Quality rare coins have an outstanding track record. The chart to the right offers documented proof of their past performance. Although past performance is no guarantee of future performance, we all know that these figures represent good indications that rare coins will continue their impressive gains due largely to the basic fundamentals of supply and demand as well as to the fact that they are very under priced.

The U.S. government does not like the rare coin portion of the Saloman Study because they feel it is misleading. The reasons they feel it is misleading is that it only contains 20 coins and does not contain gold coins. Therefore, this random sampling is lacking in the types of coins which the average individual is most likely to own. The government is fearful that people are making a generalization of the entire coin market based on a very small sampling.

Lee Certified Coins LTD. happens to agree with the government's position regarding this study. We prefer a more comprehensive study which was developed by Mr. John Albanese, the president and founder of the Numismatic Guaranty Corporation of America. He selected 100 coins which are more representative of the kinds of coins which someone would acquire for investment purposes, including gold and a wide variety of others in higher grades than the Saloman Brothers study. Mr. Albanese's study, which covers the years from 1978-1988, shows that the average appreciation of this group of 100 coins was 16.77% per annum compounded.

This figure still leaves rare coins with the best track record of any investment during the period studied and is in line with the Saloman Brothers Chart.