders that I had sent in for grading or re-grading

7 of the older holders got a CAC bean
10 of the newer holders got a CAC bean

Of the 17 older holders, I found 4 that were later upgraded by a + or full point.
The 4 upgrades were all CAC in the older holder.
Only the + upgrades were still CAC after they upgraded.

Of the 22 newer holders, I found 6 that were later upgraded
and 1 in the same grade (newer cert#)

None of the 6 that upgraded were CAC after the upgrade,
including the one that went up only by a +
The 1 that stayed the same was non CAC both times at the same grade.

Out of the total of 10 coins that upgraded (new cert# assigned)
5 of the old cert# were still valid at PCGS and CAC websites.
So they must of been crackouts without old cert being returned.

All 17 coins that originally got a CAC bean are still showing as CAC on their website,
even though I can see that 10 of them have shown up with a newer cert#

Dave99B

I love the older holders (especially for copper). Not because of grade inflation, but more for insuring (to some degree) the coin is stable. It's scary out there....so many doctors out there doing their thing.

Dave

WildIdea

I prefer my coins in holders that are pre prong. Something about the nostalgia of the early holders or the collecting history that I like. I figure, so what if they will upgrade a point, once this old holder us gone it's gone forever. I'm thinking people will appreciate that more someday than the numerical grade and pay accordingly wether it's upgraded by me or not at time of sale.

Stuart

@WildIdea You have just summarized the essence of a true long-term Collector who Enjoys their Numismatic Pastime as a Hobby, vs a Dealer, Crackout Artist or Flipper more focused on short-term Business commercial profit.

Nothing wrong with either, just different priorities, goals & objectives that are sometimes aligned and other times aren’t.

@WildIdea said:
I prefer my coins in holders that are pre prong. Something about the nostalgia of the early holders or the collecting history that I like. I figure, so what if they will upgrade a point, once this old holder us gone it's gone forever. I'm thinking people will appreciate that more someday than the numerical grade and pay accordingly wether it's upgraded by me or not at time of sale.

Unknown

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TomB

CRO is great, but there are two points written about in this thread that might be more folktale than fact.

The first is that simply because a coin is in an OGH it might mean that it has not gone through the regrade process. In the last few years PCGS has instituted the Reconsideration tier and folks can send OGH coins in over and over and over again with the requirement that the coin upgrade by at least a full-point in order to be rectified in a new holder. While this process likely does not affect lower value coins, you better believe that higher value OGH coins have seen the inside of the PCGS facility with some frequency in the recent years.

Secondly, lots of folks write about stability with OGH coins. However, all one is seeing from an OGH coin is how it looks today and not how it has looked over the years. Of course, if there are photos from auctions over time then one may compare these to confirm stability. In other words, just because a coin looks like it does today, does not mean it will look like this tomorrow. Also, I would suggest that an RD copper in OGH is far more likely to be stable than a similar coin in a new holder.

oih82w8

I don't know how much weight that coinsociety.com has, but they have quite a bit of historical prices from ebay and use OGH as a separate category along with CAC, + (PCGS), star (NGC) and combinations of the these.