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2K's Numismatic Year in Review

TwoKopeikiTwoKopeiki Posts: 9,799 ✭✭✭✭✭
edited December 17, 2017 5:24PM in World & Ancient Coins Forum

Busy year, overall, with numismatics taking a bit of a back seat. Bought a house that i love, but with it came an early 5 am wake-up followed by a 1.5 hour commute into the city that i fill with reading, working and sometimes catching up on my sleep. Wife is also 18 weeks pregnant, so doing a lot of planning for when the little one arrives next May. At the same time, mother-in-law is slowly losing her 5-year fight with cancer, so life has definitely been full of up and downs in this household.

Added only 6 coins to my collection this year, but very happy about every single addition. There's definitely been a change from previous years where I was focused primarily on filling holes in my registry sets. I also stopped gambling with sight-unseen overseas auctions, as every purchase is now weighted against a growing list of priorities and "honey-do's".

The year started with reviewing a large collection of 8 Reales being offered by folks at World Numismatics at NYINC. There were a couple of lookers, but the prices were higher than what I thought was reasonable. I particularly liked the 1814-HJ key in VF25, one of only a handful known, but not at almost $4K.

I didn't leave NYINC last year empty-handed, though. John @ CRO had a great, lustrous 1815 8 Reales in MS63 that I simply loved at a reasonable price.

That 1814-HJ surfaced again in the Sedwick sale and when it didn't sell, i ended-up reaching out to Kent Ponterio and agreeing on a price. I already had a better example of that coin in PCGS VF35 pedigreed to Jose Leunda sale in Madrid, but you can never have too many keys, in my opinion.

eBay was the source of the rest of my purchases, with the overall softness of the market resulting in some bargains.



Last one was also an eBay purchase - a long-awaited 1803-TH key date/assayer in the Carlos IV set. Picked it up raw before sending to our hosts.

Looking forward to 2018. Wife is coming with me to NYINC, so probably not going to spend as much time at the show. Still looking forward to connecting with fellow collectors and maybe having some wine and cheese at Andy Lustig's table on Thursday ;)

Have a great Christmas, Hanukkah, New Year's everyone and stay safe!


8 Reales Madness Collection

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