The finest known 1907 Ultra High Relief Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle gold coin, insured for $5 million, will be displayed during the first three days of the Santa Clara, California Coin, Stamp & Collectibles Expo to be conducted November 19 – 22, 2009. The show will be held in the Santa Clara Convention Center, 5001 Great America Parkway, where free parking is available.

“This magnificent-looking Ultra High Relief is graded PCGS Proof-69, and will be exhibited courtesy of Certified Assets Management of Wilmington, Delaware,” said Ronald J. Gillio, Expo General Chairman.

“This famous coin was designed by renowned sculptor, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, at the personal request of President Theodore Roosevelt. It was struck seven times to bring up all the beautiful features in the design. There are less than 20 known surviving examples, and this is the finest. There is no other example certified higher,” said Bob Higgins, President of Certified Assets Management.

More than 500 dealers will be buying and selling rare coins, paper money, stamps, vintage postcards, historical documents and other collectibles during the show. The Cupertino Coin Club will display exhibits, and there will be educational seminars on hobby topics.

Teletrade of Irvine, California will conduct the official auction during the Santa Clara Expo. A gold coin door prize will be awarded each day, and a children’s treasure hunt will be conducted between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. on Saturday, November 20.

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By Laura Sperber – Legend Numismatics

First, we’d like to congratulate and thank Jon Lerner (Scarsdale Coins) putting on one of the BEST shows there is! Jon fought a nasty cold and made sure everything was “just right” for everyone. We also would like to offer a huge thank you to John Albanese and his team over at CAC for donating their time and effort to offer free submissions for the collectors who attended. The Q+A session that John held was heavily attended with many good questions being answered. Legends principle, Laura Sperber is a partner with Jon Lerner (in the show) and is  shareholder in CAC.  It is our goal to make Coinfest into a premier specialty show that is a ‘must attend” for collectors. We are not looking to fill a convention center. We want dealers and collectors to be able to transact in a smaller, beautiful, safe, secure, and intimate setting. Also, we have a huge preference of offering tables at our show to dealers who will attend and want to deal with the public. The big wholesalers who do nothing but “crackouts”, they can stay at the bigger shows.

Things started off very strong when all day Thursday dealers arrived and seemed eager to do business. Wholesale activity in the rooms was moderate to strong (it really depended on what you had). We came in early to see only one dealer. Biz was good, and back home we went.

Friday was true test. The dealers were allowed in at 10. Wholesale in the room again was decent to strong. The real test came at 2:00 when the public was allowed in. Collector traffic in the room was low to moderate. However, the make up of who was there certainly rivaled any major auction with a special collection! A common comment from several dealers was that the show brought in much better educated collectors then a Baltimore or a Long Beach. Of course many collectors were just mulling around until the big event-when CAC starts accepting coins at 10AM on Saturday. We saw several collectors we knew who had flown in just to attend the show. All of these collectors did shop, and many even bought coins. Many new collectors to dealer contacts were made at the show. Our sales to collectors on Friday were very good. In fact on Friday alone, we sold more McClaren coins than we did in Philadelphia (yes, we sold only 4 in Philly-but Coinfest blew that number away in the first hour)! Of course we sold a few coins from our regular inventory as well.
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COLORADO SPRINGS – The American Numismatic Association will expand its National Money Show™ from three days to four days, beginning with the spring convention in Fort Worth, TX, in March 2010, Executive Director Larry Shepherd announced.

The show, initially scheduled to be open to the public Friday through Sunday, will now be open Thursday, March 25 through Sunday, March 28 at the Fort Worth Convention Center. Dealer set-up will be open on Wednesday afternoon. Adding the extra day signals a commitment from the ANA to expand the size of the National Money Show. In addition, the ANA is considering other changes that will add to the excitement and drawing power of the event.

“As the preeminent member based organization in numismatics, the ANA should host the best coin shows in the country,” said Shepherd. “Several commercial and regional shows have equaled or surpassed our spring show in size and dealer participation. We believe a renewed emphasis on growing and improving this show will ensure that the National Money Show continues to be among the elite spring shows in the country.

Critical to the success of this show in the future will be better scheduling and site selection, factors we are putting a lot of emphasis on currently. In the future our National Money Shows will be held in larger cities than in the past, and these cities will be selected to provide maximum appeal to collectors and dealers.”

Shepherd said he is pleased that the ANA’s summer convention, the World’s Fair of Money®, remains the golden grail of coin shows and hopes that the National Money Show will one day become the nation’s premier spring coin event.
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