What percentage of coins sent to CAC get stickers?

BIGAL2749

Sent in the 3rd or 4th string coins (119) and did expect fewer stickers but was somewhat surprised with the difference between gold and non-gold. Many of the gold were 20 TI + TII Libs purchased in the mid 90s.

42 stickers / 119 (25 NGC , 94 PCGS) = 35%
non gold of 65pcs got 17 green stickers 26%
Gold 54 pcs (20 NGC got 13, 65% and 34 PCGS received 12, 35% green) for total 25 green 46%

Of the 54 gold coins total 25/54= 46%

13/20 NGC stickered 65%
12/34 PCGS " 35%

Non gold 65 (generally 19th cent type) 17/65= 26%

4/5 NGC got a green sticker, 80%
13/60 (10 were 79-S Morgans in 65 that did not sticker) PCGS 22%

I'm still pleased since the successes were the more expensive early TI + II $20 Lib ending with 1875-CC in 61

It's been years that I shy away from anything other than PCGS slabs
but in the early 90s NGC had a better reputation on gold, But then it was JA at the wheel at NGC.

I don't know what the success rate is at CAC but I admit I was selective and didn't send in the long shots except a number of the high end that had a poor chance, but I prayed.

oih82w8

Somewhere between 0 and 99%. I have not heard of anyone getting 100% on a submission...when dealing with quantities greater than a couple. It all depends on the quality of coins submitted. One thing that I have heard of...don't send in several of the same type in an order...they begin to compete against one another.

I do not send in anything that I don't think has a better than average shot at getting beaned...and some are just head-scratcher as to why it was not beaned.

10000lakes

I have been selling off some Morgan dollars the last few years.
All were submitted to CAC as part of the auction process.

Results were:
11 out of 27 41%
21 out of 41 51%
17 out of 39 44%
14 out of 32 44%

None received the gold bean.

TomB

I seem to recall numbers slightly less than 50% success rate for CAC evaluation have been floated around as either official or semi-official.

Justacommeman

And it vastly depends on series

M

FranklinHalfAddict

@oih82w8 said:
Somewhere between 0 and 99%. I have not heard of anyone getting 100% on a submission...when dealing with quantities greater than a couple. It all depends on the quality of coins submitted. One thing that I have heard of...don't send in several of the same type in an order...they begin to compete against one another.

I do not send in anything that I don't think has a better than average shot at getting beaned...and some are just head-scratcher as to why it was not beaned.

I realize this is a very small quantity, but still more that a "couple" technically.
I went 5/5 recently.

logger7

40 average.

Last one I got 60%; previous one was disappointing with under their average. If you can get the cac stickers where they are tougher on real money grades, you are doing well.

steveben

@BIGAL2749 said:

I'm still pleased since the successes were the more expensive early TI + II $20 Lib ending with 1875-CC in 61

nice! you have an eye for gold, from what i can tell in the photos you have posted. so, i am not too surprised.

panexpoguy

It is hard to say overall. Success can vary depending on the sender. People say gold is very hard and dimes are pretty easy. My personal rates vary widely. 60% on Franklins, 50% on Morgans, 50 % on gold, 0% on Peace dollars, 50% on Buffs, and about 70% on dimes. Here is a recent submission:

I did not expect the gold dollar to CAC, but the rest were worth submission in my view.

roadrunner

@Justacommeman said:
And it vastly depends on series

M

And the grade as well. Much easier to sticker an XF/AU gold coin with limited downside than a MS 64/65/66.

If you're submitting random MS65 Saints your sticker rate could be as low as 2-6 coins per 100.

roadrunner

If the goal is to shoot for a 100% sticker rate (not my goal) than surely one could be as fussy as humanly possible and only buy the "safest" of coins that are essentially no brainers. If your goal is to buy "worthwhile coins with decent eye appeal, your sticker rate might only be in the normal ranges of 25-75%. I would agree with 35-55% being what most seasoned collectors would get if they had never known about CAC and were submitting for the first time. Collectors like Stuart are way outside that bell curve.

