July 4th Musings

I hope everyone enjoyed their 3-day weekend. July marks the beginning of the third quarter, and the coin market tends to quiet down in this period as the busy travel (marathon) schedule of January-May is much quieter in June-July until the ANA show. Many small dealers without employees take long vacations during this time of year.

Of course, at DLRC, we never slow down! There's no question that the economy is headed in some unusual places. On the one hand we are seeing an unprecedented credit crunch and the American consumer is really being squeezed thanks to gas prices and inflation in general. We'd all like to know how this will affect coin values.

For starters, many of the same forces that are pushing oil are also pushing gold prices. So that helps. But the irony is that generic certified gold pieces (especially Saint Gaudens PCGS/NGC MS60-64) are trading at the lowest premiums to spot prices ever. A knowledgable friend of mine told me at gold spot of $1500 we'll be melting mint state Saints! In other words, consumer demand for certified gold lags behing the metal price. As dealers and collectors who own such coins, we're profiting from the rising base metal cost of our inventory of such items but they are not worth as much as they should be!

What about type coins? Or good collector coins like Bust dollars or better date Barbers? Truly nice examples of these coins are still far scarcer than one would think and I would love to acquire a great collection of these coins. Especially a high end collection that is conservatively graded. I doubt the market would have any trouble getting excited about these coins. Last month's Stacks sale did really well becuase the coins were really fresh and desirable.

In the next day or two, I plan to write about some favorite coin series that I think have real potential. Please tell a friend about this BLOG. Take care and happy 4th!