Collectors Universe Exits Jewelry Grading Businesses To Focus Resources on its Collectibles Grading
Yahoo Finance
Collectors Universe, Inc. (Nasdaq: CLCT) announced that it has decided to exit the business of authenticating and grading diamonds and colored gemstones, effective immediately. The Company will be continuing to license the Gemprint identification technology and related patents and Howard Pomerantz continues to manage the licensing effort. Michael Haynes, Chief Executive Officer, stated,”…economic conditions has led us to conclude that it is unlikely these businesses will be able to achieve the goals we had established for them when we first acquired those companies. As a consequence, management and the board of directors have decided to exit the jewelry businesses”
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Answers Still Not Forthcoming From the Mint
Susan Headley – About.com
The U.S. Mint’s Public Affairs office is still refusing to provide an explanation for the multiple shipping dates that Ultra-High Relief (UHR) coin buyers received. They also refuse to give us an update about the order tracking system and why it had been offline for more than two weeks now. I previously reported that they took this system down due to security concerns on the U.S. Mint’s Web site, but we still don’t know how long the system might be offline. There are so many outstanding issues right now that I don’t recall ever having a period like this from the Mint’s press office in the past.
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Gallery’s gold plans upended by fraud probe
GlobeandMail
When New York’s famed Gagosian Gallery was planning an upcoming exhibition at its Beverly Hills, Calif., gallery, One Ton, One Kilo, it needed an unusual art supply – 100 gold bars weighing one kilogram each.To get the bars, Gagosian director Melissa Lazarov contacted Joe Frisard, president of Stanford Coins & Bullion Inc. in Houston, who had dealt with the gallery before. On Feb. 2, Lazarov placed the order and wired Stanford $2.9-million (U.S.).The gold was just about to be shipped when federal agents raided the Houston office of Stanford Financial Group, which owns Stanford Coins. Within hours, the SEC filed civil charges in Texas and appointed a receiver to take control of all Stanford Group entities. The receiver immediately issued an order freezing all accounts and assets. Gagosian was stuck.
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Aggressive buying trends
By Mark Ferguson for COIN VALUES
Collectively, dealers probably have want lists for millions of specific coins from hundreds of thousands of individual collectors. But coins on want lists don’t necessarily coincide with major buying trends in the dealer community that supply dealers with enough coins for specific promotions and to maintain inventories of coins that are routinely selling well. Let’s look at some of the current major buying trends within the U.S. coin market.
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The Glittering Gold Dollar
By R.W. Julian, Coins Magazine
Collectors tend to think that the first coinage of a new denomination came soon after someone thought of the idea and persuaded Congress to create the necessary legislation. Sometimes this is true but the gold dollar is the exception. The first suggestion of a gold dollar seems to have been made by Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton in his report on a mint and coinage, presented to Congress in early 1791. When Congress finally got around to preparing draft legislation for a coinage bill in late 1791, the gold dollar was quietly dropped from the list of suggested coins, probably on the grounds that two different dollar coins, one of silver and one of gold, were one too many. The silver dollar was thus chosen as our standard coin.
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Interview of Eric P. Newman by John Adams and John Sallayl
Medal Collectors of America
John Adams and John Sallay interview Eric P. Newman, longtime collector and author specializing in Early American numismatics. In this hour-long interview (in two parts) Eric discusses his early years as a collector, his relationship with Burdette G. Johnson, their purchase of much of the Col. Edward H. R. Green collection, and his more recent activities with his numismatic foundation and museum.
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