"Healthy" Greek prices at the Phillips/Oxford Noonans auction.

[Deinomenid]

I took the morning off work to watch this major sale which turned  into a  5 hour plus marathon. The subsequent  (also major sale) had to  be  put back hours  due  to the heavy bidding.

A few highlights to compare to estimate. Estimates are of course low or wholesale, and the market price is the market  price, but there were quite a few jawdroppers. Incidentally the proceeds go directly to coin research etc, and I see the seller (Ashmolean) is already advertising a number of positions for  full digitisation of their Greek and Roman coins. They have MANY to do still so that will be a great help.

A harshly cleaned - though great pedigree - GBP 2,000 coin for  90k

 

Or this one, very ordinary ($700?) as far as I can tell. Selling for USD9k including comm -

 

Another Crete,  because why not -

Though the very best was a  known fake, repeatedly (to Noonans' credit) announced as  such by the auctioneer before and  during the auction which - to much laughter in the room -  went for many times its revised value (of GBP100) as a forgery. The auctioneer  even wondered if the bidder(s) could understand what was being explained to them. I guess the bull market isn't  over...

It will be interesting to see  if Noonans can step into the Roma gap for this area. Their sales this week were exceptional and their cataloguing excellent.

[Curtisimo]

Yes it was an interesting morning. I had a few I was watching but I went strong on these two (some of my first big bids in a long while) and got rolled on both. Noonan’s has not been kind to me this last week.

Edited September 25 by Curtisimo

[El Cazador]

4 minutes ago, Curtisimo said:

Yes it was an interesting morning. I had a few I was watching but I went strong on these two (some of my first big bids in a long while) and got rolled on both. Noonan’s has not been kind to me this last week.

Fantastic coins, but as expected everyone was watching this auction, so - no surprise there. I didn’t even watch it , though out of all lots I probably saw 2 that went for reasonable prices, and that represented less than 0.05% of coins.

very low ROI on time spent watching vs wins

[ominus1]

46 minutes ago, El Cazador said:

very low ROI on time spent watching vs wins

....sometimes strictly a spectator sport   ^^

[ominus1]

....Healthy...now thats a nice way to put it....:)

[AncientJoe]

It was a brutal auction: I underbid my main target and didn't come close on several others. Thankfully there are always more coins coming up around the corner!

[taja1948]

All for a very good cause...

[ajax]

1 hour ago, Deinomenid said:

I took the morning off work to watch this major sale which turned  into a  5 hour plus marathon. The subsequent  (also major sale) had to  be  put back hours  due  to the heavy bidding.

A few highlights to compare to estimate. Estimates are of course low or wholesale, and the market price is the market  price, but there were quite a few jawdroppers. Incidentally the proceeds go directly to coin research etc, and I see the seller (Ashmolean) is already advertising a number of positions for  full digitisation of their Greek and Roman coins. They have MANY to do still so that will be a great help.

A harshly cleaned - though great pedigree - GBP 2,000 coin for  90k

 

Or this one, very ordinary ($700?) as far as I can tell. Selling for USD9k including comm -

 

Another Crete,  because why not -

Though the very best was a  known fake, repeatedly (to Noonans' credit) announced as  such by the auctioneer before and  during the auction which - to much laughter in the room -  went for many times its revised value (of GBP100) as a forgery. The auctioneer  even wondered if the bidder(s) could understand what was being explained to them. I guess the bull market isn't  over...

It will be interesting to see  if Noonans can step into the Roma gap for this area. Their sales this week were exceptional and their cataloguing excellent.

They are not stepping anywhere, this was an once in their lifetime sale, I don't see any reason why any physical person who is still alive would want to consign with them. After all if you want a farse comedy then prunier even had theatrical acts during his auctions.

[rvk]

2 hours ago, Deinomenid said:

Another Crete,  because why not -

Being from Sir Arthur J. Evans Collection.. is anyone surprised? That would be incredible to have.

[ajax]

8 minutes ago, rvk said:

Being from Sir Arthur J. Evans Collection.. is anyone surprised? That would be incredible to have.

