Revenant

Thank you! I still have my Signature set for these in the meantime.

With the understanding that this won't happen until after the awards cut-off, because of the freeze and among other things, I'd like for the following changes to be made: For the Venezuelan 2018-Date, P101-Date set, I think this needs to be changed to 2018-2020, P101-P114 Banco Central de Venezuela, 2018-Date, P101-Date I also think a new set / category needs to be made for 2021-Date, P115-P119 - These are the New Digital Bolivar notes. Alternatively, the new slots for the new notes could be added to the existing 2018-Date set, but, given the transition from the Bolivar Soberano to the Bolivar Digital, I think it'd be better and more consistent to split into a new set / category.

Being only a little snarky and salty here, he/she has a more expensive set, all of which he/she bought already graded near as I can tell, so I take his/her ranking as a measure of his/her wallet and not an indication of skill as a collector / grader. I'll end there and not indulge too much in a sour grades rant.

My first thought was, "More money." My main issue with chasing 69s and 70s is the value proposition. Yes, it is maybe technically incrementally better than the 68. But most will never spot the difference or care. I'd rather have a set of 67s and 68s that together tell a story as a set than a 69 or 70. All that said, if I had it, if I won the lottery and money was no issue, I'd probably make an offer to buy Bonez out. That said, that this point I've made some 70s and 69s on the NGC side. I think there's 3 70s in my NZ silver Kiwi set that I had graded myself. My Zimbabwe and Venezuelan coin sets now feature 69s that I earned myself. very proud of those.

Thanks! BTW, my wife says we're cute together.

I'd be just fine with upgrading on the cheap but I sadly know it's because the air is coming out of the stock market and the economy, people are struggling with inflation and the "little extras" are getting squeezed. I consider the first series of the 1st dollar and the 5th/6th/RTGS/New ZWD series (because that series wore a lot of hats) about even on aethetics. The OG notes are just of their time while the new ones are modern. But the new ones are one of the few that feel like a spiritual successor to the first series and not something slapped together and rushed out. They tried with the 3rd dollar design to make them look nice and like a revival of sorts after the bearer checks but the two square images together on the back is a lazy design flop that disappoints vs the first dollar notes and the newest ones. The 4th dollar series of '09 just look a bit lazy and tired, but not quite as lazy as the bearer checks. As far as historical significance the 3rd dollar probably wins as the series at the peak, the end, and the worst of the hyperinflation, with the infamous Trillions notes. The 2nd dollar bearer checks span the more interesting time period - The Fear. Operation Sunrise. The long, slow, death-spiral of the country.

After my wife bought all three of the Rhodesian pennies I was looking to maybe get with my collecting money for my birthday () I had some cash available to me, and then I saw a 68EPQ P106 note for Zimbabwe pop up from one of my favorite dealers that I've gotten most of the new notes from this series from. They were listing it for $35+$5 shipping so I decided to try for it. No one else bid and I took it. Unfortunately I can't add it to my signature set right now because it appears the PMG servers in Florida that the site needs to confirm the cert# are down. I'm hoping everyone out there with PMG and NGC are doing okay. My wife works remotely with a Florida-based company that's in Gainesville. From what she tells me they have all made it through okay but some are also without power. I already have a description / commentary written up for it to go into my signature set with it once the servers are back up and I get another chance to add it. This note makes me caught up with this series for probably the first time in a year or more. I didn't get the $50 until this one was coming out and I've just been constantly behind on this while I focused on Venezuelan, Zimbabwean and Italian coins. So it feels good to finally get caught up again. Mike may note that the grade is a 68. Now that I'm reaching pretty happy, stable points with some of the coin sets, I'm likely to take a break from some of those for a while, until next year when I start to prepare another submission. I'm starting to feel the temptation and maybe have the budget to put towards upgrading some of those 67s and 66s in this set to 68s as notes become available at prices I'm okay with.

Hi, Ali! I hope you and everyone at NGC, PMG and the rest of the CCG companies are doing okay now that Ian is headed back out over the water on the other side of Florida. Would it be possible to get a slot added for P-106a, 100 Dollars, 2020 (Cert # 2091005-039) Category should be this one: Public Sets Home Page (collectors-society.com) Thank you! Again, I hope you're all okay and the lights are back on soon if they went out.

