Owner Comments:
S-SC9D, Marsh 353 (Rare)
Acquired from: Heritage
Means: Auction 232217, Lot 64567
Date: 28 April 2022
Critique: The very low mintage "Piedfort" double thickness gold sovereign, in perfect condition. Only 2750 of these very special coins were minted, making it extremely rare right out of the box. For some reason, American collectors don't seem to understand that a Piedfort sovereign contains double the amount of gold as a normal sovereign, since they don't command much of a premium during auctions over here. I was able to purchase this coin for only $100 over the price that it was sold from The Royal Mint, which is quite a bargain for a PF70 sovereign of any type. As of 2022, NGC has certified several hundred Piedfort sovereigns from both 2017 and 2022 in PF70UC, but only 40 from 2018. So this is a relatively rare gem and thus an immense bargain for the price.
What's even more astonishing is that the auction company obviously didn't realize what this coin was. For examples of prior sales of comparable coins, they simply listed several normal size 2018 sovs in PF70UC, and those coins were minted by Gibraltar!. Wrong size, wrong country. In the coin description they merely stated that the item was made of gold, but never mentioned the total weight. What a pathetic performance by supposed professional numismatists in world coins!
The price I paid included a rather hefty 20% "buyer's premium". In actuality, the price I bid was $50 LESS than the coin was sold for by The Royal Mint, so the poor fellow who submitted this for auction actually lost a significant amount of money when you consider the 10% seller's fee that the auction company deducted from my bid, the cost of having the coin graded by NGC, and the cost of mailing the coin to the auctioneer. I estimate that when all expenses are added up, he took a 20% loss on his investment, which he held for four years.
Note that all of the above numbers are based on the price of gold in 2018, which was about 2/3 the price of gold when I purchased this coin. Based on the 2022 price when I bought it, my bid price before buyer's premium was actually less than the melt value of the coin! So the seller would have done much better financially by simply selling the coin for scrap than auctioning it off. What a tragic result, and I'm sure the seller will never again send another Piedfort coin to auction.