By Greg Reynolds

I. Who is Mr. Kris Oyster?

For around thirty-five years, Mr. Kris Oyster has been a coin dealer and he is currently well known on the nationwide show circuit. As the managing director of numismatics for DGSE, Oyster rose to fame when DGSE acquired Superior Galleries in 2007, as Superior has been a fixture in the coin business for many decades. Now, for the first time, he has agreed to be interviewed for a nationwide audience.

Greg Reynolds: Are you Managing Director of Numismatics for both DGSE and Superior Galleries? What does this job entail?

Kris Oyster: Yes, for both, and, as managing director, I am responsible for all aspects of the numismatic division of DGSE Companies nationwide .

GR: How long has DGSE been in business?

KO: DGSE has been a big name in rare coins since the firm was [organized] in 1977. I have been a coin dealer since the mid 1970’s. I became involved with DGSE in 1997. DGSE is a publicly traded company.

GR: Is DGSE well known to people in Texas?

KO: Dallas Gold and Silver is a household name in the Southwest. DGSE began in a local mall and has expanded into a hundred million dollar business. We are a major wholesaler and retailers of fine jewelry and diamonds as well as sports memorabilia,bullion products, rare coins and currency. Our revenue in 2008 was in excess of $105 million dollars. Rare coins and currency accounted for $17 million dollars of these sales in 2008. We are at almost all major coin shows as well as most regional venues. We have showrooms in Dallas and Euless, Texas, also near Charleston, South Carolina, and of course our Superior Galleries and Superior Gold and Diamond operations in Woodland Hills [in Los Angeles County]. My office is at the headquarters in Dallas. Gary Shepherd is our coin man in Euless and Brian Cohn handles our Charleston area operation.

GR: Do you serve collectors at all locations?

Yes, we even have a large cent expert on staff, Mike McKee. When I met Mike, he was 12 years old. He come into the DGSE headquarters store with his dad to buy [better-date] Lincoln pennies for his collection. We even buy and sell ancient coins. Ronnie Deschane is our on-hand consultant for ancients. Our coin expert in Euless, Gary Shepard, specializes in circulated U.S. coins that thousands of collectors want to buy, like Indian cents, Shield nickels, Barber coins, Morgan dollars, Liberty Seated series, and Extremely Fine to MS-63 19th century gold coins. We do a large business in not so expensive collector coins. We sell a big mix of collector coins, from colonial times to 2009 Proof sets. When I say that all collectors are welcome, I really mean it.

GR: What are your specialties?

KO: U.S. gold coins, U.S. paper money, and Morgan dollars. (more…)

Legend Numismatics is proud to announce the outright purchase of the Brian Sonnier Collection of colored dollars and CC GSA coins.

Brian is a long time collector (known to many as GSAGUY). You may have seen him set up at shows back in the early to mid 90’s to just display his coins.

He started his work on this incredible collection over 20 years ago. It did not matter whether it was a colored Morgan or a 91CC GSA, he had to have the best and wildest looking. The results are mind-boggling.

This collection blows away ALL other colored dollar sets that we have ever seen (yes, this collection in some ways is wilder than Sunnywood). There is every type of ORIGINAL coloration pattern. The colors mimic the wildest brightest rainbows-and yes, there are tons of reds and greens.

This was not a collection assembled overnight. Major collections were cherry picked, every auction was checked out, and he had several dealers always “on the hunt” so he could get the best of the best colored coins.

Unlike recent major colored collections to have hit the market, these coins are NOT near color misses or watered down grade wise. They also are not over graded as 95% of the collection was raw! And we did pay well in excess of $10,000.00 for more than one 80S-82S $1!!!!!!!!!

A small portion of his CC GSA collection was purchased in partnership with long time CC dealer Doug Sharpe (Aspen Rare Coins) of Sarasota Florida.

Doug as well has known Brian for many years. Since GSA’s were not our strong point, we knew Doug was the right dealer to assist us. As for the remainder of the CC’s, Brian loves them too much wanted to happily keep that part of his collection (believe us, we tried hard to buy them).

We thank Brian for keeping his promise to us over the years. Sitting at his dinning room table, the negotiations took minutes. It was tough for him to sell, but he knows the coins are going to be placed in the best homes. We have not stopped drooling and looking at the coins! Every single coin is a memorable MONSTER!

Additional Images and availability can be found on the Legend Numismatics Website

By Laura Sperber – Legend Numismatics

THE SHOW

We can never stop telling all our friends who read this what a terrific job Mary Counts, David Chrenshaw and team do. Every show there is something new and improved. If you can’t make an ANA or FUN, the Baltimore Shows are a must attend!

We’d also like to thank everyone who stopped by to see the display of a few treats from the amazing Brian Sonnier Collection of colored dollars.

ACTIVITY

This is tricky. Legend did extremely well, but we set no records (although we did sell a big coin for a record price, see below). One thing we never felt was a true “flow”. We spoke to other dealers who had great shows, and some dealers who did miserable. So we will term the overall show as “hit or miss”.

Activity prior to the show in the hotels was extremely strong. Gold was up and the crack out genius’ and others were hot to buy the cheaper gold. However, unlike previous runs, they were not purchasing bigger gold coins (they would however call their customers and easily pre-sell many bigger coins). They just wanted generics. Our sales were a little sluggish prior to the show opening. It stunned us as we had just come from record sales back in our office.

When the show actually started (dealer set up), there was little to no buzz. Its not that dealers weren’t sure of the levels, it was more like everyone was too cautious for one reason or another. But, dealers did want to do business. Probably the biggest problem (something which is usually not recognized until later) was little there was to buy on the floor and the auctions. The services weren’t making much either. So anything really nice and fresh, sold immediately for a big premium while everything else sat around.

The public attendance was strong, but they did not seem to be buying heavy. Most just wanted to look around and collect information.

Through out the entire show, we were busy selling many McClaren coins. On the floor, our stealth sales team (lead by a dealer we will call the Energizer Bunny because he keeps going and going….) did very well. Of course the cheaper the prices, the more sales the crew did. We were VERY surprised to see the amount of mid range Type ($4,000-$10,000.00) they sold. Even though at the hotels Gold was in demand, our stealth team sold more silver Type, with Walkers being next on the list.

Each day we walked the entire bourse floor to see if anything new surfaced. On Friday, we only spent $8,000.00! There was NOTHING for us! This Baltimore show was Legends WORST buying show EVER!!! We’re not going to change our standards to fill our cases or put inferior dreck on our web site. (more…)