(Long Beach, California) – Leaders of five of the hobby and profession’s most influential organizations are launching a multi-pronged consumer awareness and protection campaign against counterfeit numismatic items sold and imported from China and elsewhere. The organizations in alphabetical order are the American Numismatic Association (ANA), the Industry Council for Tangible Assets (ICTA), Numismatic Guaranty Corporation (NGC), Professional Coin Grading Service (PCGS) and the Professional Numismatists Guild (PNG).

Leaders of five major numismatic hobby and professional organizations met in Long Beach, California on May 27, 2009 to discuss possible consumer education and law enforcement actions to curtail imports and sales of counterfeit coins. From left to right: Scott Schechter, CCG/NGC; Armen Vartian, PNG; Don Willis, PCGS; Jeff Garrett, PNG; Diane Piret, ICTA; Raymond Gregson, Jr., retired I.R.S. criminal investigation special agent; Fred Weinberg, ICTA; Barry Stuppler, ANA; Robert Brueggeman, PNG; and Gary Adkins, PNG. Not pictured: meeting moderator Donn Pearlman. (Photo credit: Donn Pearlman.)

Representatives of the five groups participated in a preliminary teleconference call on May 7, 2009, and then met in Long Beach, California on May 27 to discuss a coordinated plan of action. The groups recognize that counterfeiting can’t be completely stopped, but that efforts can be made to reduce the easy availability of fakes and to educate coin buyers about common sense ways to avoid unwittingly purchasing them.

They agreed to pursue a three-part strategy as a group and/or as individual organizations: initiate consumer education and protection programs including online resources to reach the casual coin-buying public who are not part of the mainstream numismatic community; aggressively attempt to compel online auction sites to be more responsive to complaints about fraudulent listings of fake certification services’ holders and replica coins that are in violation of The Hobby Protection Act; and utilize ICTA’s extensive experience in Washington, DC to explore possible criminal actions by federal law enforcement agencies against importers and sellers of illegal numismatic items. (more…)

Mark Naber, founder of ForgeryNetwork.com, answers a few questions about collectable coin forgeries and the purpose of ForgeryNetwork.com.

How bad is the risk of buying counterfeits?

This really is quite a complicated question, depending on what you buy, what venue you buy through and your expertise in the area you collect and your ability to identify the tell tale signs of counterfeits. The dealer and geographical location of where your buy your coins will also impact the risk of buying a counterfeit. For example, if you are inexperienced collector looking for bargains on EBay from unknown dealers, in places such as China, you will almost certainly purchase counterfeits. On the other end of spectrum if you are experienced and buying from reputable dealers whom are experienced in that area, your risk is very low. Knowledge of what you are buying and whom you are buying through is the key to lowering risk. This is nothing new to most seasoned collectors, but it is unfortunate to see new collectors falling into these traps.

What would you advise new collectors to do?

The best advice I would give new collectors is to start small and slowly gain the knowledge as you go. By small I mean don’t spend much – let your spending habits slowly increase along with your expertise. Buy from reputable dealers whom specialise in what you wish to collect, join relevant clubs and discussion boards on the internet and learn; there is a wealth of information nowadays thanks to the internet. There is also a rule of thumb that one should spend 5%-10% of your annual collection budget upon books about coins and coin forgeries. The most risky thing a new collector can do is look for bargains without adequate knowledge. The old saying applies – If it’s too good to be true, it probably is. (more…)

By Len Ratzman – The California Numismatist – CoinLink Content Partner

The high only lasted a couple of hours.

It took only that long to find out that my friend’s 1795 Flowing Hair 3-leaf dollar in MS-55 (my estimate) that had been left to her by her greatgrandfather was, sadly, only a good counterfeit.

When Sarah called me from work that day, she didn’t even say hello. Her fi rst, excited words were, “Len, what do you know about old dollars?” I told her my thirty-plus years in numismatics coveting only buffalo nickels didn’t include silver dollars of any age. But, since she knew nothing about coins, she knew from 20 years of friendship that I could research the coin for her.

When she told me over the phone that the dollar was dated 1795, it didn’t take a specialist in the hobby to know instantly what potential value laid waiting to be realized.

I jumped into the car and made it to the restaurant where she worked in 11 minutes—normally a 20 minute drive. With my loupe already in hand, I said, “Hi,” and with indescribable anticipation asked her to show me the coin.

Although my grading skills only covered buffaloes from 30 years of studying them, I could still tell from the fi ne detail that, if genuine, the grading companies would probably register the dollar as an MS-55 or better. Cha-ching!

The next two hours were a blur of researching the Internet, visiting coinrelated Web sites, phone calls to local dealers and opening that latest Red Book to a section I hadn’t ever paid attention to.

But wait! A $30,000 coin just popping up out of nowhere? If it’s too good to be true, it usually isn’t. So, before I started making plans to send in the coin to be registered, I dug a little deeper and learned from a prominent expert on dollars that countless counterfeits from a foreign country had reached the states and there were two ways to tell a fake from the real thing: (more…)