The pizza is about to arrive. It is 6:05 p.m. on Monday. I am stranded in Chicago with three colleagues who had also attended the World Money Fair in Berlin. We are at a Hampton Inn in Schiller Park. Our flight out tomorrow will mean I am in motion at the usual posting time for my blog.

I am hungry and sleepy but very satisfied with the experience in Berlin. It is shocking to see prices in euros. Just about everything is expensive from an American point of view, but as one person I spoke to said: "You should see Paris." I made no reply at the time, but if that is the case, I will have to say something like, "Maybe next year." Berlin prices were enough for my delicate fiscal sensibilities. That and I don't need to see any sausages again for a while.

I hope to get a good night's sleep, get home and perhaps get a half a day put in at the office Tuesday. Fortunately, the Krause team has been posting material right along as it happened. I hope you have taken advantage of the on-the-spot reporting to find out what happened in the mint master capital of the world. We also shot video while we were there and are looking forward to expanding our online reporting capabilities.

If it comes to my personal comfort and convenience, 2008 has had a disappointing start. If it is your comfort and convenience that matters as far as being kept informed of important news events, then 2008 has started well. The Krause NumisMaster online reporting team has done it just for you.

Well, there's the pizza. Gotta go.

The decision to give the World Coin News Coin of the Year Award at the World Money Fair in Berlin Feb. 2 was a good one. All of the recipient mints and central banks were present at the top level. The speeches were gracious. The atmosphere was warm and friendly. I hope you will take the opportunity to view the images of the event on NumisMaster.com.

A surprise guest was U.S. Mint director Ed Moy. He was able to come. It was a pleasure to see him there since the United States was a big winner of three category awards. The Most Popular and Best Trade categories were won by the Nevada state quarter. The Most Historically Significant coin was the Benjamin Franklin commemorative showing him as the mature statesman.

The ceremony was punctual. That is an important consideration for this show. Staff of the world’s mints are very tightly scheduled. Albert Beck, founder of the show, said 30 meeting rooms were in continuous use throughout the show.

We began serving finger food and liquid refreshments at 3 p.m. Dr. Beck introduced me to the audience at 3:15 p.m. As I noted in my opening remarks, events are well started when Dr. Back begins them. From that point on, the program was in my hands. It clicked along, concluding at 4 p.m., to allow those on a tight schedule to leave for their next appointments. Others of us were able to stay and visit with each other.

The top winners were Canada and Hungary. Canada won the top Coin of the Year Award for a set of four $50 palladium coins showing the Big Bear and Little Bear constellations in seasonal positions in the night sky at 10 p.m. in Ottawa, as Ian Bennett, the president of the Royal Canadian Mint explained. Hungary won the People’s Choice Award for a 50 forints made of base metal that commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.

There was a Hollywood premiere aspect to the event with the photographers present. Latvia brought a video cameraman to record the whole ceremony. Latvia took home the trophy for the Best Contemporary Event coin for its l lats coin marking its fight for freedom in 1918.

There is not enough time or space to list all of the winners here, so visit the Web site presentation at www.Numismaster.com.

Congratulations to all the winners. I am catching a morning plane today with my three colleagues. It has been good to be in Berlin, but I am looking forward to going home.

If it’s Wednesday, I must be in Germany. It was touch and go yesterday as we awaited the arrival of a weather front that brought snow and very cold temperatures.

Would the plane take off from Appleton? Would the plane take off from Chicago? Would we miss the connection in Frankfurt for Berlin?

Winter travel is less about any discomfort in movement and simply mentally wondering if there would be any movement at all.

It seems I just went through this with the FUN show and merely suffered a three-hour delay on the return home. But the wondering affected both directions.

Staying awake is also an order of business today. There is a reception tonight at the Canadian Embassy. It would not due to succumb to jet lag and miss it. It is an honor to share the night with world mint directors and others actively involved in creating the world’s coinage.

My profound thanks go to the Royal Canadian Mint.

I have to catch a plane later this morning, so it is a short time in the office. I am going to Berlin, Germany, to attend the World Money Fair.

In addition to usual show duties, I will be there with three other Krause Publications staffers to give the 2008 Coin of the Year Award. Canada is the winner of the Coin of the Year Award, which will be given for the 25th time on Feb. 2.

The winning coin is actually a four-coin set of $50 palladium pieces dated 2006 that show the Big Bear and Little Bear constellations in the Canadian night sky at four seasonal points during the year, with a nice stream and pine trees on the ground to frame them.

