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 Friday, June 27, 2008
Friday Fix
Posted by tom
Friday Fix
London pm fixes for 6-27-08
Gold $919.50
Silver $17.40
Platinum $2053.00
Palladium $467.00
Friday Fix
6/27/2008 11:07:41 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00) 
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Thursday, June 26, 2008
Cautious With Commodities
Posted by tom
Cautions In Commodity Investment
I always try to err on the side of caution. Where investment is concerned I tend to do my homework and often find myself swimming outside the whirl pools that are a consequence of trends.
That is why the Walewski and Bendahan article on CityWire caught my eye, ear and interest this morning. Here are two very prominent fund managers limiting their exposure to precious metals. Going against the trend in a still rising market! Always a good warning sign for us little folks.
Where gold, silver, platinum and palladium are concerned, your holdings will always have value. Just don't get the idea that their value will always go up. As with any investment it is never wise to hold on too long trying to hit the peak. If you find yourself at the top of a market with large holdings, it's not so easy to jump off before the downhill slide. Selling in a declining market can be difficult and holding on, waiting for a return of the bull market can sometimes take years. Ask anyone who had a stake in gold or silver in 1979 and still had it in 1980.
News You Can Use
6/26/2008 1:18:16 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Swiss Shoot Talers
Posted by tom
Swiss Shooting Festival Talers
Lately I have noticed some confusion and concern over the listing of Swiss Shooting Talers in our catalogs. Actually this has been a long-running debate and one which can be viewed from several sides with no definitive answer.
 I bring it up again now, because I saw a question on the E-Sylum of the Numismatic Bibliomania Society from Bob Knepper. Bob was looking for illustrations of the Swiss Shooting Talers issued past 1960, so I emailed Wayne Homren, the E-Sylum editor, with the following information:
Regarding Bob Kneppers question about  Swiss Shooting Talers. We list them in the Unusual World Coins Catalog, which is in it's 5th edition and available form coin dealers or from our bookstore at http://www.krausebooks.com/product/647/4
Many, but not all, Swiss Shooting Taler types are illustrated in UWC. In the Swiss section you will also find other local Swiss medallic issues and types of limited circulation. I like the Huguenin Freres Talers, which are readily available in the market and feature views of various cities.
We hope to continue adding to these listings, as each new years issues are released and are doing this with the assistance of Craig Keplinger. Craig is a dealer in Swiss coins, with a specialization in the Shooting Festival coins.
 Collectors of this series will also want to keep an eye on NumisMaster at http://www.numismaster.com/ta/numis.jsp as the new issues Craig supplies the data for will first be listed there on the website before they appear in a printed work such as UWC. Craig is also working to get all types illustrated on NumisMaster well before we produce a 6th edition of UWC.
Depending on page count and size limits, we also would like to add the Swiss Shooting Talers back into the regular Standard Catalog series at some point in the future. For the moment however, NumisMaster provides a ready and accessible outlet for collectors to keep up to date.
The rest of the discussion regarding Swiss Shooting Talers centers around where they should be listed.
A few years ago the Swiss Shooting Talers were moved from the  Standard Catalogs to Unusual World Coins. This was done both for practical and technical reasons. The practical involved our ever expanding page count problems, while the technical revolves around the limited circulation times and legal tender status for this series.
After this move, several dealers, including specialist Craig Keplinger, classical 19th Century coinage dealer Dennis Gill and Islamic specialist and general world coin dealer and cataloger for Heritage Scott Cordry, have talked with me about getting the Swiss Shooting Talers back into the regular Standard Catalogs. Former concerns over page count, or arguments over limited circulation aside, their point was that these Festival coins are widely collected and maintain a status as prominent as regular Swiss issues.
They all make a good point and the editors of the SCWC series are listening. In the meantime however, collectors can avoid all these hard copy problems of which catalog the Swiss Shooting Talers will appear in by using NumsiMaster. Being a website, with all the coin, token and medallic listings our catalogs have to offer, NumisMaster provides the data, values and images you need plus the ability to search, pull and arrange them in the structure you want.
It's the best of both worlds at an annual subscription price which is lower than the cost of two of our large paper catalogs.
