Archive for category: Market Reports News

The holiday is now officially underway. Retailers worldwide participated in Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotions, trying to lure customers to their respective businesses. The Reeded Edge was no exception. Historically, we use this busy weekend to launch promotions, establish new customer relationships and clear out some older inventory. Apparently, our efforts paid off. Monday was one of our busiest shipping days of the year, with almost one hundred parcels finding their way to new owners around the country. For those of you familiar with our annual holiday sale, this is probably old news. Our focus was on number of coins out the door rather than just profit margin. At the end of the day, there were plenty of losers, primarily coins that had been in inventory for an extended time. As we have said repeatedly throughout the year, many coins have declined in value. Not surprisingly, these also tend to be the coins that languish in dealers’ inventories. Although no business likes to lose money, it is a byproduct of maintaining an inventory. Now, it is on to the new as we put some of this money back to work restocking the shelves. Rest assured, there are plenty of deals in the works, with many new coins on the immediate horizon. Stay tuned.

Next week, we will close out our 2019 coin show schedule with The Annandale Coin Show in Annandale, VA (just south of Washington D.C.). Both Rob and Robbie will be on hand for The Reeded Edge. They will have hundreds of newer coins with them, spanning collector coins from a couple hundred dollars and less to five figure rarities. Diversity is always the name of the game with our firm, as we cater to collectors at every level. Annandale also marks our final BUYING push of the year, so please offer any fresh, numismatic items to the guys. They will be aggressive, with The Reeded Edge’s open checkbook policy in full effect. Just look for the giant BUYING, BUYING, BUYING sign immediately inside the front entrance of the bourse hall, and one of the guys should be close behind. Washington is one of the most beautiful cities in the world, especially so during the holidays when it’s fully decorated. Perhaps, consider an extended weekend in the D.C. area, taking in this active local coin show along the way.

We hope that everybody had a Happy Thanksgiving; we want to extend a special thank you for your business and patronage throughout 2019. Both mean a lot to us. Finally, we would be humbled and honored to continue serving you throughout the holiday season. May each of your holidays be filled with joy, health and peace.

Baltimore once again reaffirmed that it is one of the premier coin shows on the circuit. Although this show at times had a different feel, at the end of the day, it flat-out produced. Rob and Robbie arrived in Baltimore on Tuesday to start their usual array of  pre-show trading. They found some of their regular wholesale trading partners to be a bit more cautious and reserved in their buying patterns. Any initial trepidation seemed gone by Wednesday afternoon, as they concluded their wholesale trading with a regular client who in Rob’s words was “as aggressive as ever”.  Show setup however had that tentative feeling again. There seems to be a hangover in the wholesale numismatic arena that hasn’t entirely gone away throughout the year. Perhaps, this is due to declining values in the generic numismatic sectors causing a glut of stagnant inventory and associated cash flow challenges. The key to prospering in this environment is keeping inventory moving, a concept that seems to be alluding many dealers. We are pleased that the collectors seem totally oblivious to these challenges. For them, lower prices spell opportunity. We have noticed that many series seem to have hit their sweet spots and are selling again, with some vigorously. U.S. Commemoratives are a perfect example of a series that has experienced a renaissance. The guys also reported activity in U.S. Gold, and in particular, larger coins. There has been apprehension of late to buy $10 and $20 gold, a byproduct of the European bank hoards of U.S. gold that has been literally flooding the market over the last several years. We believe that collectors are finally coming to the realization that many dates are not represented in these hoards, and they needn’t fear the series as a whole. We sold several scarce date $10 and $20 pieces in Baltimore which is an encouraging sign, and hopefully signifies a shift in collector buying trends moving forward. It was argued by some of the dealers in Baltimore that the overall collector attendance was down. Although we can neither confirm or dispel this, we would comment that the quality of the customer attending this show was as good as ever. Friday was nothing short of pandemonium at The Reeded Edge’s booth, with collectors lined up two-deep for much of the day. By the end of Saturday, the guys were both exhausted and satisfied. Hundreds of coins were both bought and sold, and thousands of dollars of business transacted over the period of 5 days, the culmination of yet another very successful Whitman Baltimore Coin Show.

Thankfully, we have two weeks back in the home office to come up for air. After a successful but grueling consecutive run of coin shows, Rob and Robbie are back, assisting the office staff in processing inventory, working on upcoming ads and price lists and some general clean-up. Although this hardly qualifies as glamorous work, it is the necessary byproduct of weeks on the road buying coins. P.A.N. was a brisk show, with steady activity throughout. The guys bought and sold quite a bit of material, although the beginning of the show proved to be the most active. The Reeded Edge has established themself as a buyer at all of these type of shows, and the flurry of material offered to us reflected that. Rob made the observation that the dealers lamenting about a slow show were the ones planted at their booths waiting for something to happen. In this business climate, you need to be creative. This could be as simple as putting a large sign up promoting your business or as arduous as canvassing every table in the room. The point is business is competitive at coin shows (and elsewhere, for that matter), and the dealer who expects that the old model of throwing out bird seed to attract the birds will work exclusively, is sadly mistaken. As we have professed time and time again, some shows are made from buying, others from selling and the remainder from a mix of a little of both; but, seldom is the success formula for any two coin shows identical.