The International panel of judges were impressed and made the set the Coin of the Year, after having first voted the set as Most Innovative.

To someone from Wisconsin, it looks like a scene from home, so I am pleased with the judging.

There is an innovation of our own this year. We have added a People’s Choice Coin of the Year Award and conducted the voting online through the NumisMaster Web site.

The result of this first effort was the victory of a 50-forint coin from Hungary that marked the 50th anniversary of the 1956 uprising against the Soviets. That heroic and tragic resistance met with tanks and brutal suppression.

However, the Hungary of today can mark that dark chapter as a point on the road to the freedom the country now enjoys.

Congratulations to both nations.

With rapidly rising bullion prices, coin collectors have gotten used to the U.S. Mint taking gold and platinum coins off the market for a time, raising prices and then putting them back on the market.

Some collectors have groused whether the process works both ways. If bullion goes down, will the price the Mint charges for coins of precious metals go down also?

The answer is yes. In the most recent statement made by the Mint on Friday to announce that it was taking proof platinum Eagles off the market, the question was answered.

Platinum jumped $67.10 per ounce to $1,680.10 on Friday after production was shut down in South Africa’s major mines due to an electricity shortage in the country.

The Mint responded to the price rise. In the boilerplate announcement, the final bulleted item says, “Significant drops in the price of platinum will likewise result in a lowering of prices.”

I don’t know when that concept will be tested. The markets seem to be of a mind to keep going higher. However, some collectors who don’t like the idea of rising prices will have to figure out a new way to grouse about it.

It is still cold in Iola, but the advance signs are it will be a colder day on Wall Street. How volatile it will get is anybody’s guess. The prices of precious metals are swinging to and fro. I will be watching as will many other people around the world. It is an opportunity to contrast the short term and the long term in my thoughts.  I promised yesterday to provide the second part of my talk to the Sarasota Coin Club. It contains my forecasts for 2008. I guess now it will also serve as a long-term counterpoint to anything that might occur today.

One interesting thought popped into my head yesterday. It was the 28th anniversary of the last high point for gold prior to the recent record. Then it plunged. Is there something about January that incites wild swings in markets? That’s a topic worth pondering.

Part II

The Sarasota Coin Club is a great group. I had the honor of speaking to them Jan. 12 at the Florida United Numismatists convention.

I talked about my 10 forecasts for 2007 (see last week’s column) and offered 10 new forecasts. I had a great time at the meeting and sharing conversations with members before it began.

At the beginning of the talk I mentioned that I was right just six times out of 10 in 2007 and that if they simply flipped a coin, they could expect five correct answers. This was my way of confessing that even editors can’t see the future anymore clearly than anyone else.

At the risk of being wrong yet again, here are highlights of what I said:

1. My first forecast relates to the future holder of the executive director job of the American Numismatic Association. I said the ANA board would hire somebody with a numismatic hobby background. I pointed out that the prior hires of individuals who had no hobby background have not worked out, including one person who lasted all of six weeks. This time the board is going to lean in the other direction.

2. I wrote my talk before I arrived at the FUN show Wednesday. My second forecast was the ANA would be hit by more lawsuits. Even before I gave the talk, the ANA president was served on Thursday with a new suit filed by a number of grading services that have been affected by the new eBay policy about acceptable grading services. ANA was served, as were representatives of eBay and the Professional Numismatists Guild. I am right already, though it looks like hindsight now.

3. More coin shows will follow Baltimore’s lead in abolishing Sunday hours. Expenses of staging coin shows are rising and keeping up empty rooms is not cost effective.

4. Designs for the 2009 quarters for the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and U.S. territories will be outstanding and help overcome some collector resistance to the new coins.

5. In 2007, the Mint was given additional authority in the consumer protection field to control use of its name and trademarks. I pointed out that most collectors think this is a good thing, but then I forecast that something would occur in 2008 that would look to collectors like the Mint was going a little too far.

6. The paper money hobby is hot. It has no formally adopted grading standard. Companies use one that is a hybrid of tradition and the coin hobby’s numerical grades. I forecast that the paper money field will make progress in trying to forge a formal set of grading standards.

7. After my 2007 forecast, are you ready for gold? I said some time in 2008 it will hit $1,000 a troy ounce.

8. Silver will hit $20. Again, from the time I wrote the speech until I delivered it, silver rose by 10 percent.

9. I will repeat from 2007 that the compositions of the cent and the nickel will change. Wrong once. Wrong twice?

10. My off-the-wall forecast for the year was the Mint was going to do something that takes it further down the road of privatization.

That’s the list. The clock is ticking.