Options
Watching the Long Beach Auction, some things are holding true.
keets
Posts: 25,351 ✭✭✭✭✭
Despite what some naysayers of late have said, So-Called Dollars seem to have some air under them. In fact, I've been watching the auction at HALive and notice quite a bit of similarity between these interesting medals and more mainstream U.S. Coinage items.
1. The rare and highly sought items continue to sell very strong with active bidding.
2. Common items sell in the same, much ballyhooed "bifurcated" fashion as coins: circulated and lower MS grades sell cheap, the higher graded and more eye-appealing items tend to command more attention and higher prices.
3. Apparently collectors of SC$'s for the most part have done their homework and can look past the auction description's sometimes wrong information, finding low-hanging fruit.
4. Attractive designs tend to draw attention and more mediocre "advertisement/storecard" looking pieces don't.
I also had hoped to get the opinions of other members who may have used the HALive bidding feature. I have a forum member representative on the floor but decided to bid on a few items from home. My bids got through but I didn't win anything...................yet. My guy on the floor helped me with one item and there are a few yet to be offered that I'm hopeful he'll win for me. The home-bidding feature is nice and allows for extra competition, good for the consignors and bad for the bidders, but it's a good thing overall. So, what did you win, what are your thoughts on my four points and on the bidding from home??
Thanks.
Al H.
1. The rare and highly sought items continue to sell very strong with active bidding.
2. Common items sell in the same, much ballyhooed "bifurcated" fashion as coins: circulated and lower MS grades sell cheap, the higher graded and more eye-appealing items tend to command more attention and higher prices.
3. Apparently collectors of SC$'s for the most part have done their homework and can look past the auction description's sometimes wrong information, finding low-hanging fruit.
4. Attractive designs tend to draw attention and more mediocre "advertisement/storecard" looking pieces don't.
I also had hoped to get the opinions of other members who may have used the HALive bidding feature. I have a forum member representative on the floor but decided to bid on a few items from home. My bids got through but I didn't win anything...................yet. My guy on the floor helped me with one item and there are a few yet to be offered that I'm hopeful he'll win for me. The home-bidding feature is nice and allows for extra competition, good for the consignors and bad for the bidders, but it's a good thing overall. So, what did you win, what are your thoughts on my four points and on the bidding from home??
Thanks.
Al H.
0
Comments
It is a two tier market . Medals in attractive high grade,
nice design and scarcity, go well over estimates. Weak, ugly and common
coins are weak. The market has evolved from collecting every so/so medal
to a more coin oriented selection process. It would appear that silver medals
have become highly desired as well as medals that are more scarce then reported.
It is hoped that the new HK book will help bring collectors more up to date on true
scarcity as well as a better listing of more varieties.
In the Heritage auction, I won 4 lots and I feel lucky to have done so. I lost out on the
other 28 lots I bid on. On a number of them, I had the earlier bid on the lot but they award
same bid to the live in person bidding. I just hate that system.
Camelot
Salvation Army HK-548
Alexander Centennial HK 510
1904 LA Purchase HK-299 ( This medal appears under graded by a point)
1894 Trans Miss HK-283 (This is a really flashy PL specimen)
Camelot
a whole bunch of lots. I tried to have a dealer bid for me, but he
was already booked with bids for other clients before I got to him.
Camelot
I won two that I'm not as crazy about and that's probably because I paid to much. A HK-597 German American MS62 and a HK-868 Colorado Dollar AU58.
If there was any low hanging fruit I didn't see it. I'll feel better tomorrow after a little time passes
I spent considerable time setting up an Excel spreadsheet containing the auction information, the NGC pop reports showing the medals relative location (yellow-highlight), and SmallForest’s price guide figures.
This auction contained about 67 top-pop lots (red HK number) and about 63 secondary-pop lots (yellow HK). I knew there would be competition for the top-pop items, so I targeted my bidding primarily on the secondary-lot items. I was not able to attend the auction or bid live, so I placed all of my bids last night. I bid on a total of 73 lots and won 13. Eleven of these were the identified top/secondary pop items, so I picked up roughly 8.5% of the lots in this auction that met these criteria.
All in all, I think I did fairly well.
tmot99, were you in the room when the Erie Canal in gold was hammered down? If there was activity on anything, I expect it was on that one...?
<< <i>I was surprised that the bidding didn't get carried away. I didn't see the absurd bids that I expected. Most things went fairly reasonably, and there were even few bargains that in retrospect I wish I'd bid on... :-}
tmot99, were you in the room when the Erie Canal in gold was hammered down? If there was activity on anything, I expect it was on that one...? >>
No, I got here late and had other things to deal with. I saw the last of my stuff sell, and didn't stay around for the HK-1000+ to sell.
Bear, if you need somone to bid for you at a future Long Beach auction you can always try me. I don't go to all of them but would be glad to if possible.
--Jerry
Camelot