50th Annual Coinarama
 

I went to check out the Coinarama show in San Diego today. This is my first visit to a coin show so I can't compare it to anything.

There were 42 dealers and 73 tables at this place. I arrived about 20 minutes after they opened and there were already a lot of people there. $4 to get in. I am a bullion guy. 99% of my stash is bullion. I have some older peace and morgan dollars that are circulated and a few older US gold coins in uncirculated condition, but nothing highly graded. Most of the tables were numismatic coins. I expected this but I was surprised how little bullion there was there considering how many dealers were present.

Morgans seemed to be really popular. The majority of dealers had graded and ungraded morgans. Not as many peace dollars in good quality. Several had heavily circulated morgan and peace dollars for sale at $13 each. One table had them at $12.50 but they looked pretty bad. One dealer had a lot of toned morgans, some were really nice looking. Maybe he had a system for toning them heavily?

Books and books of old quarters/nickels/dimes and pennies. I didn't pay much attention to these but there were tons of it. Lots of walking liberty halves, mostly ungraded but I didn't check out prices. Quite a bit of foreign coins. A few tables had ancient coins but I know very little about them so I just looked quick. About ten dealers had paper money. I would like to have one of these old gold notes but it seems like such a waste to spend about $300 on one when I could get 20 oz of silver. Quite a variety of old notes. Several dealers had old proof and mint sets. A couple dealers had all the new collectible stuff but I didn't pay any attention to it.

Gold seemed to be in short supply. Most dealers had no gold. Most of the gold was old St Gaudens, Liberties, and Indians. Mostly graded but a few tables had ungraded old gold. A little foreign gold was there, mostly sovereigns and angels. As far as modern gold it was pretty scarce. Maybe half a dozen dealers had modern gold and it was mostly Eagles. There were a few smaller denomination Pandas, Maples, Nuggets, and Krugs. One dealer had quite a few Mexican gold coins, mostly smaller denomination. I saw less than 10 1oz Krugs and I was looking for a 1973 without any luck(if anyone has one and is willing to trade let me know). Less than 10 1 oz maples in the whole place too.

Silver was everywhere but not much was close to spot. I saw only 2 100oz bars and a few 10 oz bars. There was an oddball 78? oz bar too. Eagles were selling for $16 and up individually or you could get $15 if you were buying in bulk. Not many Maples around. I only saw one lunar coin in the whole place, a 1oz horse that looked beat up. There was one dealer that had a few kilo kookaburra and several 2oz and 5oz as well but I didn't get prices. I ended up buying 25 libertads(older thicker design) and a couple newer ones for $13 each. Several dealers had Pandas from $22 to $25. Lots of proof Eagles. The 20th Anniversary Set was going from $550 to $600.

There were a few people walking around looking to sell to the dealers but most were browsing/buying. I wish there was more bullion at the show but it was fun to go and check out what was out there.

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

Good move not getting roped in to buying collectible coins aclarky. 13 bucks each for the libertads sounds good, better than paying 12.50 for worn out morgans with a Silver value of 10 bucks. Did you get any dirty looks from the dealers when you told them you were interested in bullion only? some times I do at the coin show I go to.

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

"...I ended up buying 25 libertads(older thicker design) and a couple newer ones for $13 each..."

By what you are saying, your Onza's sound like the smartest grab in the place IMO!

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

Thanks for the review! Nice score on the libertads!

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

I forgot to mention that I saw only a few platinum pieces and no palladium at all. It was truly a coin show. I guess I want to go to a precious metals show.
:coolbeer:

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

sorry that would be boring. no need for that if you are a vendor. whats the point, everybody would just look at spot and content and take it from there. why bother.

coins are for collecting. bullion is a money game only, not a fun one. collecting is fun, far more to it than just making a few bucks.

you either are a collector or you arent. we know who we are. pretty much collectors have other collections too. you got a style, you got a list of wants that impells you to fill it. you get into something new, you know what you like.

lots of us collect guns I gather. who the hell really needs more than a handgun or two, a rifle, or maybe two or three, and a shotgun. It is hard to be proficient and stay proficient with more than six small arms at once. you will notice professional operators specialize and practice heavily with one main weapon, though their familiarity may span thousands. so why collect if you are just in it for hunting or self defense

I know a lot of guys who before they were married collected girls. bagged this one, had a different kind in mind, bagged one of them, moved on. etc

Or say model trains. I found out that there are some coin and gun dudes that have model trains. I dont dig on that but some do.

My brother collects cars. I guess I dont have the money. But when he was a kid he collected coins.