Yeah the guy was a pioneer in building an archeological Disneyland on top of an ancient site 😁

Edited September 25 by ajax

[Lelouch]

I won this Athena / octopus in the second auction for 850 GBP. Great price to me as it previously sold for 850 CHF so actually a loss for the seller I think considering BP. I was very worried it was going to go way higher as a previous one went for 11000 CHF but thankfully no.

Very, very happy with it considering there are only 11 different ones on acsearch, it is one of the better examples and I like octopi.

Interestingly 5 of them are from Bertolomai. I don't really know as I am new, but I find this very suspicious especially considering the recent threads about their fakes. The next highest is NAC with 2, everyone else only ever had 1. And Bertolomai sold one of their octopuses twice as well.

[John Conduitt]

1 hour ago, ajax said:

They are not stepping anywhere, this was an once in their lifetime sale, I don't see any reason why any physical person who is still alive would want to consign with them. After all if you want a farse comedy then prunier even had theatrical acts during his auctions.

Why do you say this?

[Deinomenid]

1 hour ago, ajax said:

prunier even had theatrical acts

Prunier theatrics yes, but where was the theatre here?

It seemed competently run, they attracted a large number of the big buyers, I only saw 2 fakes and they admitted one of the two, the young auctioneer seemed on top of what was going on, they clearly had the blessing of a major academic institution etc, and got great prices for the seller!

Compare that with the latest NAC offering where as part of the entry fee you have to guess if a coin is from the Spink black cabinet or not. Or Nomos now. I just canceled my prebids at Nomos when I was told they were at 28% commission for the next auction. I’d take this sort of Noonans over that any day! 

 

 

[DonnaML]

2 hours ago, ajax said:

They are not stepping anywhere, this was an once in their lifetime sale, I don't see any reason why any physical person who is still alive would want to consign with them. After all if you want a farse comedy then prunier even had theatrical acts during his auctions.

What in the world are you talking about?

[Di Nomos]

9 hours ago, Deinomenid said:

I took the morning off work to watch this major sale which turned  into a  5 hour plus marathon. The subsequent  (also major sale) had to  be  put back hours  due  to the heavy bidding.

A few highlights to compare to estimate. Estimates are of course low or wholesale, and the market price is the market  price, but there were quite a few jawdroppers. Incidentally the proceeds go directly to coin research etc, and I see the seller (Ashmolean) is already advertising a number of positions for  full digitisation of their Greek and Roman coins. They have MANY to do still so that will be a great help.

A harshly cleaned - though great pedigree - GBP 2,000 coin for  90k

This was my target. Was prepared to bid well over estimate, but fell asleep holding my phone! Thank goodness I didn't press bid on something whilst I was nodding off. Fair to say my highest bid would have been about 75,000 GBP short.

[Di Nomos]

5 hours ago, Deinomenid said:

Prunier theatrics yes, but where was the theatre here?

It seemed competently run, they attracted a large number of the big buyers, I only saw 2 fakes and they admitted one of the two, the young auctioneer seemed on top of what was going on, they clearly had the blessing of a major academic institution etc, and got great prices for the seller!

Compare that with the latest NAC offering where as part of the entry fee you have to guess if a coin is from the Spink black cabinet or not. Or Nomos now. I just canceled my prebids at Nomos when I was told they were at 28% commission for the next auction. I’d take this sort of Noonans over that any day! 

 

 

I didn't realise Nomos was charging 28% commission. That is ridiculous. Had my eye on a couple of coins there too. Will have to reconsider. There's a coin I'm interested in the NAC auction too, but all this talk of fakes with that auction has me concerned as well. 

[AncientJoe]

5 minutes ago, Di Nomos said:

I didn't realise Nomos was charging 28% commission. That is ridiculous. Had my eye on a couple of coins there too. Will have to reconsider. There's a coin I'm interested in the NAC auction too, but all this talk of fakes with that auction has me concerned as well. 

