By Laura Sperber of Legend Numismatics

As we stated in our last Market Report, we were having trouble gauging where the market is. From our vantage point we see some very interesting happenings. It is still hard for us to see the exact direction the market is going. BUT we do NOT see it crashing or making a major overall adjustment right now.

Big money collectors are still in the game-however they are clearly shifting their goals. We have seen many cashing out “lesser” coins and reinvesting (for lack of a better word) in to rarer more quality orieinted coins. By that we mean if a player had a $1 82CC in MS66, he sold it and bought something like a GEM Bust Quarter (if one had been around). In the past 2 weeks since the ANA, we have been able to outright purchase (or recieve on consignment) at least $2 MILLION dollars worth of coins. That is something we have never experienced at this time of the year. It was weird, we’d do one deal then the next day out of the blue another would come up and we’d be flying out. Of course right after ANA is usally the worst time to sell, but people didn’t seem to care as they questioned the future or had other coins they wanted to buy now. Not one person who sold told us they needed the money to pay bills (although one person did mention taxes). Most were shifting focus or assets.

Collectors seem very skeptical about buying unless a coin is super rare, has over the top quality for the grade, and is a must buy for their specific collection. We do not see many impulse purchases happening right now from collectors. The real danger, is we do see substantial INVESTOR purchasing occuring. We can sell MILLIONS to the telemarketers who deal with them or the 2 big funds that are out there. We have had several INVESTORS call us direct and requested we build them portfolios. INVESTORS are funny, they won’t just buy anything, but when they find the “right” coin or hear the ‘right” numbers about it, the checks fly! Our sales since ANA have been incredibly strong-but then we also have a supply of fresh, truely rare, and neat coins, while many other dealers do not. We still will pay what it takes to buy certain coins because we know what is NOT available. And yes, we are still looking for that NON 1926/1932 PCGS MS65 CAC stickered $10 Indian. (more…)

Market Report by Laura Sperber - Legend Numismatics

This is a very difficult market report to write. We know what we did, what kind of business others did, we participated in all the auctions, yet we can not pinpoint exactly what is happening or where the market is headed. We also do NOT want people to think we are presenting hype.

From what we see, this may very well have been the BEST ANA Show ever in terms of business transacted overall, the strongest prices realized at the auctions, incredible displays, and from what we can see, strong attendance. All that created what we felt was a tremendous “buzz’ and nothing but positive attitudes. None of the dealers we spoke to had a bad show. All the tables seemed very busy most of the time the show was open. We know from start to finish we did an awful lot of business.

We arrived late to show. This year, we skipped all PRE ANA activities and only was at PNG day for an hour or two. Of course we were itching to make some sales. The first dealer we saw not only spent six figures with us, but bought a six figure coin without any chisel other than some terms. Not totally unusual, but its the kind of thing that when you have that happen at the very start, the rest of your show is usually kaput. Fortunately, we sold a lot to the next dealer we saw that day as well. From that point on, we never stopped selling.

The one thing we absolutely could not do-buy. Our purchases at this show are the lowest EVER for an ANA and possibly the smallest EVER for ANY major show. As of 5 PM Thursday afternoon, we had spent LESS than $100,000.00 on the bourse floor. Our buying at the auctions was substantial-but still below the levels we wanted to be at.

It has finally happened, the market is out of coins-sort of! If you wanted a junky widget-they were still around. You could not go out on the floor and buy a GEM Bust Half, a GEM early gold piece, an MS65 28S Peace Dollar, a GEM 1877 MS Indian, or that long sought after non 1926/1932 $10 Indian we still need in GEM. All the good stuff now either gets put in the back of dealers cases or gets thrown in the auction. We put out a $20 1870CC PCGS XF40 CAC piece late morning Thursday. An hour or so later, not only did we have it sold to a collector (it worth in excess of $300,000.00), we had THREE other people who were willing to commit to buy it (with two of them actually hovering behind the collector) as he was buying it. We sold several six figure coins Thursday (including a $1 1863 PCGS MS66 and monster 1891 PR set in which all the coins we PR68’s). (more…)

Morphy/Legend is proud to have been selected to sell the following collections:

• The 3 Aces Collection
• The NYS Collection
• The Norwood Collection
• The CA $2.5 Gold Collection

Each of these sets was assembled by long time collectors. Their goals were to blend the finest quality with terrific eye appeal. Of course rarities abound.

“With each sale now, we are seeing more interest both in terms of consignments and bidders. We knew it would take a while for us to break in and be a truely respected auction house, however that movement is going much faster than we anticipated” said Laura Sperber CO-partner.