Fwiw, when the Dick Osburn collection of seated halves was auctioned back in 2011 (approx 155 coins with a 55/45 NGC/PCGS split)....only 3% of the NGC coins stickered and 38% of PCGS. When Newman and Gardner were auctioned....they stickered at approx a 55-65% rate. Clearly, neither of them ever considered "stickering" as a personal goal. Then again, they didn't have any say in how PCGS/NGC graded their coins either, which is the starting point in whether it's easy or hard to get a sticker. If you send in all your coins on a day when the graders were very brutal....you could end up with a near 100% sticker rate....not that I would prefer that method.

TwoSides2aCoin

Zero % for me, so far ( never used 'em) However; PCGS has graded 99% of the coins I've submitted. About 5 percent got no grade at all.

ShadyDave

@panexpoguy said:
It is hard to say overall. Success can vary depending on the sender. People say gold is very hard and dimes are pretty easy. My personal rates vary widely. 60% on Franklins, 50% on Morgans, 50 % on gold, 0% on Peace dollars, 50% on Buffs, and about 70% on dimes. Here is a recent submission:

I did not expect the gold dollar to CAC, but the rest were worth submission in my view.

I have similar experience to you. Merc dimes I get gold stickers pretty much each submission, the last time I submitted dimes I did very well. Morgan's I do well but I have never received a gold sticker. Gold Is in the 30% range for me but I'm learning quickly. I knew a Morgan I had was a definite upgrade (78-CC w/ green sticker) so I cracked it and it went to a 64 at PCGS...

Now show some pics of those mercs!

panexpoguy

@ShadyDave said:

@panexpoguy said:
It is hard to say overall. Success can vary depending on the sender. People say gold is very hard and dimes are pretty easy. My personal rates vary widely. 60% on Franklins, 50% on Morgans, 50 % on gold, 0% on Peace dollars, 50% on Buffs, and about 70% on dimes. Here is a recent submission:

I did not expect the gold dollar to CAC, but the rest were worth submission in my view.

I have similar experience to you. Merc dimes I get gold stickers pretty much each submission, the last time I submitted dimes I did very well. Morgan's I do well but I have never received a gold sticker. Gold Is in the 30% range for me but I'm learning quickly. I knew a Morgan I had was a definite upgrade (78-CC w/ green sticker) so I cracked it and it went to a 64 at PCGS...

Now show some pics of those mercs!

I actually have several of these Mercs in with BlueCC for some images. I have not imaged any of my stickered NGC Mercs. They go in the next batch. I will post pics when the arrive. Show me some of yours if you have pics. I love a good Merc.

Wabbit2313

I went 11 on my last 20, all newly graded coins except for 3 of them. No gradeflation at all.

To add insult to myself, not long ago I sent 20 old holders of various coins in, and went 4 for 20!

panexpoguy

@Wabbit2313 said:
I went 11 on my last 20, all newly graded coins except for 3 of them. No gradeflation at all.

To add insult to myself, not long ago I sent 20 old holders of various coins in, and went 4 for 20!

Wow. You have a good eye too, that is crazy!

BIGAL2749

@panexpoguy said:
It is hard to say overall. Success can vary depending on the sender. People say gold is very hard and dimes are pretty easy. My personal rates vary widely. 60% on Franklins, 50% on Morgans, 50 % on gold, 0% on Peace dollars, 50% on Buffs, and about 70% on dimes. Here is a recent submission:

I did not expect the gold dollar to CAC, but the rest were worth submission in my view.

Quite impressive on superlative grades in the first place.
Don't know if I could tell a 66 from a 67

cameonut2011

@TomB said:
I seem to recall numbers slightly less than 50% success rate for CAC evaluation have been floated around as either official or semi-official.

