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Glen Stephens
Monthly "Stamp
News"
Market Tipster Column
December 2008
“Knowledge Is Power”
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As anyone who reads my columns knows - “Knowledge Is Power” has been my mantra for several decades. To gain knowledge you need to read books and catalogues – it is as simple as that. Too many folks in this hobby begrudge spending money on works that can save them 5 or 10 times the purchase cost, when they first use them. Philatelic publishing is no goldmine. Most efforts are break even – at BEST. Many self publishers lose a lot of money but continue - as it assists others. Seldom do I see a new work that stands out from the pack. One such book hit my desk recently. |
Nicely boxed
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This is a massive new, full colour, 800 page British Commonwealth missing colours catalogue, for all stamps of the QE2 reign from 1952. |
New Pierron Cat.
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It has the not very catchy title of: “Pierron's Modern Great Britain & Commonwealth Missing Colour Errors.” An incredible new work. Every collector of this era MUST have one, and every dealer most certainly should have a copy, as a LOT of this content is not in Stanley Gibbons Just one VERY moderate find will pay for it 5 or 10 times over. The catalogue comes in a superb custom made storage box, to keep out dust and humidity etc, which in Australia is most useful. For dealers, this also means it is a breeze to mail to clients, quickly and easily. For the Australia errors 1952 - 2000 alone, you'd need to buy 5 volumes of the ACSC - for $A365 just to look these issues up. They are all in this one book for $A100 - and you get all the detailed GB and British Commonwealth errors for free!
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Crisp presentation
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Retail price in the UK is £49.95 ($A125 at time of typing) plus post. Due to the vagaries of exchange rates, I sell these to clients just $A100 plus post! I’ve sold a couple of cartons already, so they have been a big hit with local collectors. SG have left a huge gap in the catalogue market, and “Tom Pierron” has very neatly filled it. |
Superb Production Quality
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This is no back-yard stamp society effort, done on the cheap. It is very professionally laid out, with brilliant graphics and image quality, and printed on top quality low gloss bright-white paper. The author (whose name is not Tom Pierron!) is a leading collector in this field, and knows his stuff. I understand he owns a printing business in Europe, hence the very polished and professional final product. He is an active member of stampboards.com and has posted some of his superb material up there for others to admire. Some of the things photographed on this page are worth well over $A1,000 apiece, and yet most collectors or dealers would not know they were rare errors, even if they tripped over them! |
Worth $1,000.
Does this
Indian
"missing
black" stamp
on cover
nearby look
like a $1000
item to
you? Well
not to me it
doesn't,
that's for
sure.
How can you
look it up
in SG --
they do not
list modern
issues past
1970 such as
that in
“Part One”,
which is the
problem.
Did you know
the Bermuda
1977 Fish
missing
color was
worth
£3,750?
That's
$A8,500 for
a modern
stamp. You
will not
find that in
SG either as
their “Part
One” listing
stops in
1970.
And hundreds
more stamps
are in the
same
category.
Every QE2
era recorded
missing
colour is
shown here
in colour,
and is
priced
accurately,
numbers
known are
given, and
other
details
surrounding
it, where
known.
The photos
of actual
error pieces
is
invaluable.
The various
Australia
1965 5d
Christmas
missing
colours are
well covered
- as a good
example.
TRUE
“Missing
Gold”
See
the
photo
nearby
–
which
shows
the
ACTUAL
“Missing
Gold”
in a
strip
of
5,
being
the
lowest
stamp
in
the
strip.
Every
year
dozens
of
dreamers
and/or
con-men
list
these
up
on
ebay
etc,
at
$100’s
each
after
creating
them
with
a
Q-Tip
dipped
in
Methylated
Spirit.
And
many
sell
to
clueless
buyers.
Once
you
have
seen
the
TRUE
error,
or a
sharp
colour
photo
of
it,
these
crude
ebay
confections
do
not
warrant
a
second
glance.
This
catalogue
was
created
by a
very
keen
collector
of
the
field,
with
active
assistance
of
the
leading
error
dealers
on
all
continents.
Many “Old Friends.” I see a lot of "Old Friends"
in here …. many of which I discovered. The Australia 1992 45c
Animal roll of 100 with missing black I bought off a
client only as it had a red pen mark through it all,
so was unusual. We both agreed it looked
odd. I paid him many times face value for it, which
he was happy with, and I forgot about it for some
months. Only much later when
fidgeting with the roll when on a phone call, did I
notice it also had missing black on all 100 stamps!
A dealer offered me a sum
that exactly matched the current economy class
airline ticket overseas I'd just booked, which
pleased me. I now see the roll is cat
£24,000 - or near $A55,000 in Pierron, so I should
have forsaken the airline ticket!
Another
“old
friend”
I
see
in
here
is
the
Cocos
Island
1969
4c
fish
with
Salmon
Pink
missing.
In
1984
I
found
a
small
block
of
these
in a
box
of
junk,
with
the
colour
progressively
missing,
and
totally
missing
on
one
row.
No-one
had
seen
them
before.
Or
since.
I
think
there
were
3 or
4
strips
in
the
block,
so
today’s
prices
are
way
too
low
in
my
view.