I think the remainder of the NAC auction has been well-vetted now but feel free to drop me a PM if you have any lots you're uncertain on (I recently viewed the sale in-person).

[Deinomenid]

14 minutes ago, Di Nomos said:

I didn't realise Nomos was charging 28% commission. That is ridiculous

It was not obvious at all (funny that!) but it is in the new terms for the auction - 

[CPK]

7 hours ago, Lelouch said:

I won this Athena / octopus in the second auction for 850 GBP. Great price to me as it previously sold for 850 CHF so actually a loss for the seller I think considering BP. I was very worried it was going to go way higher as a previous one went for 11000 CHF but thankfully no.

Very, very happy with it considering there are only 11 different ones on acsearch, it is one of the better examples and I like octopi.

Interestingly 5 of them are from Bertolomai. I don't really know as I am new, but I find this very suspicious especially considering the recent threads about their fakes. The next highest is NAC with 2, everyone else only ever had 1. And Bertolomai sold one of their octopuses twice as well.

Whoa! That is a spectacular coin - look at that artistry! And on such a small canvas, too. I think you did very well at that hammer price!

[Curtisimo]

11 hours ago, El Cazador said:

Fantastic coins, but as expected everyone was watching this auction, so - no surprise there. I didn’t even watch it , though out of all lots I probably saw 2 that went for reasonable prices, and that represented less than 0.05% of coins.

very low ROI on time spent watching vs wins

This is true but all you need is maybe 1 out of 100 on long shots bids to make it fun. I’ve been surprised a few times. Plus I lose the vast majority of my bids in auctions anyway so getting “clio’d” doesn’t really bother me anymore. 🙂 

[wuntbedruv]

11 hours ago, Deinomenid said:

Prunier theatrics yes, but where was the theatre here?

It seemed competently run, they attracted a large number of the big buyers, I only saw 2 fakes and they admitted one of the two, the young auctioneer seemed on top of what was going on, they clearly had the blessing of a major academic institution etc, and got great prices for the seller!

Compare that with the latest NAC offering where as part of the entry fee you have to guess if a coin is from the Spink black cabinet or not. Or Nomos now. I just canceled my prebids at Nomos when I was told they were at 28% commission for the next auction. I’d take this sort of Noonans over that any day! 

 

 

The 'young auctioneer' is also the cataloguer of the sale - an extremely competent numismatist, gentleman and very hard worker.

I'm off to Noonans this afternoon to pick up a coin I won at their British sale last week and have a beer with him! 

[Brennos]

On 9/25/2024 at 10:14 PM, Deinomenid said:

Or Nomos now. I just canceled my prebids at Nomos when I was told they were at 28% commission for the next auction. 

And if the consignor is who I think he is (a well-known Belgian collector) beware of the hidden reserve prices, which must be very high.

Edited September 27 by Brennos

[kirispupis]

On 9/25/2024 at 6:58 PM, Deinomenid said:

It was not obvious at all (funny that!) but it is in the new terms for the auction - 

Is this for all new auctions, or just their premium ones? I double checked and I was charged 20% at their last auction.

They definitely seem to have a couple of bidders who are agnostic to prices, so I'm sure this change will improve their bottom line.

[Deinomenid]

3 hours ago, kirispupis said:

Is this for all new auctions, or just their premium ones?

Who knows though the claim seems to be it is just for this one. I canceled my registration so am not sure. I’m sure that they’ll muddle through without me somehow 😀 but I’m not using them again in a hurry.

If they are giving away a lot to the seller then I imagine this sort of thing will happen again and again on good collections, without a buyers’s strike.

Re @Brennos’s comment, I am led to suspect the same.

 

[Merkil]

Hi Deinomenid, 

I agree with all your comments except for the lot 214 for which i think the price is in the low side. This coin is just amazing, perhaps the best known for the first emissions of Knossos, with "recognized dies", and ... still available on the private market.

The Jameson 1317 reached 160kCHF in 2023 (Svoronos 3) and the one from the Gillet collection 115 000 CHF in 2007, both are in poor condition.