Classic Commemoratives 1965 Values Adjusted For Inflation

Very insightful analysis CC ...

First impression review of your 1965-adjusted to today prices tells me that mid-grade MS classic silver commemorative have been a loser as an investment.

Specifically note the Hawaiian ... current price for an MS63 example is on the order of $2600 ... compared to your $4284 inflation adjusted value.

Wondering however about the granularity of your Red Book data source ... I have a 1972-25th Edition that I kept as a youngster ... and in the classic silver commemorative section my 25th Edition lists two prices ... Ex. Fine and Unc.

Assume your 1965 Red Book version contains the same grade levels ... so politely wonder how you can make the extrapolation to "Unc" equals MS63?

That said ... two significant thoughts to consider ... believe we spoke about these ideas ...

First ... there are many collectors who do not care about price appreciation of their coins. To this set of collectors ... the joy of owning/holding/cherishing a fine piece of USA coinage history is what matters ... regardless of whether it is a good or bad long term investment.

Suggest that you need to deal with that segment of collectors in your book.

Second ... this fine analysis does not consider the price appreciation potential of what I consider to be the true investment opportunity in these coins ... MS65/MS66/MS67 well struck coins with significant eye appeal and ... today ... CAC green beanies.

That is IMHO where potential investment opportunities exist today ... high end coins ... strictly graded with tremendous eye appeal.

Impossible to get that data from a 1965 Red Book ... but a consideration for the future audience of your book.

Appreciate your hard work and contributions CC ... expressing again my personal willingness to add any value I can to your book endeavor and collecting efforts.

David

I regularly calculate inflation rates over selected time periods.
You need annual inflation rate stats. for the period you are looking at, and just multiply them together.
A lot of this economic reference information for many countries can be found on the
TRADE ECONOMICS Site.

AVERAGE inflation rates over a time period are much easier and less laborious to calculate. However, you need a calculator with an exponential function.

David, you can have my first born son, he is useless but 10 ASE's that's a heavy bounty.

David- maybe I shouldn't have been so glib... what I'm trying to determine is WHEN did the numismatic value happen? For some series it was very early after its release, for others later. There are clear winners and losers. I think if we can make sense of the numbers and what they are doing over the years- we might be able to find out the size of the hobby and how much interest is in the series. Remember value is a result of having less demand than supply.
this typically is how it works with coins- but there's another side- an industry which is constantly nudging costs higher.

The Stone Mountain is an example of being artificially priced.

Outdated catalogs with prices have some value, because relative pricing can indicate scarce grades for price, as well as scarce/rare types, and/or dates.

I would never buy a complete 4 volume set of Krause every year, I would never be able afford them. I tend to buy recent, rather than current volumes, on a rotational 5 year basis, as the opportunity arises.

Same for me with Australian catalogues.

As I noted in an earlier post, a calculator with exponential function comes in handy to incdicate a suggested current price, based on an old catalog price.

I also collect ancients. For a current price in this area, I consult the 'VCOINS' Site. On this site, there about $30 million worth of ancients currently available for sale from dealers Worldwide.

CC99999: Actually I agree in detail with all of the points you have made here.
A calculator can only provide an indication of what the current price may be. That is better than just using old catalog prices.

I occasionally buy gold coins. My technique here is to look at the AGW melt price, and look at the premium above the melt price in an old catalog, if there is no more recent information available and apply an overall inflation rate to the premium component only. The result of this is added to the current melt value.

With this figure, I do what ever I can to obtain a current price for the coin independently, with realised recent auction prices or current for sale prices. Then I consider both.

It is a way to determine if price of a coin I may be offered truly reflects current prices for that item.

Since my collection is mature, I don't have the need to look for a particular coin. This is an advantage when I submit a bid at auction, because I usually submit a low bid, and don't care if I miss out. I keeps me cash! That's OK.

If I win, THAT'S when I get excited! I know I have new treasure at a good price!

The problem with any of these historical trend analysis ideas is the changing of standards over time. It's interesting to say that an investment in ms65 whatever would have gained 47% a year since 1965, but meaningless if the Gem BU coins then either weren't available, or don't rate ms65 ratings today.

Salomon Brothers used to have an annual report on non-traditional investments, and every year, they'd claim that rare coins rose 30% or so a year.

So if I put away $100,000 in coins in 1980, by 2000 I'd have $19,004,963.77 worth of coins, and could sell over $5.7 million of them every year forever, without lowering the base value.

Ain't happening.

To be flat-out frank, commems, either the old halves or the modern ones, have never had wide popularity, with the exception of a few like the Columbian Expo and Stoned Mtn. For decades, they have been subject to promotion and speculative pushes instead of true collector markets.