I
offered
them
to
(the
late)
UK
error
dealer
Derek
Worboys
soon
after,
who
offered
me
VERY
many
hundreds
of
times
what
the
box
of
junk
had
cost
me.
I
remember
the
year
exactly,
as
I’d
just
taken
vacant
possession
of
my
new
home
in
Hunter’s
Hill.
The
VERY
first
phone
call
I
took
was
Derek
phoning
from
London
to
make
me
an
large
offer.
Paid
for
the
removal
van
–
and
more!
Cocos Missing Pink
A
unique
discovery
|
These Cocos Fish are now £1,750 ($3,850) per strip of 3. To this day I understand it is the only missing colour ever discovered from Cocos, since SG 1 in 1963. As I first found them by chance 15 years after issue date, I feel sure no others have turned up, so these really should be priced 2 or 3 times higher than now. Over 80 different countries are covered in this Pierron, with 1,250-plus errors detailed, and more than 2,500 sharp images. Normal stamps appear alongside errors for easy reference. Known or estimated quantities are listed. Genuine market prices, based on dealer sales and auction results, are included. How the errors occurred, where and when they were found, and other significant information also appears – often available nowhere else. Values for all recorded formats of every error are included: mint, used, first day cover, traffic light block, plate/cylinder block, booklet pane, sheet etc. The electronic version of this Pierron catalogue also is sold on CD-ROM for $A62 to Australia. Files are in PDF format and require Adobe Reader or similar. Order via - tompierron@bacchic.net Because of the huge file size of the electronic catalogue, it's impractical to offer it as a download. Instead, it comes on a packed CD-ROM and can be copied to (and printed from) your computer. PC and Mac compatible. |
SA Railways Cat
|
Staying with the “Knowledge is Power” theme and new catalogues, I’ll mention another useful niche publication. I was in Adelaide mid October for “STAMPEX” and was given a copy of “The Parcel Stamps Of South Australia – Part One – Railways, Tramways and Bus”. This has just been released in time for the show by well known local authors Martin Walker and Tony Presgrave. |
15 years in the making!
|
They told me this has been 15 years in the making. A most useful book for collectors of this area and is 52 pages, in a font size far too small for many, I’d guess. Why it was not 52 x larger A4 pages I have no idea, as much of the text is far too small to read readily, and many collectors of this area will have far worse eyesight than me! |
Bring your magnifier! It has every appearance of being
prepared as A4 in normal font size, and then shrunk down
to A5, so I am at a loss as to what that was about,
other than to save a few cents on paper and ink? It may not be too late to revert
back to the more usual A4 size for future copies if my
guess is right. I showed it to others, and got the same
comment re the small font size. Martin Walker tells me today it
is the same size font used by SG catalogues, so readers
can be the judge on whether that works when in A5. Anyway, it has copious numbers
of color photos, which is a nice change from many
earlier Railway type listings. The authors are both members of
stampboards.com and said there that they had bowed to
suggestions and rated scarcity via both “R” rating
AND $ prices. Not always a popular course with
collector authors, but the market seems to demand it
these days. A very useful book to obtain for
both dealers and collectors. And at $A25 just one
barely decent discovery will repay that very fast.
.jpg)
How
much?
|
Let me ask all readers – if they saw this nearby ratty looking 1930 4d black in a circuit book or dealer stock at $2 would you give it even a second glance? Well I most certainly would not have, but with this book you’d discover it is rated “R5” and is valued at $A500! |
1930 series RARE
|
Indeed the entire 1930 set in this design are all rated “R5” – and all are at $500 either mint or used – even the lowest 1d value. I would never have bothered to even ask about a 1d railway stamp, or look it up to be honest, so these books are a great resource. This scarce set is on plain paper – the sets before and after it on coloured or under-printed paper are also all scarce, but not quite in this league. Oddly most states did not have very high value Railway Parcel stamps for some reason - despite some very costly parcels being hauled. For several of the SA series even 5/- top values are reported but not seen by the authors. |
A $1,000 item
|
This SA £5 depicted nearby is the highest railway face value I can recall seeing. It is a $A1,000 stamp mint, and $A750 used. Yet even on this set, the 5/- value has not been sighted by the authors, but 3/-, 10/-, and £1 are recorded. The £1 is the same price as the £5, and all 4 top values are “R5”. The book has useful sections on all the SA Private bus companies, meter and cash register stamps, and even the Silverton Tramway issues and all Commonwealth Railway issues. With lots of colour photos. |
No used copies?