Many exciting coins are included in this sale. Highlights are:

• H.01 1795 NGC MS62BN NYS
• H.10 1833 NGC MS67* NYS
• 10C 1859 NGC PR67 ULTRA CAMEO NORWOOD
• 10C 1895O NGC MS64 3 ACES
• 25C 1818/5 NGC MS65
• 50C 1822/1 NGC MS65 NYS
• 50C 1836 50/00 NGC MS66PL NYS
• 50C 1952 PCGS PR67 CAMEO
• $1 1795 FLOWINGHAIR NGC XF40
• $1 1878 7TF REV 78 PCGS MS65 DMPL
• $2.5 1839C NGC MS60
• $2.5 1908-1929 PCGS 63/63 SET CA INDIAN COLLECTION
• $5 1909 PCGS MS66
• $20 1857S PCGS MS65

(more…)

By Laura Sperber of Legend Numismatics

Legend is not used to failure, but publicly we will admit we have in two cases. No, its not in our forever fight to rid the business of coin docs (the services are gaining the upper hand in that fight). We blew it on two simple requests from new customers.

One said he’d like a beautiful GEM MS $10 Indian (non 26 or 32), the other requested we help in building a PR65 Barber Half set. These requests were both recent, and we have only found 2 coins for the Barber set and can’t find that elusive $10 Indian.

Even with all the access we have to coins and with all of our high power connections we can’t locate these coins in NICE condition. We’ve seen a small handful of junky $10 Indians and we weren’t presented with many opportunities on the Barbers. It seems most of the really nice pieces are in solid collector hands. Our standards are strict, but not so insanely strict as to miss the ‘right” pieces. It’s not like we can find numerous pieces being offered of even junk-nothing is out there. Do NOT be fooled by higher populations-remember there are regrades, crackouts, and possibly far more people collecting than what is graded.

We want collectors to take note of our failures not because it gives the chatroom weenies something else to ridicule us about (which they like to do by mere mention of our names), but because we believe it sends a powerful message as to what is NOT out there and the potential of where the coin market could be heading. These should not be hard coins to find-yet today they are. Routinely in our Market Reports we tell you how dry the shows have become. Here we prove this by our failure to secure the $10 Indian and buy several Barbers for the set we are building.

What does this really mean? PRICES WILL HAVE TO GO UP! These coins, just like all the others we are searching for won’t appear unless prices get stronger. This is why when you see a major auction and it has FRESH high grade pieces-they are ALL selling for multiples of what you think they are worth. In cases of true high grade rarities, published prices are bunk and should NOT even be printed (that’s a whole other subject we will get into at a later time). (more…)

Funny how things work. We expected this to blow away Long Beach, but for us, it ended up the quieter show. Overall, we still did several hundred thousand in business and unlike Long Beach, we did do some retail. The only thing we could not do: BUY COINS! Yet again, the floor was beyond dry. NOTE: We had commented that at the last LB Show you could “bowl down the isles.” An attention seeking know-it-all type dealer who has nothing better to do than troll gossip boards for biz, made some comments on a chat board that this was not true and that we had our backs turned. Well, that was BS and we totally stand by that comment and ALL our observations for the Long Beach show. Ask any major dealer who has attended that show for years, the public attendance is badly declining. There is no specific reason.

The Baltimore Show simply had too many odds going against them this time for it to be a great show. Having a major show the week before was the #1 problem. The overal uncertainty of the economy probably was #2 (i.e high gas). #3 bad luck with the killer heat (weather). And last, #4-many collectors along the East Coast simply are waiting for the summer ANA Show at the end of July (which is also in Baltimore). Dealers certainly were burnt out from all the recent travel. Less then the usual amount of summer dealers attended (so it seemed). Still, everyone who was there clearly tried to make the best of it. If you had nice and fresh coins, they immediately sold the first day or to the first person you showed.

Surprisingly to us, the collector turn out was a little heavier than what we thought it would be. However, it was still incredibly less than what the March show brings in. Many substantial dealers felt (for them) the show really ended by 10 AM Friday. Very few stayed for Saturday. We ourselves did NO business Saturday at all and we were bone tried, so yes, we left early.

We strongly feel this show should NOT be used to measure the market, it was most likely an abberation.

Yet again, we congratulate Mary Counts, David Chrenshaw, and all the Whitman people for working hard to put on what clearly has become the BEST privately owned show in the biz. We just wish circumstances could have been better for them this time around!

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