When first asked, I think JA posted that the number was around 40% from both services with roughly equal sticker rate for both services. From what I understand, the number in recent times is decreasing and not increasing.

topstuf

So an average 60% of all graded coins are headed to eBay?

david3142

@cameonut2011 said:

@TomB said:
I seem to recall numbers slightly less than 50% success rate for CAC evaluation have been floated around as either official or semi-official.

When first asked, I think JA posted that the number was around 40% from both services with roughly equal sticker rate for both services. From what I understand, the number in recent times is decreasing and not increasing.

That trend make sense. The quality of coins not already sent to CAC is lower, and coin grades tend to go up anytime it’s worth it to try for the upgrade (which is probably more likely for those already stickered).

BIGAL2749

This was a 4th submission and were not the most likely to succeed.

I was happy that the last pages (gold) which did much better than the first 3 pages.

Only my 20 Lib and low MS type have not gone though.

stman

I would imagine if collectors had to pay for rejects, the sticker rate might change.

astrorat

I've sent 240 coins to CAC in 12 submissions. I will usually include 2 or 3 coins that I expect have a small chance of getting stickered.

My sticker rate is at 70%.

ricko

I find this to be an interesting thread..... and one that can be interpreted as CAC being a confirmation entity of a submitter's grading skills..... Cheers, RickO

Coin Finder

I'm around 45%. I must admit I am not as good a grader as I thought when it comes to finding the difference between a "C" graded coin and "B" graded coin...I am about 90% on coins I know will sticker or "A" graded coins..

topstuf

@Justacommeman said:
And it vastly depends on series

M

Oh, my jumping goodness. The series is pertinent to a coin's being accepted by the most experienced, trustworthy, super duper, seen more coins than anyone in the galaxy, never to be doubted..... numismatic examiner.

We need a list of series that can be safely assumed to be,,,,, preferred,

topstuf

@ricko said:
I find this to be an interesting thread..... and one that can be interpreted as CAC being a confirmation entity of a submitter's grading skills..... Cheers, RickO

I wish there were a way to "Agree" multiple times.

DRUNNER

Small sample sizes are of course the most direct way to inferior conclusions . . . . but I only submit vintage holders . . . Doilies, NGC 2.1/2.0, and not recent slabs (for the most part). FWIW, I am batting about 98% (only one has ever been "Not CAC") . . . of that type of holder.

Admittedly, the Doilies (virtually all Morgans) that are clearly not CAC, I do not send in. I do pre-screen for the obvious problems. Still . . . the overall grade of the previously mentioned iterations of holders has been quite well received by CAC.

Drunner

TomB

The first time I submitted anything to CAC was during their first appearance at the late, great CoinFest show in CT. This was the show, I believe, where the venue was a middle school and we all had to evacuate into the light rain for perhaps 30-minutes due to a Fire Marshall inspection. It was the first CoinFest show, as well, and all the other shows after that were held in a much more upscale facility.

Regardless, I submitted 77-coins and wrote down what I thought each coin would do vis-a-vis sticker. I then sent the predictions to Mark Feld so that an outside person would have the predictions in writing prior to the actual results. Please note that these were only coins that were in my collection and that all the coins in the collection had been purchased prior to the advent of CAC. Therefore, this did not contain inventory and the purchase of the coins was not influenced by CAC as the entity did not yet exist when the coins were purchased.

The results for the 77-submitted coins;

Predicted successful stickers; 74-coins
Actual successful stickers; 74-coins
Predicted failed sticker attempts; 3-coins
Actual failed sticker attempts; 3-coins

This yields an overall success rate of 96.1%. My success rate has climbed since then to nearer 100%, but as roadrunner pointed out previously in this thread, I am one of those incredibly picky folks who waits and buys when the right coin is offered. My submission contained copper, nickel, silver and gold; spanned from Colonial coinage to the 1950-s era; had both proof and business strike examples; and ranged from PR8 to MS68.

