Mary Elise,
Your comments are very interesting and your sleep apnea example could not have demonstrated your point any better. Despite the glaring difference between the two firm's internal rules and regulations, coins graded by PCGS still retains some kind of perceived advantage over those of the same grade in NGC holders.
I feel fairly confident in suggesting that the overall skill and experience level of the grading staffs at PCGS, NGC as well as ANACS are relatively the same. Despite this assumption, a review of published prices and, or auction prices realized will clearly demonstrate that coins of the same grade are usually worth more in a PCGS holder than any other. Of course, I am discounting premium quality coins which always are priced higher regardless of holder, as well as eliminating from the mix all low-end coins within each grade level.
There are many other questionable factors floating around regarding grading as well. One particular favorite of mine (not) is CAC, the Certified Acceptance Corporation. Below, I've copied and pasted the initial description of their service from their web site;
"Due to today’s selective collector/dealer, an ever increasing number of certified coins on the market are considered low end for their grade. CAC holds coins to a higher standard so you can be confident in the value of yours. We verify previously graded coins and award our sticker only to those coins that meet the standard for today’s sophisticated buyer."
The application of grading standards is a subjective process simply because it's initiated by a
human being sitting at the grading table, not a Cray computer. Most collectors have seen plenty of grade certified coins that, even with moderate levels of experience, were clearly questionable for the grade. This goes for CAC graded coins too.
On one of my visits to Southgate Coins, Rusty challenged me to select the best and the worst out of a few Carson City minted coins. The coins were all of the same date and denomination and were all certified in the same mint state grade. Rusty first covered the area of each holder with the printed grade and information. He told me only that one of the coins was certified as a CAC premium example. My task was to find it and tell him why it was a premium coin.
After spending some time with my loop under bright examination lamps, I made my selections. When the grades were uncovered, I was shocked to find that the coin I had selected as the worst was the one with a CAC sticker! Rusty had done the exact same thing earlier with Marie, who is vastly more experienced than I am...she too found the CAC coin to be the worst of the coins.
My point is that CAC is populated with humans just like every other company. Experienced collectors do not buy holders or stickers, they buy coins and make their grading and pricing decisions based on the coin, independent of the label.
PCGS responded to the CAC business challenge by offering almost the exact same "highest and best grading standard" service. They call this their "Secure Plus" grading. The new system has some great advantages such as highly detailed laser scan photographs of each coin to establish a unique "fingerprint" file for each individual coin. This will guard against future resubmissions and dangerous grade inflation as well as serving as a tool to recover stolen or lost coins.
But at the heart of the strategy for the new Secure Plus system, PCGS established a PLUS grade for each grade beginning at VF 25. Strategically, this move effectively downgraded every coin graded in a plain PCGS holder and challenged collectors with PCGS graded coins to resubmit for a Secure Plus grade, which ostensibly, will increase the value of the coins.
Just think about this for a moment. Is PCGS saying that, out of the blue, their grading standards have somehow been completely redesigned and upgraded to a much higher standard than had been previously applied when grading the millions of coins already in PCGS holders? Or, is it more likely that they saw CAC as both a credibility challenge as well as opening for a whole new set of services for which PCGS could charge fees and premiums?
Professional numismatists and very experienced collectors are not seriously affected by this new juxtapositioning. As I said earlier, they pay attention to the coin, and only secondarily to its stated grade and other sticker descriptions. However, the vast majority of coin collectors do not have the grading experience necessary to step away entiely, or even partially, from their reliance on the grading services grade certifications. Such people, including this collector, represent the largest cross section of the numismatic market and are the primary targets of both CAC's and PCGS's Secure Plus services.
NGC had also added a Plus level grade designation, though they have not built a new fee service around the Plus grade strategy.
I am all for free markets and innovative business concepts. However, in my mind, and in many others', PCGS made one huge, unforgivable decision. They did not endeavor to create a foundation for their new Secure Plus system by first resetting the bar of grading standards at their own cost. The Secure Plus system would have been unassailable had PCGS initiated the program by re-grading any coin already in a PCGS holder at their own expense, or at the very least at a heavy discount designed to recover some or all PCGS's actual, net cost of the resubmission. Instead, PCGS created a whole new, and much more expensive set of fee services for all submissions requesting the Secure Plus system.
The fee schedule for all PCGS services, including Secure Plus can be found at;
www.pcgs.com/gradinglist.html
The following statement about Secure Plus was cut and pasted from the PCGS web site;
What does PCGS Secure Plus do for your coins? Two extremely important things – it builds confidence (Secure), and adds value (Plus). PCGS Secure Plus achieves these goals with:
-More precise and consistent grading
-Improved detection of altered coins
-Less chance of "gradeflation" for the wrong reasons
-More likely recovery if a Secure Plus coin is ever lost or stolen
-Increased recognition of high-end coins within each grade
Maryelise, there are as many subjective considerations in this great avocation as there are objective. I've learned, the hard way, that the best defense is a good offense. I continue to build my skills at "knowledge based" collecting but always team-up with Rusty for all expensive coin purchases. His decades of experience together with his unfailing integrity and combined with his comittment to protect the coin investments of his freinds and clients, provides the very finest "certification" a person could possibly ask for.
Thanks again for your interesting comments. I hope this reply will give you a thing or two to contemplate.
Belay Off
