Certification Services should justify their actions!

I'll start off by saying that I DO NOT BELIEVE IN A GRADE OF MS70!!!!!!
Perhaps that is the "old school" collector in me or just plain common sense
but I am tired of seeing coins that grade MS70 that go for many times what
an MS69 go for.

I believe that when a coin is being slabbed MS70 or MS69, a letter should
accompany the coin so as to explain why it made the grade or missed the
grade. Explaining in detail to the consumer what may be wrong with the coin
to not have been slabbed MS70 will better serve the coin collecting
community.

Am I wrong in wanting this justification??

I do not slab my coins because it is too darn expensive. I can use that
money to buy other specimens that I may need. However, I think for the
price that they charge to slab these coins, they can write a letter
explaining why a particular coin obtained a certain grade.

Fred

PS- THERE IS NO MS70!!!!!!

I believe Mr. Sheldon stated that MS70 was a THEORETICAL grade and WOULD BE
worth 70 times the grade of G-4.

he has made no justification that it ever existed.
I for one do not believe it exists and it is all a marketing ploy for
registry sets.

However, that is my opinion, and I respect all of yours. But, I am not
going to dump $40,000 for a penny in MS70. I'll take my money and buy
earlier pieces for my collection.

Fred


"Michael E. Marotta" wrote in message
om...
"Fred" wrote
I'll start off by saying that I DO NOT BELIEVE IN A GRADE OF MS70!!!!!!
PS- THERE IS NO MS70!!!!!!

Sure there is. I have a Silver Roosevelt Dime graded MS-70 by ICG.
It looks perfect to me.

You have to cull out the reality of today from the historical
development of grading. Remember that the 70-point scale was the work
of psychologist William Sheldon who measured Hillary Rodham (Clinton)
naked in his quest to quantify everthing. On the original Sheldon
Scale, an MS-70 Large Cent would be worth $70; while a MS-1 would
bring $1. That was his rationale back then.

Over time, we got used to calling all Good coins 4 and all Very Fine
coins 20 to 35 with Extemely Fine being 45, and so on, with 10 steps
of Mint State from 60 to 70 -- and applying this to Eisenhower Dollars
and all manner of other coins that Sheldon never saw in his lifetime
and never considered though he might. (How did Sheldon grade Seated
Dimes?) When Third Party Grading came along, the services (and the
Red Book) adopted the 70-point scale.

Well, all of that is fine, perhaps, but really it is (perhaps) totally
irrelevant. The reality is that of the billions of coins struck, some
small percentage are truly perfect. I have one. My friends James
Taylor and J. P. Martin assured me that the coin is MS-70. They know
coins even better than I do. I trust their judgment.

Whether or not ABC certification agrees with XYZ certifcation that the
famous 1804 Novodel Dollar is this or that grade and was never
cleaned, etc., opens a different can of worms. Whether JKL or PQR or
UVW grading service is owned by saints or sinners is another can of
worms.

If you watch some traffic lights really closely, you could swear that
the light can be yellow and red at the same split second. You cannot
tell that to the cop when you run the red light. What I mean is that
given that a reasonable, knowledgable person can sort out grading
services and grade, the fact remains that 70 is perfect and such coins
do exit.

Michael
ANA R-162953

In the early days of ANACS grading, we got in a matte proof 1912 $20 St.
Gaudens that was absolutely literally flawless. We certified it as a Proof-70.
..
A few months later the company that had submitted it put it in one of their
auctions as a Proof-69, with no mention of the certification. When I asked them
why they did it that way, they said that they were afraid that nobody would
believe them if they ran it in the catalogue as a Proof-70.
..
That coin was NICE!
..
Tom DeLorey
..
Subject: Certification Services should justify their actions!
From: (Michael E. Marotta)
Date: 8/8/2003 10:31 PM Central Daylight Time
Message-id:

"Fred" wrote
I'll start off by saying that I DO NOT BELIEVE IN A GRADE OF MS70!!!!!!
PS- THERE IS NO MS70!!!!!!

Sure there is. I have a Silver Roosevelt Dime graded MS-70 by ICG.
It looks perfect to me.

