The Green Tree half cents comprised the first 236 lots of the Goldberg's pre-Long Beach auction, held Sunday Feb. 18 in Los Angeles. These are my post-auction impressions from the sale.
The majority of the coins stayed relatively close to pre-sale estimates, and met expectations. However, as usual there were both upside surprises and also some coins that fell far short of their estimates. The general theme that emerged was that scarce & rare varieties that were in mid-to-low grades did not do very well (price-wise). Here are a few of the most notable examples:
LOT 15 was a 1794 C-7 (R5+) graded EAC F12 (PCGS F15). It was hammered for $2650 vs. an estimate of $5000.
LOT 21 was a 1795 C-3 (R5+) graded EAC F15 (PCGS VF25). It was hammered for $4250 vs. an estimate of $8000.
LOT 90 was a 1805 C-2 (R5) graded EAC VG10 (PCGS F12). It was hammered for $3750 vs. an estimate of $8000.
LOT 100 was a 1806 C-3 (R6) graded EAC G4+ (PCGS G4). It was hammered for $3000 vs. an estimate of $6000.
It was apparently a good day to be bargain hunting among rare half cent varieties!
As I mentioned above, there were also some surprises on the upside of prices. A few of these include:
LOT 125 was a 1809 C-2 (R3) graded EAC VF35 (PCGS AU53). It was hammered for $2100 vs. an estimate of only $600!
LOT 172 was a 1825 C-3 (R1) graded EAC MS64 (PCGS MS65RB). It was hammered for $4000 vs. an estimate of only $2000.
LOT 201 was a 1849 C-1 (R2-) graded EAC MS63 (PCGS MS64RB). It was hammered for $3000 vs. an estimate of only $1000!
LOT 205 was a 1851 C-1 (R1) graded EAC MS65 (PCGS MS66BN). It was hammered for $4000 vs. an estimate of only $2000.
Note that all these coins rank very high in the condition census. The trend that emerges from these high-side surprises is that Quality is still King!
I will try to share some impressions from the large cent portion of the sale a little later.
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