Focus Country
6/26/2008 11:12:28 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Panama Silver Balboa Sets Rising
Posted by tom
 High Silver Spot Requires Raise in Balboa Sets
Yesterday I had a call from Standard Catalog contributor Peter N. Berger in Panama. Peter had gotten his new 36th edition Standard Catalog of World Coins and was searching through the DVD listings for Panama when he noticed that some of the proof set prices seemed too low. With the rise in spot silver, some of the 1 Balboa and 5 Balboa silver proof values had slipped a bit below current melt pulling the set values down with them.
 We talked a little about the DVD, which Peter found pretty useful, and about how we would correct the 1 & 5 Balboa listings and the sets out on NumisMaster. I explained to Peter that since the catalog becomes a fixed entity once our designer  runs the pages, NumisMaster has become an ideal and essential spot to keep current prices updated and available to collectors and dealers alike. Peter had yet to try NumisMaster, but I think after our conversation he will be signing up soon. The new all encompassing $79.95 one year subscription price, covering 1601-Date for all world coinage, is a great price and Peter thought it sounded like a real bargain.
After hanging up the phone I took an hour or so to enter all the updates for the silver 1 & 5 Balboas in Panama and then I updated all the proof and mint set listings to reflect current values. Stop by NumisMaster and check it out. There's always new data, new issues, new values and updates being entered, making NumisMaster a vital tool for world coin collectors.
KP Update
6/25/2008 3:11:31 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Two More Days For 2001-Date Special Offer
Posted by tom
KP Update
6/25/2008 10:35:33 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Work Starts Numiszendium
Posted by tom
Work Founds Numiszendium Encyclopedia Site
You may have noticed a new addition to my blogrolls this morning, as news came from friend Aidan Work, that he had established a new base for building an encyclopedia of numismatic knowledge under the banner of Numiszendium.
Numiszendium
is a MediaWiki format website where knowledgeable numismatists can enter information about coins, banknotes, tokens and medallic coins. Aidan's hope is that this site can eventually be built to encyclopedic size and provide a good source for coin collectors and researchers both to pull from and deposit into.
It's brand new and you can register for free and begin being an active part of the hobby of numismatics today. It will take a lot of work to make Numiszendium useful, as it is jut an empty vehicle at the moment, but Aidan and his friends are dedicated and really do want to provide a broad forum for all numismatists.
Take a moment and check it out today at Numiszendium.
News You Can Use
6/25/2008 10:28:01 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Friday, June 20, 2008
Friday Fix
Posted by tom
Friday Fix
London pm fixes for 6-20-08
Gold $907.50
Silver $17.44
Platinum $2068.00
Palladium $475.00
Friday Fix
6/20/2008 10:47:46 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Thursday, June 19, 2008
Gold at $5,000?
Posted by tom
Comment That Gold Could Reach $5,000 an Ounce
I've read a lot of forcasts, predictions and ramblings on the future of gold. I've heard reasonable predictions of $1,000 an ounce, futuristic impressions of $2,000 an ounce and now a mathematical fiction of $5,000 an ounce based on limited available quantites and the anticipation of skyrocketing demand in the face of raging inflation.
Yes, $5,000 an ounce as a possible future for gold through the eyes of Christopher Wyke of Schroder Investment Management Ltd., a very large global investment firm. Of course you should consider that Wyke was busy promoting Schroder's new Alternative Solutions Gold and Metals Fund at a conference in Hong Kong when he made these statements. As a promotional urging it certainly did get Wyke and Schroder plenty of investment community and Internet buzz, which may be worth much more than $5,000 an ounce to their new fund.
Todays $5,000 an ounce remark is certainly a large revision of Wyke's March 2, 2008 comments in a TimeOnline interview, where he said that "Gold could reach $1,200 a troy ounce or even $1,500". But conditions are always changing and new information comes to light every day, so who knows, maybe a 330% increase in ones forecast over a 3.5 month period is reasonable. Or maybe within context Wyke was talking about a more distant future, one which I will never expect to see.
News You Can Use
6/19/2008 6:29:04 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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I'm Not There
Posted by tom
 Tom's Recommended Film of the Week
I'm Not There
Most folks will either dislike or be confused by I'm Not There. Even fans of Bob Dylan may find it anoying and disjointed. It is a unique vision of the direct Todd Haynes and as such, it takes some getting used to.
