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A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Panda

Non-circulating bullion coin of the People's Republic of China (mainland China). Pandas were first issued in 1982. They feature various poses of China's familiar, and loveable, pandas on one side; usually the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvest in the Temple of Heaven in Beijing (Peiking) graces the other. Sizes vary from one-tenth ounce to multiple kilo weights and come in silver, gold, platinum. A marketing bonanza. See rounds.

Pan-Pac

Any of the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition commemorative coins--half dollar, gold dollar, $2.50 and $50 gold octagonal and round. The $50 gold round, the rarest of the group with 483 mintage trades wholesale for $38,000 in Mint State 64 condition as of February 1995.

Papers

As in authenticating papers, or grading certificates. By the early 1980s a craze for third party opinions and certified grading swept the coin business. Uneducated speculators (oxymoron), rather than take the effort to find out just what it was they were spending their money on, demanded a crutch in the form of grading and authenticating papers. As usual, liberties were taken by the uncouth issuers of such papers. Over one dozen firms offered the service, so undoubtedly a monumental scandal is brewing. One occult gentleman, in tie-dyed T-shirt and slippers who had a penchant for cute little boys, commanded $100 per purple-ink-signed authentication of sometimes questionable Proofs, before he passed on to the Great Beyond. His autographs are now collector items. Papers were made obsolete by the introduction of slabbing in 1986.

Paquet Twenty

1861-S Liberty head $20 gold piece minted using Anthony Paquet's distinctive reverse die. A scarce coin.

Paramount Dollars

Paramount Coin Company sold thousands of so-called Mint State 65 silver dollars during the 1970s in 3" x 4" plastic holders having their logo and the coin's grade printed in silver on a red cardboard insert. Their pollyannaish grading caused snickers in later years.

Park

To put a coin away in storage in anticipation of a price rise. "I'm gonna Park this 1902 English proof set until I can get $4000 for it."

Particularization

A grand term (and a real mouthful) borrowed from The Rare Art Traditions by Joseph Alsop. In any advanced collecting field the market participants (collectors, investors, speculators, dealers) tend to break down their field into finer and finer categories or compartments. As prices advance, as money flows into the market, the players develop ingenious ways to make ever finer distinctions in rarity, grade, or desirability, and, therefore, in value; in short, they particularize their objects.

With coins this is done through a number of contrivances. For instance: (1) separating coins into dates and mints of issue; (2) going after low mintage pieces; (3) multiplying the number of grade categories; (4) isolating toning from brilliance; (5) prooflike surface from luster; (6) determining provenance or pedigree; (7) population or census numbers, as in low pop versus high pop; (8) Condition Census; (9) die varieties; (10) die states within die varieties; (11) Finest Known and tied for Finest Known; (12) rarity ratings [1 through 8].

Then we have: (13) so-called Premium Quality versus average quality; (14) split grades; (15) minor variances such as, open 3 versus closed 3, or micro-mintmark versus regular mintmark, or tall date versus medium date versus small date, or large letters versus medium letters versus small letters--and to put an end to it: (16) full strike versus average strike, with examples including full head, hair, nose, lips, horn, tail, bands, diamonds, claw(s), wreath, date, mintmark, skirt lines, bell lines, steps, toes, shield, rivets, rims, stars, clasp, denticles, centers, breast feathers, LIBERTY. And any combination of the above--the list is almost endless!

Pedigree

Misuse of the term provenance to describe previous ownership of a rare or significant coin. Horses and bloodhounds have pedigrees; coins have provenance. In days gone by, a pedigree carried some weight; coins bearing them possessed manna. However, beginning in the 1980s, everyone and his uncle--large cent collectors leading the parade--began appending lengthy so-called pedigrees to otherwise meaningless coins. Examples like the following, culled from Superior Galleries' 1991 G. Lee Kuntz auction of large cents: Lot 601. 1852. Newcomb-4. Rarity-1. Mint State 60. Ex. Abner Kreisberg M.B.S. 9/67:500--R. E. Naftzger, Jr.--Del Bland 11/76. (It's a blasted R-1 1852 large cent, for Christ's sake!) Or how about this ditty entitled "Double Struck Sheldon-120B Tied for Fourth Finest Known"? Tied for fourth finest? We find, after sludging through an awful, wordy description that it was, more properly, "tied for fourth finest known with two or three others." The cataloger's definitive statement is followed by the usual endless string of past owners.

Phone Book

Annual Krause publisher's Standard Catalog of World Coins. The 1985 edition weighs in at 2048 pages.

