My first slabbed coin

[andyg]

It arrived unexpected in a job lot from Ebay (total cost (inc. Post) £4.41)

some questions,
1) Who are the 'International Numismatic Bureau', some dodgy TPG outfit?
2) MS70 - I presume means of the finest condition? (yet this coin has scratches on)
3) How do I extract it from it's rather worthless entombment?

What's the point of buying coins in plastic when they are not as good as they say they are,
surely this catches out a lot of new collectors who think they are getting a bargain, which in time
will undermine the whole system of 'slabbing'.......

[translateltd]

And therein lies the whole problem of numeric grading - it can't ever be scientific or entirely consistent, and is open to unscrupulous or ignorant exploitation.  If we can't even agree (generally speaking) on assigning one of the handful of "traditional" grades to any coin, there's even less chance of consensus when you have 70 points to assign. 

A thought: maybe your slab is actually an experiment in decimal grading, and 30 points have been taken off for the scratches ...

[Bimat]

What is a slabbed coin? 

Aditya

[translateltd]

One that should be placed under a slab of concrete, and left there ...

No, seriously: a "slab" is the hard plastic case you can see in the picture, with a label describing the coin and the grade that the "slabbing company" has assigned to it.  It's big business in the US (sadly).  You pay a fee, the company grades and "slabs" your coin, and the slab is sealed to make it hard to remove the coin without wrecking the plastic.

One of our colleagues in NZ posted the following video from a US slabbing company recently - I hope this is not construed as advertising from me, as I have nothing to do with the company in question:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hAQv6qmGcis&feature=related

[bruce61813]

  Get the hammer! Slabbed coins may be the rage, but -
some questions,
1) Who are the 'International Numismatic Bureau', some dodgy TPG outfit?
    You have it right, you can even get your own slab cases, actucally those would not be too bad an idea. You would no have to seal them, there is a place inside to have a tag with data, and they will protect the coin, not to mention they are uniform in size.

2) MS70 - I presume means of the finest condition? (yet this coin has scratches on)
This is one of the fake companies, or a do-it-yourself project. Often slabbed coins sell for triple the price of the same quality non-slabbed coins. there are silly buyers everywhere

3) How do I extract it from it's rather worthless entombment?
There are several ways, since this is probably not sonically welded, I would try a dremel type tool with a cuttine blade to run around the edge, or a file. You might be able to just saw the rim off also.

What's the point of buying coins in plastic when they are not as good as they say they are,
surely this catches out a lot of new collectors who think they are getting a bargain, which in time
will undermine the whole system of 'slabbing'.......
"You can fool some of the people " and the silliness of slabbing has fooled a lot of people. there is a huge backlash over slabbing in the ancient coin collecting community. They are really against the whole concept, isf youwant to protect a perfect coin, get something like the Airtite coin capsules. they are protective, and can be opened if needed

Bruce

[andyg]

well, since I wasn't too bothered about the coin I just used my hands to snap the darn thing, quite tough ain't they! now I've just got to pick up the bits of plastic which shot around the room...

Quite how PCGS's 'World class graders' would assign a grade to a mediaeval British coin I fail to see.
I also note their inventory of coins slabbed includes coins which will have been 'slabbed' then reslabbed for a better grade, so according to the population reports two coins exist, when in reality it's the same coin....

[UK Decimal +]

In God we trust.   In slabbers we don't.

I think that, if you find as many bits of plastic as you can, you should return them to INB and tell them what we think of them and their system, also reminding them to delete your coin from their records.   I'm sure that we can find their address somehow.   Have a bit of fun having a go at them.

There again, is it really worth all that trouble?

Out of interest, have any other members any good/bad stories about slabbed coins?

Bill.

[bruce61813]

I would not bother. The company sells the 'slabs' also.  . If you search Google, there is enough reading about them to keep you occupied for the next 20 years. I personally don't like slabbing  from any company!

Bruce

[andyg]

What's surprising is how far from MS70 the coin is, it's easier to tell without the plastic, as you can see from the scan there's no shortage of scratches....

I've also taken the liberty of removing the fingerprints which had been encased with the coin

[translateltd]

My favourite story about slabs (wish I could remember the company) comes from sometime in the mid-1990s, so it must have been early days for slabbing, when someone brought a slabbed coin back from a trip to the US.  It had quite a fancy grade, and I assume whoever had it in his hand for the required 13.5 seconds went quickly through all the diagnostics before printing the label out ... but completely missed the big cuts in the rim - I think four, from memory - where someone must have had it roughly mounted in a metal holder for a necklace or something at some stage.  That rather established my distrust of the whole concept right from the outset.

[Figleaf]

The whole concept of slabbing rests on some hypotheses that, most of the time, are all false:

- grading is important
- you are a klutz, you can't do it and if you did no one would trust you
- people trust grading services
- you buy coins only to sell them again
- you rarely want to look at your coins, since they can not be put in albums
- you never show them to a laymen, who would put them back out of order
- you have unlimited space for your collection

The only hypothesis that seems to work out is that in the US market, slabbed coins get a better price, because, as Bruce put it, "You can fool some of the people (all of the time)".

I didn't count how many times the chief pressure salesman used the terms "world class" and "all over the world", but, knowing there is little to practically no interest in this "service" outside the collectors of modern coins of the US and Canada, it gives you a good impression of how far these people can be trusted more than any other marketeer selling boxed air.

Peter

[coffeyce]

I have a few i bought from crap slab companies. state quarters but only paid like 1$ each.

The only companies I have learned that have good rep are NGC, ANACS and PCGS, they are 3rd party grading companies which means they dont slab thier own coins. Other companies slab their own coins to make profit.

Chris

[Ukrainii Pyat]

I have bought slabbed coins, but only for the coin and not the undesired opinion of some fool in a poorly ventilated and windowless facility.  I have also freed them from their plastic prison:

Poor auld Annie was suffocating in a TPG slab until I found her and freed her from that miserable existence.  She has done fine for 300 years, she didn't need a plastic coffin.

Just like lacquering, penny boards, and wrapping in plastic wrap, so shall slabs pass in fashions.

[Prosit]

It may be a third party grader but IBP is not one I have heard of.  The top three or so of the US TPGs are fairly consistent with their grades within the company.  Not so comparing one company to the other and not so comparing the same company over a long period of time.

Weather one likes these services or detests them, the fact reamins that in the US there is a large market for them.  Been going on somewhere around 40 years now and they are not going away.

Personally this is what I prefer:

http://www.austriancoins.com/slab.html

Some images are missing as I haven't done any maintanence in years.
Dale

[andyg]

Just like lacquering, penny boards, and wrapping in plastic wrap, so shall slabs pass in fashions.

What's a penny board?
just curious