Antique Coins: 'A Big Money Business' by MELANIE ABRAMS
| April 04, 2016
LONDON — “Once coin collecting was a gentlemanly
pursuit. Now it’s a big money business,” said Richard Bishop,
senior specialist at Spink, one of London’s premier coin
auction houses. “The rising prices are being dictated by
the people who are buying the coins, because there are a
hundred buyers to every seller, so the market is driving
itself.”
Consider the Charles II five guinea piece,
which Spink sold for 150,000 pounds, about $210,000, last
May, tripling its top £50,000 sales estimate. Or the Lord
St. Oswald 1794 silver dollar, which went for $4.99 million
at the second D. Brent Pogue Collection sale in September,
held by Stack’s Bowers Galleries and Sotheby’s in New York
— more than 20 times its $242,000 price at its last auction,
in 1985.
Indeed, the Luxury Investment Index in Knight
Frank’s recent Wealth Report shows that coins have become
the second-highest-performing luxury asset, behind cars,
in the 12 months up to the fourth quarter of 2015. They
appreciated 13 percent in that period, and achieved a sizable
92 percent growth during the preceding five years.
“The bull coin market stems from the global
financial crash in 2008,” said Keith Heddle, managing director
of Stanley Gibbons Investments. It provided the Wealth Report
figures from its 2015 English Coin 200 Index, which captured
the growth of 200 British coins valued at £5,000 to £225,000.
“People were looking for an alternative way of diversifying
their portfolio with alternative assets that are tangible
and aren’t correlated to the stock market, where everything
can drop at the same time,” he said. “Coins keep going up
because they are not linked to the financial market.”
Gold prices also have pushed up the prices
of gold coins, said Christopher Martin of CJ Martin Coins
and chairman of the British Numismatic Trade Association.
As he noted, “You can buy an ancient gold coin for double
the bullion value, which has a greater intrinsic value and
rarity because, of course, these coins are not being produced
now and are limited in their availability.”
Emerging markets also have introduced new
collectors. India is now one of the hottest markets, Mr.
Martin said, as Indians “are beginning to be interested
in their own coins and see the investment potential.”
Rare, flashy items like big gold coins are
driving the top end of the market as they grab the headlines,
said Mark Rasmussen, who deals in British coins ranging
from the Anglo-Saxon era through the 1950s. And British
coins have a worldwide appeal, he said, thanks to the British
imperial history. “Anything that is top quality — near the
condition when struck — goes for a high price, as collectors
want the best examples that no one else has,” Mr. Rasmussen
added.
The history or character depicted on a coin
often also increases appeal, whether the piece is an Alexander
the Great Tetradrachm or an Elizabeth I half crown, although
Philip Cohen of the London company Coin Heritage said the
fascination with coins also can be more visceral: “People
equate coins with the word ‘treasure,’ which people like
to find and hoard and remember from childhood, like reading
‘Treasure Island.’ And, of course, coins have been the basis
of society for at least 3000 years, so there are positive
associations with holding value.”
The Internet is fueling the rising value
of antique coins, too, allowing easy access to information
like catalogs, price tracking and live bidding. John Millensted,
head of coins at Bonhams in London, said, “People are less
frightened of auctions than they used to be as we want people
to buy and it’s easier to buy over the Internet because
small items like coins don’t need huge shipping fees.” He
noted that Bonhams’ coin auctions had attracted live online
bids from as far afield as Australia and Canada.
The future of coins looks bright. As Mr.
Heddle noted: “With a solid and constant 10-year rise of
232 percent, it’s tough to argue with the evidence.