Pigs

Derogatory term first heard from Billy P. in June 1986 to describe the Professional Coin Grading Service (PCGS). See clear, white, slab, and sideways.

Politically Correct

The catch-phrase of the nineties, political correctness or PC is exemplified by the number-one leading numismatic publication. The current editorial staff has taken perfectly good coin market slang and turned it into a mouthful of marbles. For instance: our once mellifluous Mercury Dime has become "winged Liberty head" dime in their reckoning, since the Roman god of traders and merchants appears nowhere on the coin. Worse than this pedantry, they have adroitly transmogrified our beloved Buffalo Nickel into an "Indian head five-cent coin" (there being no such animal as a "nickel" in America's pantheon of coinage).

However, the Powers that Be have made a major faux pas (them's French for "slip of the tongue"). The word Indian is no longer good etiquette. Second, the artist created his portrait from the likenesses of three men. Lastly, the ruminant on the reverse of the coin is, more accurately, an American bison. If the powers of political correctness gain control over our speechification, we might come across this happy scene sometime in the new century:

A pink-cheeked nine-year-old lad enters his local coin-and-baseball-card establishment. After gaining the attention of the owner by farting upwind from him he asks in a sweet, soprano voice, "Hey mister! Have you got a 15-D Composite Native American head American bison reverse five-cent coin in Very Good you can lemme have for three bucks?"

Poly

Polyethylene. Small plastic envelopes one puts coins into to protect the surface from abrasion and grubby-fingered cretins.

Pop

Population. Once third-party grading appeared, the services rendered an additional service by releasing population (census) reports of the coins they had graded. Naturally, coin dealers soon found a new arena for enrichment: low population coins. Never mind that the total supply of a piece might be enormous. If its population in a particular grade was extremely low (say, below 5 graded), and concurrently, if the grade were acceptably high (generally, '65' and better), a delectable premium could be demanded and received. As of 1993-1995, "low pop" coins were all the rage with telemarketers.

For example: an inconsequential 1876 California fractional gold quarter dollar (octagonal format), catalog number BG-797 in the official guide, sold in raw Gem Uncirculated condition in October 1989 at the height of the 1985-1989 coin boom. It fetched $176. In 1992, long after prices had crashed, one savvy telemarketer placed a nearly identical specimen--now PCGS encapsulated Mint State 65 and having a low population of 2--with a giddy investor for . . . get this . . . $12,000. Superior Coin Company was awarded the honor and privilege of auctioning said BG-797 in February 1993 for the now-sober consignor. It failed to sell.

Also, seen in a January 4, 1993 Coin World ad: "Pop-1 for date, Pop-4 for series." See particularization, slab, clear.

Premium Quality

Often abbreviated 'PQ'. Another splendiferous euphemism, Premium Quality translates into "I want a higher price for mine because I think it deserves it." Always, the emphasis is on more, never less. Everyone else's is invariably inferior. Thus, one sees an auction lot description "1899-O Morgan. PCGS graded Mint State 66. Deep Mirror Prooflike. Premium Quality" for what is under different conditions a very Plain Jane coin. See particularization.

Princess

U.S. $3 gold piece so-called for designer James Longacre's idealized Indian Princess portrait. (Not to be confused with Little Princess.)

Prooflike

Also 'PL'. Simulating the appearance of a proof coin with its mirror field and frosted devices. Not to be confused with proof-like (hyphenated), a descriptive term used by the Canadian mint for its near-proof quality coinage sold to collectors at a premium over face value. Several versions of prooflike exist nowadays: plain-vanilla 'PL', "deep," and "deep mirror," depending upon which grading service you are using and how much imagination you incorporate. Prices rise the deeper you get. See particularization.

Put it on a wall

Refers to a coin shop bid board. Most bid boards are arranged along one wall of the shop, generally a pegboard-and-pin affair. "What are you going to ask for your X?" "Oh, I don't know. Think I'll put it on a wall and see if there's any action."

Puttier

One who employs a putty-like substance to hide slide marks or scratches on a (usually) Mint State or Proof gold coin. When tonguing, fingering, or thumbing doesn't work, the coin is sent in to a professional puttier to enhance its appearance. He applies either automobile bondo or (a later discovery) window glazing compound such as "33 Glazing" lightly to the affected area. This softens the luster; it prevents the light from reflecting back brilliantly off any marks or hairlines into the observer's eye. (For many months before they caught on to the practice, it enabled the owner to get a higher grade from the eagle-eyed grading services than the coin warranted.)

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