I'm Not There presents segments of Bob Dylan's life, with no particular adhearance to historical accuracy. It mixes Haynes life perceptions with Dylan's larger than life characters. It offers the reasonable outlook that some people, such as Dylan, create many different personnas within one lifetime.
Most significantly however, if puts forth some excellent acting, with six people all playing different eras of the Dylan mystique. Marcus Carl Franklin is the child Dylan, Christian Bale is the folk/religious Dylan, Cate Blanchett is the electric rocking Dylan, Heath Ledger is the pop-icon Dylan, Richard Gere is the reclusive older Dylan and Ben Whishaw is the unique thinking Dylan under the harsh light of public fame. Together they present a single perspective of a driven man, whose own fame and subsequent public-perceived responsibility so shocked and disturbed him that he spent years trying to reinvent what he had so successfuly invented. It's a grand portrat of an artist trying to create in the shadow of a man propelled into unwanted leadership.
If that all sounds confusing then I think you have an idea of Haynes creation in I'm Not There. It's not a simple stright forward film, it's not light entertainment, but it may keep you thinking for a while if you give it a chance.
Tom's Recommended Film of the Week
6/19/2008 1:36:48 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Gold Breaks Through $900 Barrier
Posted by tom
Gold Breaks $900 Again
After vacillating all week, but with general upward drive, Gold finally broke through the $900 barrier this morning. As of this posting it rests at about $903.
Let's see if it holds above $900 through tomorrow morning in time for our Friday Fix!
News You Can Use
6/19/2008 1:07:59 PM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Price updating for Danish India - Tranquebar
Posted by tom
 Prices Going Up For Tranquebar
This week I have been working on upgrading the values in our India-Danish Tranquebar or Trankebar section, with the expert advice of numismatist Olav Sejeroe. Values on these scarce, crude,  primarily lead and copper issues have gone up, up, up in the years since we published the 3rd edition of the Standard Catalog of Wolrd Coins 1601-1700. In the interim Olav's website has has proved to be an excellent resource for collectors, allowing everyone to keep up with his ongoing research advancements.
For some of the types we formerly listed only as Rare, Olav has now been able to determine values. Some duplicated listings have been cleaned up and removed. Better descriptions have been added where needed and some varieties which are no longer of significance financially have been deleted.
Olav's work should make these fascinating coins a bit easier to understand for the average collector. Check out this revision now at NumisMaster and keep an eye out for the new 4th edition SCWC 1601-1700 coming this fall from KPbooks.
Price Change of the Week
6/19/2008 11:46:35 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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Collecting South Africa
Posted by tom
Sources For Collecting South African Coinage
After more than 20 years of work as numismatic market analyst for the Standard Catalog of World Coins series, one bit of advice I can surely give budding collectors is: educate yourself before spending your money. In the old days, we used to say, "Buy the book before the coin", which was good advice, but in todays fast paced world you can do so much more.
For instance, if you want to begin collecting South African coins, you can start by  learning about the home market. Check out the South African auction site Bid or Buy and see how they do the eBay thing on their home turf. Bid or Buy has nearly 3,500 listings in their coin catagory as of this posting and most sellers will ship to Europe and the United States. Take time to view the SA Mint site and see what they are producing today. Check around the Internet and see what South Africa has to offer in the way of coin knowledge, specialty references, websites and blogs.
 Then see what the Australian, European and U.S. markets are up to. Check out Noble Numismatics auctions, as they often have South African coins and medals in their sales. Take a look at the Dix Noonan Webb auction site, where the South African proof sets I mentioned in my last posting are being sold today. Get on the mailing list or check out the World Coin News ads for Dennis Gill, the Garden City, NY coin dealer  who has over 80 classic South African coins for sale on his latest price list.
Of course, using a Standard Catalog, DVD or the NumisMaster website, is a fine grounded base to start from, but knowledge is not a single celled creature, it is always growing and evolving. We have many experts who help us to grow the Standard Catalog of World Coins and NumisMaster and if you seek to gain knowledge of your own, perhaps some day you will be one of those experts too.
Focus Country
6/19/2008 10:38:06 AM (Eastern Daylight Time, UTC-04:00)
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