No need to explain why to a collector. And if you can go into a coin show like this and have such a cold reaction my guess is you are not a collector. that is fine, I don't have many friends who are collectors, it's nothing special. but you either are a collector or you arent.

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

Anty, I have been going to a regular coin show near where I live and have seen plenty of people come in with there coin collections to sell and get spot or a little more for them, or sometimes the dealers don't even want them, not that there crooks but they have to have a large spread on those things to make a living being a coin dealer. I like nice morgans that you can buy for like maybe up to 15 bucks but that's it.
But I understand about collecting, have been a car guy all my life and it has cost me plenty of money.

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

I guess I'm not a true collector, but I have collected different types of gold and silver. I have collected the entire 1oz gold lunars series and I'm working on sets of silver lunars in 1oz and 2oz. I collected gold coins from eight different countries. I am currently looking for a 1973 Krugerrand since it was the only gold minted during my birth year that I have found. I have collected some older US gold so I have an example of many different kinds including St Gaudens and Liberties in several denominations and Indians in several denominations. I have collected silver from six different countries as well.

If I only cared about the money I would have bought the cheapest bullion available or only American Eagles. My purchase last month was two 10oz lunars and three .99999 maples. Oh well, guess I'm just not a true collector.

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

Wait I have a collection of gold coins too, forgot all about it. All the gold 1/4 ounce coins from europe, asia and america from the early 1900's.

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

well now dont get pissed, I didnt say a true vs false collector, I just said I didnt take your for the collecting type from your comments. I am obviously wrong, and I retract my incorrect judgment.

but you will admit that your words were directed at the business of bullion and not collecting. and indeed we have had conversations here about bullionatics vs numismatics if you will. just different perspectives but my point is that personality may inform the reasons we all may be buying pms or coins with pm content

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

Not pissed at all, you'd feel the heat if I was pissed. I like a lot of the older coins but I don't need every year or mint mark if they look the same and I could care less if they are MS62 or MS64. I don't like slabbed, I like to feel them in my hand.

Naccarato is right about people being taken advantage of in this numismatic area. If you aren't close to an expert then you are the prey. I saw several people in there trying to sell slabbed coins to a dealer that were not PCGS or NGC and the dealers had to explain the whole deal that you and I know. I felt sorry for these people because they thought they had something they didn't have.

I don't have anything against people and their collections, but I can't help but see more value in things that are priced closer to their metal content. This is just a product of me being frugal I guess. Oh, I have a couple thousand baseball and football cards that were fun at the time(80s) but are worth very little lately. I guess I also collect music as I have a few thousand songs but that isn't quite the same. I really enjoyed myself at the show and would go again next year. Sorry if I came across too disappointed about the amount of bullion there.
:coolbeer:

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

we're on the same page with all that

I bought a lot of slabbed coins off ebay once, pretty cheap lot and they guaranteed a certain amount of silver and a certain minimum number would be ngc, pcgs, and anacs. there were like ten other coins and all of them were ridiculously overgraded, so I can see why these top tier outfits stack up. I hear people say IGC is second tier with anacs sometimes, but I havent seen their grading so I dont know.

I did just buy an anacs slabbed SAE in a rare date but I havent got it yet to tell, its MS 70 as I recall. I cant really tell the diff between MS 60 and 70 saes anyhow.

anyhow dude keep up with the coin stuff, I know there are a lot of collectors here but they are hiding and need to be encouraged. its not cool or something! I got bullion but man do I love coins. I spent an hour tonight going through my mercuries. They're all common dates but I put the nicest ones into 2x2s and a bunch of the rarer mintmarked ones too. Stuck the rest in a bag that I will trade in next visit to a shop to go through the miscellaneous boxes. I have bought a ton of mercuries from Morgan mint believe it or not, for 89 cents a piece, which is less than any of the shops carry them for around me-- always they charge 1.10 for common ones. So I had bought a bunch from them and it took me a while to go through them.

Matter of fact I had a great night, the family was gone, and instead of wasting money on a movie or going to a bar I mowed the lawn, weeded the veg garden, cut up my tomato, my banana pepper, my jalapeno pepper, and two little onions, stuck that in with some baked beans and bratwurst under the broiler and had a great and inexpensive supper; then I had a shower and then I sorted the mercs; then I came on here and yakked as much as I wanted to, did some more chores, Now I think I am going to crack open a warsteiner and go watch that boxing movie with Russel Crowe on DVD. :D

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

I wonder how much below spot these dealers were buying pre-1964 90% silver bags?

Re: 50th Annual Coinarama
 

Last time I saw someone bringing in 90 percent coins he got 8.50 times face from one dealer, but I think Silver was a little higher than now. One dealer I talk to says he gets stuff from estate selloffs for 6 x face.