You have to cull out the reality of today from the historical
development of grading. Remember that the 70-point scale was the work
of psychologist William Sheldon who measured Hillary Rodham (Clinton)
naked in his quest to quantify everthing. On the original Sheldon
Scale, an MS-70 Large Cent would be worth $70; while a MS-1 would
bring $1. That was his rationale back then.

Over time, we got used to calling all Good coins 4 and all Very Fine
coins 20 to 35 with Extemely Fine being 45, and so on, with 10 steps
of Mint State from 60 to 70 -- and applying this to Eisenhower Dollars
and all manner of other coins that Sheldon never saw in his lifetime
and never considered though he might. (How did Sheldon grade Seated
Dimes?) When Third Party Grading came along, the services (and the
Red Book) adopted the 70-point scale.

Well, all of that is fine, perhaps, but really it is (perhaps) totally
irrelevant. The reality is that of the billions of coins struck, some
small percentage are truly perfect. I have one. My friends James
Taylor and J. P. Martin assured me that the coin is MS-70. They know
coins even better than I do. I trust their judgment.

Whether or not ABC certification agrees with XYZ certifcation that the
famous 1804 Novodel Dollar is this or that grade and was never
cleaned, etc., opens a different can of worms. Whether JKL or PQR or
UVW grading service is owned by saints or sinners is another can of
worms.

If you watch some traffic lights really closely, you could swear that
the light can be yellow and red at the same split second. You cannot
tell that to the cop when you run the red light. What I mean is that
given that a reasonable, knowledgable person can sort out grading
services and grade, the fact remains that 70 is perfect and such coins
do exit.

Michael
ANA R-162953








TomDeLorey
..
"Standard Oil" What they use to keep the grading standards slippery!

In article ,
nowspam says...
In the early days of ANACS grading, we got in a matte proof 1912 $20 St.
Gaudens that was absolutely literally flawless. We certified it as a Proof-70.
.
A few months later the company that had submitted it put it in one of their
auctions as a Proof-69, with no mention of the certification. When I asked them
why they did it that way, they said that they were afraid that nobody would
believe them if they ran it in the catalogue as a Proof-70.
.
That coin was NICE!

Now that's one I'd like to have a nice big picture of! (Notice I don't
even say I want to own it. I'm sure that would never happen.)

Chrysta

In article , (JSTONE9352) wrote:
I do not slab my coins because it is too darn expensive. I can use that
money to buy other specimens that I may need. However, I think for the
price that they charge to slab these coins, they can write a letter
explaining why a particular coin obtained a certain grade.


Not an unreasonable request for the cost
of slabbing. However, anything other than
a vague form letter kind of explanation
would open up a can of worms for the
grading services and I don't think they
will ever do it.

As long as they can hide behind the mysterious "market grade" to justify
their actions, we will never see a detailed description from the slabbers.
PCGS is getting heat from some collectors because they graded the latest
cent/dime mule MS65Red after it was known to have been handled several
times and even bounced off the floor of a store. My gosh, it must have
been an MS69Red when it was shipped from the USMint!!!

Deven Atkinson
--
Penny Lane Numismatic - Categorized Web Links
http://www.bright.net/~deven/pennylane.htm
ANA Member #1197707

Ira Stein, I was just wondering who taught you how to grade coins? Did
you buy a book or video or what? Ed

In article , ospam (Ira Stein) wrote:
Devan Atkinsin writes:

As long as they can hide behind the mysterious "market grade" to justify
their actions, we will never see a detailed description from the slabbers.
PCGS is getting heat from some collectors because they graded the latest
cent/dime mule MS65Red after it was known to have been handled several
times and even bounced off the floor of a store. My gosh, it must have
been an MS69Red when it was shipped from the USMint!!!




It is a common misconception that any coin, once handled, cannot be Mint State,
much less MS-65! That is simply not so.

IF the coin does not show wear on the high points under 7X magnification it
could still be graded MS and in fact would fit the definition of Mint State.
Even if the coin possessed a trace of a fingerprint it might still be graded
MS-65 by ANY of the top companies. remember. MS-65 does not define a perfect
coin! Far from it.

Yes. Perhaps I should have looked at the coin before passing judgement.
It has been my experience that after a cent is handled in commerce that the
MS65 ANA grading standard of "lightly fingermarked" can not hold true,
especially for a Red designation. But this coin could be an exception.
We must continue to disagree about market grading, Ira. I see it as a bane
to the hobby, and you live within its embrace. You know more about the
small cent "market" than I, but I know more about the technical grade of
the cents I want for my matched set.