As an aside, my current rate of gold stickers is approximately 15% for my entire history of coins submitted to CAC from my collection, but that submission number is fewer than 200-pieces.

Unknown

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panexpoguy

@ShadyDave Todd sent back the latest batch of images, turns out only one of the Mercs I had sent to CAC was in the batch. I will get the rest imaged in the next batch. Here is the PCGS 39D

dabrin

I just got back 20 PCGS Lincoln wheat cents all in MS from CAC and had a success rate of 65%. I did have 1 coin in MS-66+ grade that did not CAC; I found this interesting as CAC does not recognize plus grades- so PCGS thought it was an "A" grade MS-66 and CAC thought it was a "C" grade MS-66. Does anyone know if Lincoln Wheats are an easy CAC series (like Mercs) or a tough one (like St Gaudens). Here is a pic of the MS-66+ that did not CAC:

thefinn

I sent 12 coins in a couple of years ago and got 10 green beans and 2 gold beans. I'm pretty picky about what I buy and like to buy non-CAC coins. Getting ready to send in my next set of 20 or so.

BAJJERFAN

Would you pay CAC to grade your raw coins and have them come back as say 64 A B or C?

winesteven

@dabrin said:
.....Does anyone know if Lincoln Wheats are an easy CAC series (like Mercs) or a tough one (like St Gaudens)?

First, CAUTION to others, as this thread was started in 2017. The new posts start three above mine by @dabrin.

I’d say easy. About 1-1/2 years ago I was looking to expand my collection to start a set where the pricing differential between coins with CAC’s vs. without CAC’s was not too large. After doing some research I decided to start a Lincoln Wheat DATE Registry Set. By needing only one coin for each date, it allows me the flexibility to avoid more expensive coins for each date in the same grade, and also requires only slightly more than 1/3 of the coins needed for a “Complete” set. This allowed me to then afford to include only Lincoln’s graded with the RD suffix, and also allowed my budget to then afford to pay the slight premium to include only coins with CAC’s.

Here’s my set, currently ranked #42, with 15 coins out of 50 still needed. 27 of the 35 coins currently in the set have a “+”:

https://www.pcgs.com/setregistry/half-cents/lincoln-cents-major-sets/lincoln-cents-date-set-circulation-strikes-1909-1958/publishedset/196606

yspsales

Has CAC put a dent in the crackout game or does it happen in greater frequency?

lusterlover

@winesteven said:

@dabrin said:
.....Does anyone know if Lincoln Wheats are an easy CAC series (like Mercs) or a tough one (like St Gaudens)?

First, CAUTION to others, as this thread was started in 2017. The new posts start three above mine by @dabrin.

I’d say easy. About 1-1/2 years ago I was looking to expand my collection to start a set where the pricing differential between coins with CAC’s vs. without CAC’s was not too large. After doing some research I decided to start a Lincoln Wheat DATE Registry Set. By needing only one coin for each date, it allows me the flexibility to avoid more expensive coins for each date in the same grade, and also requires only slightly more than 1/3 of the coins needed for a “Complete” set. This allowed me to then afford to include only Lincoln’s graded with the RD suffix, and also allowed my budget to then afford to pay the slight premium to include only coins with CAC’s.

Here’s my set, currently ranked #42, with 15 coins out of 50 still needed. 27 of the 35 coins currently in the set have a “+”:

https://www.pcgs.com/setregistry/half-cents/lincoln-cents-major-sets/lincoln-cents-date-set-circulation-strikes-1909-1958/publishedset/196606

I respectfully disagree. I think he's asking if CAC is harder on Lincolns then some series, and I would say yes in my experience.

In regard to the coin, it looks like there's something going on the the left obv field. Maybe John thought there was a cleaning at some point. He is big on originality. The rev strike is a bit weak as well. Just speculating.

nencoin

We have a pitiful success rate with large, yellow coins. Understandable, considering the sometimes very significant spreads between CAC and non-CAC bids.

winesteven

@lusterlover said:

I respectfully disagree. I think he's asking if CAC is harder on Lincolns then some series, and I would say yes in my experience.

