STILL TRAMATIZED
In our 40 year career we never had a worse show then the 2019 FUN Show. It was a complete train wreck for us and actually took a harsh physical and emotional toll. As of this writing, we are still wounded (health wise) and fear it will be weeks before we can make a full recovery. What happened to us really does NOT reflect the current market. We allowed ourselves to drift in a direction that we simply should not have. We totally misjudged the auction and had a bad game plan. Considering we expected to spend as much as $8 million for various players-and we spent only $800,000.00. Yikes! That is a huge hit. Plus the fact, we had the winner of the 1884 Trade Dollar called us up and ask if we could rep him on that and the 1885 and we had to turn him down (oh did we pick the wrong pony). OUCH! The fact the auction was so strong is a HUGE plus for the market. Looking back today at the prices realized-geez, what were we thinking? Legend is famous for stepping up, NOT losing. As far as being the under bidder on the 1885-we’ll end up with the FINEST one eventually (we won’t mess that up). We are doing our best to mentally move on. This situation is one bad mistake we learned from and will NEVER happen again to us.
What happened to us also happens to many collectors. When an auctions contents surface, we started to prepare. We became obsessed with many coins. This is a huge problem for many collectors. They love auctions but can have great coins offered to them (or see them offered) while fantasizing about having to buy something out of a sale. Thank goodness this did not happen to us. However, while waiting for FUN, we got creamed when the stock market plunged. Ugh oh. So 2 weeks before the auction we felt all the big coins would go cheap and told our customers such. As the fog lifted and we were a day or two out from the sale-we had to go back to each customer and point out how wrong we were. We simply had blinders on when looking at the facts of what was offered. This is a rule for anyone: if you see a low pop and really high quality coin that has not been offered in ages-NEVER think cheap-no matter what the outside markets are doing (we believe many collectors suffer the same feelings we did about buying coins while stocks tanked). You will never buy nice or great coins if you do not play to win. All your doing setting a new market price in the end.
We can not state this enough: the FUN auction was powerful proof as the strength of better coins and really high quality coins. Many record prices were set.
BACK TO REALITY
We did no blockbuster sales this week. We did however sell a very good amount of coins (several five figure coins). We had a few smaller deals (for us) that as soon as we offered them, BOOM! SOLD! Sales off the web site we very consistent all week which was really good. We had figured the week would be dead-NOT!
This week the pain came from us not really buying a ton of coins at FUN. We certainly could not buy the coins we wanted. You saw the 3 really nice MS66 CC DMPL’s we had-poof! Gone to 3 different collectors. We’d buy every PCGS MS66 CAC or better DMPL we could find. We could have sold those coins 3x each. Bust coins? We only bought 2-BOTH sold already. Gold? OMG, we seriously need much better gold super bad. Proof gold is impossible to buy (especially $20’s that we badly need). It is beyond amazing the demand for better PCGS CAC coins right now. Its NOT a craze by any stretch, its what collectors seek.
Another thing that is raising out eye brows, our auction is really starting to take off. You won’t see the bids now, but the amount of phone bidders and proxy bidders already set is amazing. The other thing-the amount of registrants and people viewing the lots online his beyond any number we expected. Lot 233 the monster toned 1956 PCGS MS66+ leads the way. Lot 21 the 1C 1909 VDB PR 66RD CAC is next. We are shocked that 5 ordinary gold pieces are right behind. Lot 437 a $20 1911 PCGS MS64 CAC has 900 page views so far (remember, we’re little guys-we don’t have a trillion names). We can see the build up happening. Collectors are going to where there are cool coins-which are the auctions these days. One thing about our auctions-each lot is vetted for quality. So the $20 1911 isn’t dirty or scuffy. At FUN, we looked in many cases and saw ugly gold or over graded gold-of course the majority were non CAC coins.
We can not stress enough that if you are pondering buying a neat coin, bite the bullet and buy it. While a coin may be listed somewhere today, do to count of it being around tomorrow. And based upon the auctions, right now you can get you better deals on line from dealers like us. Your not in any competition to buy or pay a higher price.
In the beginning of December it was a buyers market. Today, if you have the right coins (not stuff) it is a sellers market. Remember our saying: “there s no substitution for quality”. That includes eye appeal too.
An FYI: there clearly is still plenty of money out there. We know many people who made serious coin from the December stock melt down. Every day this writer drives home through a very affluent town called Rumson. There are plenty of $3 million + homes that have traded hands there recently-including a $15 million manse.
LEGEND NUMISMATICS IS BUYING
We bought so little at FUN for ourselves we need to get back on track. We still have $20,000,000.00 in Want Lists to fill. We need wicked cool coins to work with on a daily basis. For the BS about loving coins, we MUST buy the VERY BEST quality or we go nutso.