BTW, what is up with the changed spelling of my name in your reply
header??? Devan Atkinsin? Too funny!

Deven Atkinson
--
Penny Lane Numismatic - Categorized Web Links
http://www.bright.net/~deven/pennylane.htm
ANA Member #1197707

Deven Atkinson writes:

Yes. Perhaps I should have looked at the coin before passing judgement.
It has been my experience that after a cent is handled in commerce that the
MS65 ANA grading standard of "lightly fingermarked" can not hold true,
especially for a Red designation. But this coin could be an exception.
We must continue to disagree about market grading, Ira. I see it as a bane
to the hobby, and you live within its embrace. You know more about the
small cent "market" than I, but I know more about the technical grade of
the cents I want for my matched set.

BTW, what is up with the changed spelling of my name in your reply
header??? Devan Atkinsin? Too funny!



Just a typo, Devan, as I am prone to do. No spell check in my AOL newsreader so
some of my typos are really atrocious.

Oh, I know full well how to grade technically, but the market seems to require
market grading in their slabbed material, and that the area in which I deal.

For example, you probably wouldn't agree with the grade of a $30,000 MS-65RD DD
Lincoln Cent, but since ALL were pulled out of circulation, that difficult to
get grade is real. If you buy certified coins in this market, you've got to
know the rules of the marketplace.



Ira Stein

Ed McGrath asks:

Ira Stein, I was just wondering who taught you how to grade coins? Did
you buy a book or video or what? Ed


Much simpler than that, Ed. I fake it!

Seriously, books and videos can be helpful and my first grading guide was with
line drawings in the Brown & Dunn Grading Guide in the 1960's, but years and
years of experience as a collector who could afford to attend major show and
saw tons of then raw material and later as a dealer going to even more shows,
one learns the ropes.

I've always been a stickler for the right "appearance" in a coin, first for my
own collections and then for inventory. As a guy who studied photography in
college in the 1960's, I believe I've always had a critical eye and I'm not
sure a critical eye can be taught. I believe it just comes naturally.



Ira Stein

In article , ospam (Ira Stein) wrote:
[snip]

Just a typo, Devan, as I am prone to do. No spell check in my AOL newsreader so
some of my typos are really atrocious.

Oh, I know full well how to grade technically, but the market seems to require
market grading in their slabbed material, and that the area in which I deal.

For example, you probably wouldn't agree with the grade of a $30,000 MS-65RD DD
Lincoln Cent, but since ALL were pulled out of circulation, that difficult to
get grade is real. If you buy certified coins in this market, you've got to
know the rules of the marketplace.

I only have to know the rules of my budget, and my wants. Market grade be
damned. If I bought a slabbed F12 1911S Lincoln cent because it matches
the 1911 and 1911D VG8+ coins I already had, then the rules of the
marketplace had nothing to do with it. How do I know? Because I put my
thumb over the slab grade when I look at a slabbed coin, and I was willing
to pay the offered price before I looked at the grade on the slab. What
has happened is that a VG8+ coin is now a F12 slabbed coin because people
like me are willing to pay what was F12 prices for VG8 coins. Granted the
swing here is only a dollar or two but why else, besides poor grading on
the part of a market leader third party grading service, would this VG8
coin end up in a F12 holder?? Why would such a low value coin be slabbed
at all?? The higher the market grade, the bigger the dollar swing, the
bigger the hype, and the more fraud that is possible.
I don't care who slabs it, that 11S was a very nice VG8, not a 12.

Don't get me wrong, Ira. I understand that you are earning money and need
to play the market grading game so you don't get burned by it. When I say
that market grading is fraud and a bane to the hobby, I mean the practice
of market grading, not those like you that need to embrace it to keep
selling and earning money. I am sure that if someone asked you to keep an
eye out for a nice 1911S F12 Lincoln cent for them, you would have passed
on the slab I described above. I think it is great that you do not play
the crackout game. You have my respect. Market grading does not.

Deven Atkinson
--
Penny Lane Numismatic - Categorized Web Links
http://www.bright.net/~deven/pennylane.htm
ANA Member #1197707