My sense is he was not asking if "some" series are easier than than Lincoln's but just trying to get a sense in general if Lincoln's were "easy" vs. Saints, which are tough. That's OK that we disagree, as this is a subjective question anyway. I'm looking at the impact of supply and demand on pricing. As I see it, a VERY low percentage of Saints merit a CAC, and that's why there's a tremendous percentage differential for those few that do have CAC's. I think we agree it makes sense to look at percentage differences, and not dollars, since gold is gold, and Lincoln's are copper. From my experience, buying only Wheat Lincoln's graded by PCGS that are RD, and only with CAC's, my perception is the prices of those with CAC's is not a lot different than those without them. As a genralization, I'm looking at three figure coins for the Lincoln's, not four figure coins, where i acknowledge, without research that the CAC "premium" may be a higher perentage than that of coins selling below $1,000.

oih82w8

@FranklinHalfAddict said:

@oih82w8 said:
Somewhere between 0 and 99%. I have not heard of anyone getting 100% on a submission...when dealing with quantities greater than a couple. It all depends on the quality of coins submitted. One thing that I have heard of...don't send in several of the same type in an order...they begin to compete against one another.

I do not send in anything that I don't think has a better than average shot at getting beaned...and some are just head-scratcher as to why it was not beaned.

I realize this is a very small quantity, but still more that a "couple" technically.
I went 5/5 recently.

This is an old thread, and on my last batch I went 10/10 CAC, none exceeded. I have another batch of 9 there now.

HashTag

Delete

rays

The only numbers you're going to get are anecdotal and mean nothing.
The CAC people don't disclose this information (for good reasons) and likely never will.

keets

I have only sent in a 7-coin lot through a dealer and all were green stickered, so 100%.

to be honest, I think what gets a sticker is more dependent on the submitter than CAC. if you just send stuff in because you think the coins will be worth more money with the sticker, good luck. you'll be somewhere in oih82w8's 0-99% range. if you be really critical and don't necessarily trust yourself, being critical, the chances will be better.

the more relevant question might be "What percent of PCGS graded coins do you think are properly graded?" move forward from that point.

Tom147

@keets said:

the more relevant question might be "What percent of PCGS graded coins do you think are properly graded?" move forward from that point.

That question needs to take into account gradeflation. Current vs OGH's

logger7

Maurice Rosen did an interview with JA where statistics were provided on various denominations and grades; the upshot was that as you go up in grade toward MS67 success rates went up. It's worth checking out MR's advisory if you are a serious collector: https://rcnh.com/NewsItem.aspx?id=23

Another consideration is those submitting to cac may exclude unlikely cac candidates. However I have sent coins I did not think would pass like a low grade 12-s Liberty Nickel that did. The 40% average is a good rule.

Unknown

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TONEDDOLLARS

My personal record on my collection of GAS's is 118 submitted 71CAC'd .6016949% All green
Not bad considering a lot of collectors feel GSA's are graded very liberally.

astrorat

@HashTag said:

@ricko said:
I find this to be an interesting thread..... and one that can be interpreted as CAC being a confirmation entity of a submitter's grading skills..... Cheers, RickO

I think this is partially correct. I also think CAC is a confirmation of a submitter's ability to decipher original surfaces. Many coins in PCGS and NGC plastic are graded correctly, but don't have original surfaces (which is okay under current market grading guidelines).

CAC provides an opinion as to the TPG grade and originality of the coin, IMO.

Sometimes people submit coins that are "liners" and may or may not be stickered by CAC, and the submitters were "gambling" the coin would sticker.

Cougar1978

I would say if the increase in sell value of coins stickered exceed costs of stickering that’s a win. Works good enough for me. Looks like you did real well.

oih82w8

I received the results from my latest submission of 9...I'll just say...it was the worst that I have ever sent in.