There is a cute story that we like to re-tell about an outsider who accompanies his collector friend to a large coin show. The story goes that after a day of walking around the bourse, the outsider made the following observations: The dealers behind the tables resembled a retirement home, with the average age over 65. The collectors sitting in front of the tables were older yet. Where is the youth in this hobby? More worrisome, if this trend continues, where will this hobby be in 10 years? This almost exact scenario (although paraphrased) was published in the A.N.A.’s magazine The Numismatist back in the 1930s! This leads us to our next observation about the current trend of coin shows. Show attendance has been noticeably off across the board, but the market in general remains strong. How can this be? In our estimation, we are in a transitionary period, one which we feel will continue its path into the future. The coin show, as a medium for conducting numismatic business between dealers and collectors, is moving towards obsolescence. The shift that we have noticed with all but the most ardent club-supported shows and larger national shows is one towards a wholesale environment. In other words, dealers attend coin shows to trade with other dealers. Collectors still supporting coin shows are an aging demographic, much like the group still using print publications as their business medium. The internet is the wave of the future, and it is where the youth in our hobby has migrated. With the advent of digital imaging, the need to see items in person becomes much less important. Numismatics is moving in the same direction as the rest of retail commerce. For those who fear change, this is a scary proposition. However, for the forward-thinker, endless opportunities abound for the future of our hobby. Other hobbies, such as stamp collecting have been resurrected by platforms like eBay. We project the same for coins. The instantaneous ability to share information allows collectors and dealers to network like never before. The power and potential is limitless, and it is a prospect that we are excited about. Much like the future of the hobby prognosticated by the outsider 80+ years ago, it looks daunting at face value, but is actually very bright once all factors are considered.

As the old saying goes, there is no place like home. This is especially true coming on the heels of successive weeks on the road. Last week’s North Carolina Numismatic Association’s Annual Convention was pretty much as expected. The crowds were decent, and the seller’s plentiful. But, absent was the quality retail buyer. This show just does not seem to garner this sector, at least not in the numbers that other shows of comparable size do. Despite this noticeable void, the guys still reported a solid show. This was especially true from a buying perspective. Although there were few really marquis coins from Charlotte, there were definitely numerous purchases, In all, the quantity of material may have actually eclipsed the prior week’s VNA show in Fredericksburg. Of special note, was a large raw collection, which should be featured shortly on our TRECOINS eBay store. For those of you new here, we do not list any raw coins in our online store, on our REEDEDEDGE eBay account, in Coin World or Numismatic News, on Collector’s Corner or our regular published price list (both electronic and print). This is just one more reason why collectors of raw coins should make a point to visit our TRECOINS eBay store. With two weeks in the office before heading to Pittsburgh for the PAN Show, we hope to be playing a lot of catch-up, including listing many of the coins which have been sitting idle in our vault for the past several weeks. To put it in plain terms, we BETTER get caught up, because another large collection is looming in the very near future. With the help of our first-rate office staff, we know that we will get it done without missing a beat. Next week, we will be featuring an in-depth look at the early fall coin market, so please stay tuned.

Ask Rob and Robbie what their single favorite coin show of the year is, and they will probably both answer VNA. The Virginia Numismatic Association Annual Convention is just the perfect mix of everything. It’s not too big but yet not too small. Although populated by mostly regional dealers, it also attracts some national players. The crowd is always robust and eclectic. There are a plethora of coins and coin collectors in this area, so one never knows what might walk through the front door.  For these reasons and more, the guys have a large front and center spread, very probably the largest bourse of certified coins in the entire room. Just look for the giant BUYING, BUYING, BUYING sign (visible from virtually all vantage points in the room) marking the Reeded Edge’s end-cap booth. Not to out-do the last several shows, but both the quantity and diversity of our United States certified coin inventory in Fredericksburg will be unprecedented. Please consider stopping by our booth with your want list. Equally as important, the guys will be aggressively BUYING ANY OR ALL BETTER, FRESH UNITED STATES COLLECTOR COINS. Our open-checkbook policy will be in full effect; we routinely get asked if we are buying coins, to which we ALWAYS answer, “WE ARE ALWAYS BUYING!” This weekend in Fredericksburg will be no exception. We certainly hope that this historically important and quaint city is in your travel plans for this upcoming weekend, as the guys would love to see you at the show!