G'day Stackers, is it a reasonable rule of thumb that queen Victoria sovereigns will always be more valuable than the king George if they are of the same condition? Is there a particular king George to look out for?
What sort of money would you expect to pay for these 1921P ($1400) near unc & 1925P choice unc ($1950)
That is of great assistance & much appreciated Thank you very much. OT: do have a nugget "Golden Eagle" you would consider selling? Thanks, Tony.
Fair enough, I don't blame you. If you are interested in trading an unc specimen GE + a 1/4 of something else, I could trade a 1/2 oz unc specimen hand of faith
Would you mind sharing which auction was that? (I agree $1950 for ChUnc 1925P is a tad steep, although they apparently tend to be scarce in top grades.)
G'day jultorsk, is was a mate of mine. I need to work on getting him a bit closer to the money by the sounds of it.
Thanks for that info HYG, probably a better gauge than the book, although it is only one sale it certainly helps to sort the oats from the chaff.
Thanks HYG. There were some nice collections dispersed in that auction. That GV went for a very reasonable price.
Market is starting to price varieties at lower grades . The ever so larger of the young heads (1871-1887) and larger of the Jubilee are few dollars more. AFAIK these have never been well documented with in McDonalds or Renniks about which mintmarks go with which shields/st geoge, go with which effigy die. (Correct me if wrong)
I have only Renniks, but I'd agree - there's loads more granular info in Spink. There should be a new edition of the Marsh (Steve Hill) book coming late next spring as well.
I don't know, I though McDonald did a pretty good job listing and identifying the varieties in both the Young Head/St. George as well as the Jubilee Head/St. George Sovereigns. He even went to the trouble of providing photographic step by step instruction's to identify the long, medium, and short tails, as well as the BP variations, the WW head portraits, and all the J.E.B. varieties. I thought that was a top effort from Greg, considering his was only a small pocket book catalogue and not a specialists guide! I did purchase some high grade Young Head varieties some years ago from Downies auctions, which used to be part of the Ted Gibson collection and there were only three or four known of some of the varieties back then. Foolishly, I resold some of them a couple of years ago, but still have a few left in my collection, I have not kept abreast with these coins so I am not sure what the known number of each is now. This is definitely an absorbing and fascinating field of sovereign collecting to get into with all these varieties to look for, and with lesser grade examples being able to be procured for not a lot over bullion value it is accessible to collectors both rich and poor to enjoy.
To be honest I mostly ignore tales, WW, BP and so on and look only at date, mint and grade. There's already enough things making certain coins rare now. No need to introduce more variations and rarity. Would start to look silly if PCGS/NGC said such and such AU50 sovereign is top of pop.
To answer your question, yes. Victorias are harder to find and sell for a bit more than Georges. The better question is: who cares? Remember, they all have 0.2354 oz of gold in them. They were all in UK colony circulation, and they all have a king or queen on them. Time is money. If you want to play the numismatic game and pretend one is "more valuable," that's up to you... dealers will love you for it. Trust me. If you want to buy at significant premiums and then fail to find buyers and eventually have dealers/traders (same ones you may have bought from) give you spot-ish price and "down market" excuses in the end, enjoy that. That's how the numi game works. If, on the other hand, you want to stack and stack easily (and sell off quick when needed), then you need to do that efficiently and realize they're all the same gold content, same currency history, etc. Personally, I have hundreds of the things bought over the last 20yrs or so. I like them. I like recognizable 9167 gold with history to it, and the sovs are significantly cheaper premium than then American pre-1933 ones. Those old USA eagle and half would be my pick, but premiums are stupid for my goals. Modern AGEs and krugs are too big, and besides, they were never money. Sovereigns are ideal for history, reasonable size/price, and liquidity. A coin type that's easy to find and buy/sell a lot of when you have the xtra money or gold price is low/high in your eyes is a key. Time is money! I would say, over the years, I have majority Edwards (usually cheapest), a lot of George, some veil ("old") Vic, fewer jubilee, only a few young Vic. I don't get the newer non-circulation Elizabeths at all... for gold, I like coins tough enough to not scratch easily and ones that were money at one time. That is just the mix of sovs that I happen to find for low-priced sovereigns. Again, I could care less about year, Aussie vs UK vs South Africa etc mint, or a few scratches... I just get real circulated sovereigns. I buy the "random date" ones from bullion store sales when possible... usually they send Edwards or George for those, very few veils in my purchases of randoms. I got the variety that I did since I get whatever is on sale but try for variety if prices are same/similar... never paid more than 10% premium on any, usually under 5% with various sales or motivated sellers. To be clear, couldn't tell you what years or mints to save my life... most/all "commons" I am sure. Again, if you want get into the pompous numi circus and start trying to memorize what year or mint or grade fetches what prices, then you get to worry if they may have been misgraded or jeweler copied for numi reasons. You also get to seek far and wide for buyers or sellers at the "right" price. Have fun. Only do it if you really enjoy that... time is money. Also, if you are old or pass unexpected, any numi stuff you have will be basically useless to heirs... they will just get duped by dealers when selling it. They will all sell for spot, though... everyone knows that. The numi fans can try to find and convince a buyer to pay more. Not my cup of protein shake
Bingo I go in asking for bullion sovs or even better if they have 1/2's And all I say is ,I don't want to look at them as I don't discriminate . Most dealers will still lay them out for you to look at ,all I do is take the oldest ones . Make the transaction easy And when people ask me what "grade" the coin is ? "Good condition for age "
Thanks SG, all good advice for somebody like me dipping my toe in the sovereign pool- better to start at the shallow end
Key date coins and rare bars always appreciate at a faster rate than gold and silver price. A stacker that ignores collectability is basically leaving thousands on the table for the next person. (I honestly don't see the appeal of most collectibles but if there's demand... )