Shocked At The Number Of Fakes Out There (Rant)

Short term, they are of course a problem. The industrial-scale fake-making happening in China has been going on for several decades now, and they're coming into the West by the shipping-containerful. The new Chinese-based online shopping platforms like Forty Thieves merely makes them more visible, but they have always been out there, in the street markets. And there will be a slow creep of these fakes throughout the numismatic community, as Westerners who own them eventually on-sell them to clueless collectors and dealers. You can no longer assume that someone selling Chinese fakes on ebay is part of the counterfeiting gang; they may be innocent victims themselves.

The prevalence of Chinese fakes, especially high-quality fakes of Chinese coins, has meant that the third party graders have had to change their global policy: they now refuse to guarantee the authenticity of a slabbed Chinese coin.

Long term, I am less worried - numismatists of the future will probably have some kind of numismatic tricorder that they can simply wave at a coin and it goes "bbep beep - FAKE". Counterfeiters might fool us - and all a counterfeiter needs to do is to fool one person, once, and their job is done - but they can't fool everybody forever. Fouree ancient coins fooled people in ancient times, but we can easily tell the difference. Paduans fooled Renaissance collectors, but their efforts look almomst laughable today.

And of course, it should be poiinted out that fourees and Paduans are both centuries-old collector items in their own right today. Who knows, maybe in 100 years time, there will be a "Chinese Counterfeit Collectors Society" whose members specialize in studying and collecting the things we now consider a scourge.


For protecting yourself, experience is as always the key. Become experienced at handling the common types of fakes, and know the signs to look for - things like improbable wear patterns (eg. lettering that's almost worn flat, but dragon-scales that are perfectly pristine). Also, be like the US Secret Service and familiarize yourself with the genuine articles, so that if a new type of fake crosses your path, the internal alarm bells start going off, even if you can't consciously spot a problem.

For protecting others, information and education is key - just like it says in this forum's banner logo up in the top left of the screen. In part, you're already helping to spread the word - by posting about it on an Internet forum that can be readily found by Google. Hopefully, someone who Googles "Chinese coins bought at flea market" will find a forum thread much like this one, warning them of the 99.9% certainty that their "bargains" are fakes.

One way to protect yourself is to avoid the obvious places that fakes abound; Esty, craigslist, Chinese sites.
Arm yourself with knowledge going in,ask question here on CCF before making a purchase.
John1

It's wise to be vigilant to avoid fakes. But we should not let fakes stop us collecting, enjoying. I mostly buy from well known reputable online dealers and my local coin store.

Fake coin making started not long after coins were first used for transactions about 6th cent. BC. I have collected both modern and ancient coins. Here is my ancient fake silver denarius of Emperor Domition, called a fourree. Cheaper copper/bronze was used inside with a thin layer of silver on top (like our clad coins today). There has been in the news some seizures of fake coins while being imported but I wish the government would do more. As long as China and other places do little to stop manufacturing fakes it will continue. Of course in China there are severe penalties for counterfeiting their own currency.



PS. I found 47 cents in Walmart CoinStar today, no silver though.

One of my numismatist colleagues believes that numismatics will die when there are more and more fakes, but I totally disagree with him. I believe that our hobby will live on for a very long time. I want to say that although there are really a lot of fakes, but most of them are very bad fakes. Even a novice collector can see bad fakes. Those of higher quality should be more careful with them. Experience, experience will help you to avoid buying fakes in the future. So carefully read the terms of sale from coin dealers on the Internet. If you see that the seller does not guarantee the authenticity of the coins, then with a 99% probability he is selling fakes.