Selling and Buying Coins and Other Things
10/20/2023It seems to be becoming normal in the coin business for sales offers to not include a statement about the condition (grade) from the coin. Look at the picture, the offers suggest. Well, two things. One: it’s a picture, it’s not thing itself. Maybe the picture was “worked on.” Two: occasionally I’ve bought a coin online and it was not the one that was pictured. Anyway, I’m old school, and … Click here to read the whole article!
6 December 2021 So now I have seen 6 numismatic holdings get dealt with after the passing of the owner. The first one left specific instructions, though not in the will, to contact me for the disposition of the collection. It’s been 4 years. Nothing has happened. The second was a dealer, we were on the same wavelength, though we were not close. I ran into another dealer at a … Click here to read the whole article!
We all know what a fantasy is, don’t we? Something acts like it’s real but it’s not real. In the world of coins there are things that look like coins, maybe they even say that they’re worth a certain amount, like coins do. But it’s not a coin. Fantasies and Coins and the Human Condition Fantasy is where we go to get away from “it.” Right? Whatever the structure of … Click here to read the whole article!
I asked the web: What is a coin? It told me: “a flat, typically round piece of metal with an official stamp, used as money.” And a token: a voucher that can be exchanged for goods or services, typically one given as a gift or offered as part of a promotional offer. And two others: a thing serving as a visible or tangible representation of a fact, and of course the cybernetic definitions. The second one seems more fundamental to me. Tower of … Click here to read the whole article!
Generally speaking, when I write these blogs, any time I refer to “coin collecting,” I am in my mind including the collection of paper money, tokens, medals, and military awards. To me they are all specialized branches of the general field of numismatics. “Numismatics” is a word that describes the study of coins, and by extension the study of anonymous items of value or representations of value in commerce. And I’m referring to … Click here to read the whole article!
What are coins? What makes them interesting? What do coins reveal about history? What are they worth? Why do people collect them? Does coin collecting have investment value? “What are coins?” This may seem like a silly question, but the world as-we-know-it is changing rapidly. There may be a time in the not too distant future when some people might not know what a coin is. I’m Bob Reis, the owner of Golden … Click here to read the whole article!