|
One interesting fact that Martin Walker confirmed for me when in Adelaide was the 1962 Commonwealth Railways pre-decimal set of 17 values mint, 1d to 10/- have never been seen used by the authors! Not a single value of it. Pretty amazing as they were not replaced until 1966 with the decimal series. I recently sold complete MUH sheets of 24 of each value, so it is surprising no used copies have been sighted. |
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Technology is taking over catalogues of all kinds, and Dave Elsmore has a rather useful online railway and revenue listing, that sometimes does not agree with this book. It is sad that even the basic values known to exist in sets etc can’t even be agreed on by both sides, given that very serious collectors are involved. The good thing about on-line catalogues is they can be amended and updated fast when needs be. Both with prices and new discoveries. I’ll take a closer look at that next month. We have a wealth of info in Australia on these issues, and it would be superb to see that knowledge being combined and amalgamated by common agreement. |
Block Busters
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One of my long term campaigns has been to convince readers to put aside EVERY postally used block of Australia you ever see. Right NOW most do not have much if any premium over 4 singles. I can guarantee you in a decade you will look back on this column and laugh to imagine NO-ONE placed a premium on most used blocks. Many major European basic catalogues as a matter of course list stamps mint, used, FDC, on cover and in USED blocks of 4. Look at a Swiss/Liechtenstein Zumstein or Italian or Scandinavian catalogues etc and you will see what I mean. Stamps worth peanuts as singles are often worth a FORTUNE in a postally used block in many European markets. Swiss stamps issued in the Kangaroo era can catalogue 500 times as much in a used block, as for a used single. The 1914 3f Jungfrau is in the basic Zumstein at 3,250 SF a used block, but only 8 SF for a used single. Many Kangaroos would rate high multiples like that. The same rarity applies in Australian stamps of course. But NOT the prices – YET. Facit does the same for Sweden and Scandinavia. In the 2009 Facit, the relatively cheap Sweden 1858 12öre blue Arms (Facit # 9) is priced at x 500 for a block of four. That stamps is18 SEK for the cheapest shade for a used single, but 9,000 SEK for a used block of four of the cheapest shade. For rarer issues Facit list how many blocks of four are known. Facit also list largest known multiples. For some issues it might only be a pair that is the largest se-tenant unit, for others it is a block of 20 or larger. The ACSC can do the same. |
Buy such things now.
|
I sold the 1963/5 Navigators shown nearby in postal VFU blocks recently for $A600 – all with different cds, and all correctly dated in period. That is only the price of 4 used sets. It is certainly true that virtually EVERY Australia stamp from 1913 to the present date EXISTS in postally used blocks - even high values like these £2. |
Used blocks exist
|
Arthur Gray and I discussed this on Adelaide this month, and he agrees with me there are very few instances where no used blocks are recorded – and even then we are only guessing they are not out there. The £1 Leski block shown nearby was used in 1923 and first surfaced on the market this month – 85 years after being used. But just try finding them if you start collecting them. Right now, few bother. For years I have been urging the editor and publisher of the ACSC to do so at some point, and I feel sure they will one day. It will give
added reason for folk to buy each new
edition of catalogues and will not take
any more space or pages than they now
do, as they simply add the universal
cross hair block symbol to all current
listings.
I have discussed this with leading dealers and all agree the demand for used blocks is increasing all the time. Richard Juzwin told me in Adelaide he fully agrees the market under-values such material at present, and that he is actively buying it whenever he sees it on offer, and hopes the ACSC lists them if future. Juzwin told me he was the underbidder on this used block of £1 Kangaroos shown nearby at Leski’s October 6th sale in Melbourne. The stamps are 3rd watermark, and was invoiced to the buyer at just on $A20,000. As 4 singles they would sell for about a QUARTER of that. Charles Leski told me the vendor bought these blocks in to show him, housed in a cheap $5 type Chinese stockbook.
|
Sold for ~$20,000
|
This block had been in the family for decades and never sold for 3 generations, so had presumably been soaked off a parcel at the time of receipt in 1923. An equally nice looking £1 FIRST watermark used block came up at a stamp auction in Wales UK a couple of years back, and I know myself, Simon Dunkerley and Tony Shields and several others all bid strongly on it, only to see Stanley Gibbons outbid us all. Most of the Kangaroos are known in used blocks, and the archive sales offered the First Watermark bi-colour high values up to £2 in used blocks with Brisbane cancels, several of which I have sold since. |
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I recall Martyn Greive from A-One stamps showing me a parcel piece with no less than ELEVEN x £1 grey 3rd wmk Kangaroos on it, including a block of 6, and also THREE x £2 Small Multi Roos. It was a new discovery he’d found in quite recent times, among an estate of a man who threw nothing out – even parcel wrappers. This piece was used in 1933 from Sydney to Newcastle Waters NT, on a 32 lbs car parts air shipment. Over £17 on a domestic parcel, so MUCH high value used Roo blocks DO certainly exist – especially to USA/Europe.. It is likely all the KGV heads, in all the watermarks and perfs and dies exist in blocks too – but many would be very rare thus. I once asked experienced dealer Rod Perry if he had even seen or handled a KGV head 4d Lemon Yellow in a USED block of 4. Rod thought about it for while, and agreed he could not recall seeing one, but also agreed one or more likely existed, if a search were made. An inexperienced dealer would likely offer it for $50 to $100 on today’s market, but I’d want $500. Watch this space. I’ve outlined the above and similar facts to the publisher and editor of the ACSC over several years, and if you agree please add to the groundswell. Publishers need to add good reasons for each new edition to be purchased, and here is a perfect reason for EVERY volume to get new sales. As I have typed many times our ACSC is the world’s best, but like a top sportsman it needs to keep improving, to stay in that position. |
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