CICF sees buying buzz

The strong European euro and weak U.S. dollar helped contribute to a bourse floor buying buzz at the 32nd Annual Chicago International Coin Fair held April 26-29 in Rosemont, Ill.

General Chairman Kevin Foley was pleased with the event.

He should be. There was a steady buzz on the bourse floor from the start of Professional Preview afternoon right through the close of the show on Sunday afternoon. Deals were still being done at closing time, which doesn?t usually happen at this venerable world coin event.

Not only the euro is strong, so is the British pound. This fact brought in dealers long absent from the show, with representation from Germany, Great Britain, Italy and Switzerland. Even the nice weekend weather did not deter show attendees, some forgoing seasonal yard work, or the early fishing season to attend and visit their favorite dealers.

I gave demonstrations to dealers and collectors alike of Krause?s NumisMaster, the online version of the Standard Catalog of World Coins series, which I contribute to. Readers can get a sample look at www.Numismaster.com.

The show auction featured 2,355 lots called by Ponterio & Associates of San Diego, Calif. In addition to coins of Latin America, the auction featured Classical Greek, Roman through Byzantine, world gold and minors and over 250 lots of paper money.

The political campaign for seats on the American Numismatic Association board of governors was in evidence by the presence of hopefuls Donald Dool, Clifford Mishler and Radford Stearns.

Meetings during the show featured Stearns with a slide-illustrated lecture on Russian Plate Money before the Ancient Coin Collectors Guild, Andy Singer at the Every Country Coin Collectors group, Jeff Amelse on Byzantine bronzes, and Chub Jacob?s presentation on Japanese one yen silver pieces and Trade dollars, 1870-1914, before the Chicago Coin Club.

At the Chicago Coin Club meeting April 28, a distribution was made of a continuing series of primitive monies, with this year?s offering being cigarette money, described in a well-researched paper by Robert Leonard, a past CCC past president.