Avoid This Dealer In SF Bay Area!

I don't usually speak ill of dealers, but in this case I'll make an exception. To avoid any possible libel, I'll just report the facts below. Lacking a better place to report this, here goes.

Yesterday I re-visited a dealer since I was in the area. The last time I was there, they tried to pass off a group of key Canadian cents as "MS Red" when in fact they were obviously whizzed...hairlines everywhere! They did not disclose this to me--I found out on my own.

Giving them one last chance, I went through their Indian cents (to cherry-pick of course). During my visit, the guy there discussed their $100K/day volume in gold coins, and had a couple buyers who got all his attention (well, no surprise there). I overheard what amounted to a sales pitch packaged as investment advice, which struck me as flawed at best (in my opinion).

Then, a man stepped in with a gold coin which had a few marks on the obverse. He wondered if/how these marks could be removed, to which the owner said (I kid you not) "burn them off with a propane torch" (!)



Then, when it was my time to buy my items, I found I was low on cash (and they don't take credit). Rather than just let the .75 slide, this guy browbeated me on why I don't carry more currency? Sigh...if you do $100K/day in gold, what does a few cents matter?!

I learned my lesson yesterday, and wanted to spare you a similar experience.

This shop is in Palo Alto, CA near Stanford U. It has "broker" in the name.