Gold $2.5 / $5 / $10 Indian Questions
Weather11am
Posts: 2,045 ✭✭✭
I've traditionally been far more into modern coins and actually don't own any pre-1933 gold. I am thinking about dabbling in pre-33 gold starting with $2.5 / $5 / $10 Indians. Given that, I had some general questions:
1. If buying PCGS/NGC gold certified coins from reputable dealers, how worried should I be about fakes?
2. Does having a CAC sticker change the answer to question 1 at all?
3. Where do you think the best value is in the current market? (Just curious).
4. Anyone have any cool pics?!
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The whole worlds off its rocker, buy Gold™.
BOOMIN!™
The major authentication services do an excellent job of weeding out the counterfeits. I wouldn't worry about it as long as you buy a coin in one of their slabs. Be aware that the Chinese are counterfeiting coins and putting them in counterfeit slabs.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire
Weather11am...I am toying with the same idea. Check PCGS Coin Facts on Indian Eagles...they have never been lower. My recent purchase and my first Indian Eagle...two more to go . Take Care...
CC
$2 1/2 Indians are my main focus. I wouldn't be to worried about fakes if you are buying graded. I've never been too concerned with CACed coins, but most do. If you want to take a look at a few I have send me a messsage and I can send you my eBay page.
As to #1. Please post your credentials rather than nonsense! You have demonstrated (at least to me) over and over that many of your opinions are not based on any general knowledge of numismatics.
With regard to #2. I tried to educate some of the members in another discussion about this "time" thing stuck in your head:
@blitzdude said: "It is impossible for anyone to ACCURATELY authenticate and grade a coin in 6 seconds. If other professional graders believe as you do we collectors are screwed because there will be hundred's of thousands of fakes slabbed by the "top" grading services."
I have seen STUDENTS in advanced grading classes grade a coin in under FOUR SECONDS on a regular basis.
@blitzdude I'm using your post as an opening to inform folks based on what I've seen and know. Consider it just an informed opinion.
Last year in Tampa, PNG put on an authentication seminar for its members. I went to the class wishing to see fakes I had not seen before and there were quite a few. They passed around coins - some in slabs. That's because a fake or group of fakes gets past a TPGS on occasion. It happens because we are humans and the "good" counterfeits get more deceptive as the years pass. Two folks next and near me (you all would know them by name) did not even bother to pick up several coins. Other times they picked it up and looked at it with just their eyes for TWO SECONDS or less. I saw other experienced dealers pick the same coins up and study them for several minutes while conferring with the fellow next to them. Then they asked one of the instructors to explain how to determine that this POS, "across-the-room" obvious counterfeit was bad.
Let's make a comparison. Do you know how many folks play baseball? Some go on to play the game in high school. A few of them make a college team. Out of those, some make it into the minors. Some of those are good enough to make the "Show." What do you think the percent is of those who know how to play the game and those who REALLY get to play the game in the Big Leagues? Taking it further, there is a Baseball Hall of Fame. Not many former Big League players make it into the Hall of Fame. In the Hall of Fame, there are some standouts. The experienced professional authenticators who have worked in a major TPGS for several decades (not all of them and probably less than a dozen) are comparable to the Hall of Fame standouts. You, 98% of the dealers I run into at the smaller shows, and 90% of all those folks who have been collectors for fifty years DID NOT EVEN MAKE THE HIGH SCHOOL TEAM! There are lots of Big League baseball players on Collectors Universe. IMO, more than on other forums. There are also lots of Hall of Fame members here.
That said, here is the rest. As a generalization, genuine coins made during certain time periods from all over the world look similar. That's why a 1644 Thaler that looks like it was made in 2018 can be authenticated from a foot away without picking it up! This comes from decades of experience and close observation. It's the so-called 10,000 hour rule needed to become an expert in something. What do we call someone with 20,000 hours? How about 40,000 hours? What about 65,000 hours with 60,000 plus hours staring down the tubes of a microscope?
Here is the catch. That fellow I just described could tell if a coin was good or bad in less than six seconds under the scope in the 1990's. As for today, recently I learned that the poor fellow often takes several minutes to determine some perfectly good looking coins are counterfeit! We ain't in Kansas anymore. That's the authentication part of the equation.
Now for grading a coin fast. Remember, we are talking about the major players in the coin market, I don't wish to name any, let's say John Albanese - nope, he along with many here and one woman
are the guys who are already in the Hall. I'm talking about the market maker's and big wholesale dealers plus the very experienced collectors. They all can grade a coin in seconds. Most of them could easily work at a TPGS but they would need to take a pay cut. These folks and the professional graders are within one point of the grade virtually any time they touch the coin and it gets finalized after the rest of it gets totally out of the flip. GRADING COINS IS EASY the problems start for some folks (at least for me) when you need to PRICE THEM and adjust their actual condition of preservation to their commercial value. How high up the MS grading scale should I push this hairlined AU?
Summary:
Authentication can take more than six seconds because today, they are making deceptive fakes in some series yet in the majority of cases, anyone knows the coin is genuine even in a flip!" If I hand you a 1945 Washington quarter, how long will it take you to authenticate it?
Grading, usually less time with a familiar series - like a 1945 Washington quarter? I'll bet most folks here can pick up a typical Morgan dollar and grade it in six seconds.
PS I learned at one Summer Seminar the instructor told the class to grade the coin without needing to look at the reverse! That was not me.
Finally, we tend to judge others by our own standards, There are some true wizards of numismatics out there - even some we have never heard of. There are others who just don't get it.
@insider2 sorry to say but your major leaguers are letting fakes slip into slabs. The only nonsense I see is the fact that these know it all "experts" think they don't even need to pull a coin out of the flip and can tell in 2 seconds if it's authentic or not. It's arrogance like this that's allowing the Chinese to take the TPG out back of the woodshed. Your students are being schooled alright and unfortunately it's not by the good guys.
Does buying a slabbed coin from a reputable dealer cut down the risks of buying a fake? Absolutely. Does it eliminate the risk? Absolutely NOT.
The whole worlds off its rocker, buy Gold™.
BOOMIN!™
Well, my rock throwing friend, consider this. if we were to add up the number of counterfeit U. S. coins that were slabbed as genuine before 2000 and disregard mint errors and the "Micro O" Morgan dollars that 99.999% of the world considered genuine, the number of fakes that got slabbed in the millions of certified coins would be so low I don't know how many decimal points to use! After about 2010, the fakes started to get really good. Today they are amazing. Nevertheless, In all the U.S. coins that have been slabbed, I'll still bet the number of counterfeits that slipped by a major TPGS is under .001%.
Your statement above: "Yes, be worried" reminds me of that little chicken in the nursery story. IMO, It also borderlines libel and could harm business. I'll blast the TPGS (and do) whenever they screw up if I can back up what I say or write with FACTS and not MISINFORMATION done to fill up space in a column so I can appear to be knowledgeable.
I am sure that many many counterfeit coins have been slabbed.
Out of 70 million 
Our hosts once paid $150K to correct such a mistake. TPG authenticity guarantees seemed to have worked out pretty well for the consumer.
I forgot to add about the guarantee.