How do I spot counterfeit pcgs and ngc slabs?

I'm worrying that there are lots of counterfeit slabs on ebay

 

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Stay off of ebay.. Then you won't have any worries!

 

One way not to worry is to know that both Grading Companies offer on-line Certifiction Verification. Enter the Certification numbers to find out if the ebay slabs are real.

https://www.pcgs.com/cert/
and
https://www.ngccoin.com/certlookup/

 

Another way is to know the seller. Look at their feedback score. Look at their history. Read what buyers have to say about them. Do you see anything posted about fake items? Maybe fake slabs?... then avoid them! If you see slabs coming out of a foreign country then be careful. But it won't be fair to tell you this about foreign sellers because it's not true for all foreign sellers.

 

Raw ( non-slabbed ) counterfeit coins are often found in everyplace from ebay, craigslist, and all of the social media sell places, that there is a lot of worry. Less in a coin shop or coin show, and even less in a slab, as such reports usually make the coin magazines and these forums rather quickly. Paddyman98 suggestions will take care of most of the cases. Jim

 

Experience.

 

Galen59, answered: "Experience."

There's that word again we all throw around. In this case, it does not apply. Unless you actually work at the service where a slab is being examined to see if it is fake and know the "hidden tells" of a genuine slab, I'll bet neither you nor any member posting on CT could tell the difference 20% of the time using state-of-the-art counterfeit cases with correctly graded genuine coins in them! That percent includes the 15% of the times your correct guess was pure luck.

 

Of course not, but no ones making perfect counterfeit slabs with correctly graded genuine coins so it really doesn't matter if someone would fail that hypothetical

 

These are of questionable value with NGC's being the better site. Most fake slabs use information from genuine slabs so the the sites stating that such and such serial number is such and such coin doesn't mean much.

On the NGC site though you have a fair chance of having the genuine slab pictured allowing you to compare the coin in the slab in question to the coin in the known genuine slab. The down side is the NGC has been around and slabbing coins for 30 years, but only doing the images for 10. Any slab older than 10 years will not have an image. Still this is better than PCGS which only images a small percentage of the coins they slab so you probably have a better than 90% chance that any given slab will NOT have an image.

The NGC site also has the shortcoming that a significant number of the images really don't show the coin well. Frankly I would rather they imaged the coin rather than the slab.

 

baseball21, posted: "Of course not, but no ones making perfect counterfeit slabs with correctly graded genuine coins so it really doesn't matter if someone would fail that hypothetical."

OK, let's say I made up a silly, hypothetical scenario. What do I know? So for now, I'll post one we can discuss.

Perhaps you'll agree that 99.9% of us cannot detect a very deceptive fake. 2% of us might be suspicious and send it in to be checked. We know that in some cases, a new group of very deceptive fakes has been put into a genuine slab until they are detected.

Perhaps you'll also agree that 96% of us cannot detect a fake slab until the diagnostics are published. I know you know that the slab parts used by some TPGS's are made in China? None of those parts would ever reach the black market in CHINA!

Now let's put the two together. Deceptive fake coin and deceptive slab. While I know there are some really knowledgeable folks around here...I'll bet none of us on CT could detect the kind of stuff that is causing a little hand-wringing and changes to the slabs.

 

Worry harder.

That's the only way change happens ; if we all worry together!

 

David Setree Rare Coins, posted: "Worry harder. That's the only way change happens; if we all worry together!

And all of us are helpful extra eyes!

 

There are some tricky and confusing things being stated in this thread. I am particularly puzzled by the concept of the value of a "properly graded coin" being dependent on the authenticity of the cheap plastic holder it has been placed in. Granted, there is some 'insurance value' in an authentic trusted source attached to the cheap plastic holder, but if the coin itself is "properly graded", isn't its value therefore intrinsic and independent of whether it is in a holder or not?

 

Use of red for emphasis is mine. I would never assume this , and specifically , not with that surety. Even if one of the board of trustees of the company personally ran the company in China, I would not bet anything of value, that the slabs wouldn't somehow , sometimes, make it out the door. Nothing against PCGS, nor their ownership, I am just suspecting human nature. Same is true for any product being designed or made in China, or for that matter , in the US.

 

Labels/fronts/spacing ect. Fake slabs are easier than a really good fake coin to spot. They're also older slabs. You are making a mountain out of a mole hill of worry with this one. Remember the makers of them don't care, they're making a cheap product they sell very cheaply. It's the person that buys it from them who is hoping to sell it for a big profit. I'm sure the makers can better spend their time faking other things than putting serious time effort and cost into trying to get the labels right.

If someone is really that worried though just stick to PCGS secure plus coins and you'll be perfectly safe.

 

No, raw coins sell at a discount. PCGS and NGC coins are more liquid and get better prices than raw coins from the added security of an independent grading. Graded and raw coins have different prices and there's different prices depending on the grading company used

 

@desertgem: @Insider’s post was tongue in cheek, I am quite sure .

Steve

 

Thanks, baseball21. Makes more sense the way you've put it.

 

It's somewhat sad and depressing to hear there is so much skulduggery in the coin world these days. And unfortunately or otherwise, it's the type of circumstance that all too often lends us oldsters to saying "I'm glad I'm not young anymore today."