ALL COINS MUST BE PCGS CAC-no exceptions
ALL Morgan DMPL’s MS65 or better on the rare dates, and MS66 and better on things like an 80S. NO hazed mirrors.
2 HIGH RELIEFS MS65 or higher (either WE or FE)
ALL MS 66 or better gold
ALL $10+20 PROOF LIBERTY GOLD 65 and higher. NO hazed mirrors.
ALL REALLY RARE PATTERNS PR64 and higher (NO Standard Silvers in any metal)
$1 1890CC, 1891CC, 1892CC PCGS MS66 OR HIGHER-MUST BE WHITE
$1 1889CC MS64
2 $3 MS65 or finer for Type sets-no spots
$10 1801 PCGS MS64 or higher
$1 1921 PEACE PCGS MS67 (we can dream can’t we?)
ALL MS65 OR BETTER SEATED DOLLARS (we recently bought a 1869 in MS66 CAC)
Again, out Want List is huge. But we will buy anything we think is cool. What do you have? We’ll buy entire collections just to get at a coin or two (done this many times). No one will pay more then we will for the coins we really like (our heads are screwed on right again). Contact George Huang: legend@legendcoin.com. He will be in attendance at Long Beach. Or visit us at the Legend Auction lot viewing January 25-27 at the Marriott in Beverly Hills. Legend’s chief buyer will be there!
NEWPS
Yet again, we have a smaller but nice offering. Its painfully obvious we did not buy enough at FUN. Unlike others who have no clue (the wannabes are back), we buy ONLY the very best eye appeal and top end for the grade coins. We’ll never buy a coin just to have product to offer. Here are a few highlights from this offering:
1C 1855 UP 55 PCGS MS65RD CAC REAL RED!
3CS 1864 PCGS PR67 CAC
5C 1916 PCGS PR67 CAC COLOR!
$2.5 1906 PCGS PR67 CAMEO CAC
$10 1909S PCGS MS65 CAC CROW RIVER COLOR!
Those are just a coins from our NEWPS.
We need you to really check out our main inventory listings. We have many coins we feel have simply been overlooked:
1C 1805 PCGS MS63+ CAC GRAYSON
5C 1880 PCGS MS65 CAC THE KEY DATE
25C 1892 PCGS MS67+ CAC WOW!
25C 1916 ST PCGS MS66FH CAC
$1 1840 PCGS PR64 CAC REALLY RARE!
$1 1875S PCGS MS66 CAC BEATS THE MS67 THAT JUST SOLD
$1 1882CC PCGS MS67 CAC
$2.5 1838 PCGS MS63+ CAC SUPER HIGH END
$3 1854 PCGS MS65+ CAC
$5 1802/1 PCGS MS64 CAC
$5 1908 INDIAN PCGS MS66+ CAC WHY IS THIS STILL HERE???????
$20 1854 PCGS MS64 CAC INCREDIBLE
We can add a few more. First, be glad these are not in auction. You do not have to compete to buy them. We’ll happily work out terms or reasonable trades. Legend Numismatics goes out of its way to stock coins others can only dream about. In this market, with coins so dry, we are befuddled as to why some of these are still here. Do know, once these are sold, POOF! You won’t ever see many coins similar-even at auction!
Call or email George Huang to discuss any coin in our inventory. ALL NEWPS ARE NOW POSTED
LEGEND RARE COIN AUCTIONS
www.legendauctions.com
Two more weeks to go. If you read above, we are already swamped with bidders and registrants. We believe coins will NOT sell cheap at all in this sale-and NOTHING will fall through the cracks. BE READY!
Lot viewing opens in BH at the Marriott Friday 9 AM.
PCGS will be in our lot viewing room accepting submissions Friday and Saturday. Can’t beat that!
If you have any questions, seek special terms, or need to phone bid, please contact us now. The tam heads to LA Thursday.
FINAL CALL
We are on the final call for coins for our March Regency Sale (3/21) to be held in conjunction with the PCGS Invitational in Las Vegas.
Besides the PHENOMENAL Young-Dakota proof Type/original proof sets (and the famous $1 1893CC PCGS PR65+BM CAC), we have an earth moving MONSTER consignment of larger Proof type. The deal is highlighted by a killer $1 1880 TD PCGS PR67+ Cameo. ALL coins are PCGS CAC.
All coins MUST be in our offices no later then Friday Feb 1. Space is really limited. So far, we can say this will be our typical MONSTER record breaking Legend auction!
You can visit us at lot viewing or at our table at the Long Beach Show.
Contact: Julie Abrams: julie@legendauctions.com, Jessica Berkman: jessica@legendauctions.com, or Greg Cohen: greg@legendauctions.com. They will custom craft the perfect plan for you!
IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS OR WISH TO ORDER, PLEASE EMAIL US: legend@legendcoin.com. WE DO NOT CHECK OUR PHONE MESSAGES UNTIL 9 AM MONDAY
