The ANA And Counterfeiting

The ANA is not an enforcement agency. They can't force anyone to do anything. Their powers are pretty much limited to education, possibly some lobbying of government to get their enforcement arms to do something. Difficult and dangerous. Remember the US laws really can't be applied to people in other countries so you are kind of limited to economic sanctions, which are not likely to happen because of counterfeits in our small piece of the economic pie. But they do have laws they can use against the citizens here, hobby protection act. And they ould turn the customs agents loose on any and all coins being sipped into the country, give them discretion to pull any coins they might be suspicious of and send them for testing at the mint labs. Of course that will mean cracking them out, but they have plenty of $800 hammers. And do you know about the case of the mint lab checking to see if the mintmark was added on an AU 1893-S dollar by trying to dig a knife point under it several times to try and pop it off? Turned out it was real. And why stop at customs, they can do the sme thing with domestic mail if the coins are crossing state lines. "Oh it turned out you coin was real and so was the slab. Here's the coin and the pieces of the slab back." (No they don't have to compensate you for the loss of the slab, and possibly not even if they damage the coin.)

The only other thing the ANA can do is carry out sanctions against their own members if they are caught dealing in the fakes. But the maximum they can do is expel you.

No, actually stepping up education is THE best thing the ANA can really do to meet this threat. Only those who are truly educated about the threat can really be safe from it.

^^ yup yup. If you take to time to learn about a type of coin, you can feel confident about your purchases. Make sure the source for your coin has a return policy and take the coin home and inspect it with your loupe. Compare it to other coins of that type you have. COmpare it to description in a grading book or online. Post pictures of it here and ask us. IF there is a doubt in your mind at all, send it back and pick up another one.

--gary

One thing that I see being overlooked in these "Chinese counterfeit" threads so far:
The Chinese do not manufacture ANYTHING for import to the US without someone here requesting the product!
Someone here has to go there, and then supervise and approve the tooling/prototyping. All this after they find and choose a factory/manufacturer with enough competence to pull it off.

We have to do like they did a decade or so back with the counterfeit cassettes/CDs... Go after the peddlers and slowly work the way up the ladder and find the big fish, all while trying to surpress the flood.

Depending on the size of the "flood" with recent counterfeiting operations, and just how bad it may get.....I fear a "devaluing" of these legit coins sometime in the future.
The market could be flooded with Chinese knockoff stuff for decades to come.....it's NOT that way right now, but just how prevelant could this become?.......no one can't predict the future, but I hope this doesn't end up being like "The Dark Ages" for coin collecting.......a "Black Plague" era or something.......how many decades would it take to get rid of them once the "infection" was in "plague like" form ? Is THAT a scarry thought or what ?....And could the "art/evil" of counterfeiting from the Chinese and other "yet to be discovered countries" reach a level that's unimagined by anyone thus far ?..(meaning too that they "perfect" their work and get really good at it)....hummmm....just pondering....

.......with Jbuck too......

Right now there's not enough money in it to interest the Russian Mafia or U.S. crime organizations...but ....is that day looming ?...let's all keep our fingers crossed that someone in law enforcement has the will and the way to "nip this in the bud" before it becomes something that could ruin our sport for generations to come!...
Terrorism takes up a lot of resources for law enforcement on a Federal level with money, and personel, and focus/interest more importantly.......
So, I don't know if they would allocate much "overseas" attention to this problem until it got to be too late and became a MASSIVE problem !...Secret Service people, FBI, CIA,.....doesn't matter......they're awful busy!...Kim Jong Ill of North Korea has been printing U.S. money for decades and also much was found in Iraq that was counterfeit.....I just question how much "action" would be put into Chinese or any other Asian country's criminality behaviors espicially if it's needing a "crackdown" by THAT country's authorities.........seems pretty bleak to me that much would happen to stop it "over there".