Market Reports

What a nasty year 2015 was. At very best the market was “choppy”. We had a slight scare when for reasons unknown the market pretty much stopped dead after ANA in August and did not reawaken until late October. Except for a few trophy coins (we’re even including crazy colored Morgans in these ranks), prices overall stepped down about 10-20% last year.

Generic better gold took the worst hits of anything (next MS Barber coins). For the life of us we don’t get how GEM $5 Indians have fallen from $15,000.00 to $10,000.00 when NONE are available. We can say this about so many other Copper and Silver areas too. We do believe the severe lack of supply is also causing a layer of collectors to back away from buying (with interests only stimulated when a world class sale happens-thus more dramatic prices realized). Collectors need to be fed a supply. 2015 had few other coins appear outside of the big great collections. This definitely added to the market being so choppy.

In 2015 we had Pogue, the end of Gardner, and Newman. Ouch! However if you notice, save for a few Gardner coins, there are virtually NO retreads of Pogue or Newman floating around. Collectors devoured over $100 million worth coins from these top auctions. To us, this does prove a solid foundation is still there. The real loss of value in 2015 came from widgets and plain old bad coins (DRECK). A bright spot is the collecting public has wised up about gradeflation and coin doctoring. That helps add to long term consumer confidence. So they now pass on the bad stuff, which is why CAC coins are so much more money than dreck coins. The dreck coins all fell like a rock in 2015 (probably more then 20%).

The Legend companies (Legend and Legend Rare Coin Auctions) sold a combined $50 million worth of coins for 2015 profitably. We probably spent another $25 million representing collectors at auctions. That was an awful lot of biz! We did have FOUR people who spent OVER $3 million each with us, but we’d say the majority of our sales were $2-$10,000.00 coins. In December (typically a weaker month) we sold close to $2 million to collectors including two coins for about $250G each! We’re NOT wholesalers in disguise either. Our sales are 95% to collectors. To us, our sales are yet another good sign the depth of collector participation is still there. All year our problem was NOT finding buyers (save for that one dead period), it was finding the coins! Those who stepped up in 2015 WILL be rewarded in a few short years as this slower cycle ends.

The entire Legend staff thanks everyone for working with us for 2015!

Nothing much has changed with the drop of the New Years Ball. We expect FUN to be marginal at best. Dealers don’t display great coins anymore and instead rush to put their coins in auctions. This years FUN sale is also one of the smaller sales we can remember. Since we’ve suffered from “dry” bourse floors all 2015 and a few years prior, we see no reason to expect a crowd or many coins at FUN.

In 2016 we still doubt there will be any flood of dumping or any great coins coming to auction and selling for cents on the dollar. For years, that “black hole” coins have disappearing into has proven strong handed. The market should continue to be choppy until all most of the dreck is gone. If only a few small scattered offerings of neat coin appear, that’s really not enough to move the needle up anything longer than a few days. We do see supply as major problem in 2016. You can only build so many top sets.

No question the opportunities are HUGE right now. We NOT at the 2008 market peak. Prices are soft overall (except trophy coins). As we mentioned before, in some cases, there are no known reasons for coins to be so cheap. We have been advising collectors to step up on every single great coin that pops up today since they are so few. If a collector has the right mind set and holds the coins long term, they will be greatly rewarded. Its not a guess, its the history of the cycles in the coin market. THIS IS 100% A BUYERS MARKET-you just can’t go out and build something like a top pop Saint set (which mystifies us as we have never seen a time in our 40 year career where there is no one activity building a new Saint set-it used to be the King of the Big Boys collections).

Legend and Legend Auctions are pretty much going to be status quo for at least the first half of 2016. Our staff, backers, and customer base have not changed. We still have in EXCESS of $20 million in Want List coins. No question the Legend companies will still continue to lead the market in buying and selling better coins for 2016. Now all we have to do is find the “right” coins!

Sorry, NO NEWPS this week. We will have awesome NEWPS when we return next week from FUN. We won’t be posting NEWPS until Sunday. Until then check out our regular inventory listings-we want to make some deals!

What a year we had. It was highlighted by the record breaking Coronet Collection of Morgans selling for “BEYOND MOON MONEY PRICES”. Its not easy to build and run a rare coin auction business. Some how we got through 2015 and are looking forward to a great 2016!

Hard to believe that 3 years in we still have some technical and admin glitches. We’re very sorry for that and do know we are working overtime to provide you with a hassle free and great auction experience. We hope to upgrade some of our technology in 2016. We already have added a very qualified numismatist-Greg Cohen to our staff. Having someone like Greg sets us apart from several internet and even “big” auction houses-we have real live coin dealers with real street creds on staff! We assure you, Greg will provide you with the ultimate in quality advice and personal service.

We already have several amazing coins for our Feb Regency Sale. Our 500 lot sale is filling up fast and space is now limited. The Friday Jan 8th is our ABSOLUTE deadline for consigning. Contact Julie Abrams at julie@legendauctions to have your coins included!