Well, things were unexpectedly slow today because I didn't get a 3D model from a client I was supposed to get, so I got to fill out my form today. I was going to print everything and put labels in flips... and then my black ink cartridge crapped out. Ordered a new one. It's supposed to be here... Friday! The day I was going to do the forms originally. I guess this is back to being a weekend project.

Yeah. I don't see anyone really liking that or that generating much collector demand, which is really what I think they're hoping for with this. If they were really going for the populace and commerce they would have gone fractional. I'd also call this a big step down from what they did 20 years ago, for even what they did with the $10 and $25 coins in 2003, and the Bond Coins in 2014-2016, but even those 2003 coins are pretty "meh" in terms of "nice to look at."

You gotta make sure you're working that "Category" option to split up your posts or have sub-sets because I don't think the system lets you have more than one "journal." I can't say I completely blame them because it does feel a bit like speaking into the void some days. But I at least know you're here. But by the measure of "recently" CCUK and VEC probably beat me. I still have not been able to find pictures of the new gold coins - only images of a coin from 2001 celebrating their gold refinery or something with the Zimbabwe bird on one side and the Black Rhino on the other. Apparently the new coins are going to be one troy ounce which breaks my heart a bit because they're going to be expensive and I think that is going to effectively price me out. I also think that suggests this is more a ploy for creating collectables for the international market and not for making something for the locals because I think the locals have a poverty rate of 90%, most of them earn something like $2-3 a day (if I remember reading something along those lines right) and the locals are not going to be buying $1,900-2,000 coins. Anyway... I do think I'm going to order a P-106 soon just to be able to upload my description and have the set up to date and likely "finished" for the foreseeable future because I, like you, think we're done at the 100 It's also my hope to fill out paperwork for a submission to NGC on Friday.

I honestly had not even thought about it even a little bit when posting this. I just had something to post about over here for the first time in a while. I've been focusing all my collecting efforts on Italian coins and the Venezuelan coins so this set and the PMG side have just been very quiet. But... yeah. I could be one of the few with 100 entries over here. The one I mainly think about in that regard is my NGC journal, which now clocks in at 386 entries, but it would probably be over 400 if I hadn't deleted some old entries I no longer felt comfortable with or approved of over its 15 year run. You are at 85 entries. Steve R is at 81 The Shiek is at 75 mikim13 is at 23 GSA_Gem_Quest is at 29 ddr70 is at 22 Amarillo1 is at 21 Given that there are only 647 entries and the top 4 there make up 341 I think its fair to say that the 4 of us do most of the heavy lifting over here. I sometimes worry that these long journals with multiple posts must make me seem very self-absorbed and self-important or something. I worry that it isn't a good look sometimes.

Thanks, I'd like to see that if it's a real picture. If they really are going to be releasing these in 2 weeks as they claim they have to have them struck by now, so they certainly know what they'll look like and have examples to show off so it wouldn't surprise me if the images are out there. I just need to find them. I am sure that either the rocks or the bird will feature prominently on the new coins. The only thing that gives me a little doubt on this is the Bond Coins - which are very tokenized and do not feature the national imagery and symbolism that were on the other coins. If you look at the photos in my Zimbabwe coin set, that Zimbabwe bird side of your bullion issue is almost the same as the obverse of those older coins. Yeah. After you said this I went back and checked and the $100 notes are dated 2020 too. So they probably just sat on them for 2 years while they just got worth less and less and then got worthless. I've drafted up a description for the $100 note. I'm going to try to snap up an example soon to plug in my set and have it fully up-to-date for the first time in about a year. After that though I'm thinking you're right and I'll get a break from having to update these until the new new series hits.

I'm putting this up as what I'm calling my 2022 update to the Zimbabwe set. When I got into this in 2015 I thought it would be done and that I would just get to build the sets and the descriptions and be done. It has been very interesting and an unexpected journey to have this new series that started in 2019 (2016 if you count the bond notes) and having to update and revise to reflect the timeline moving forward, but it's something I've enjoyed following immensely, carrying the set forward. The timing of this update is spurred partially by my wife buying me a graded example of the $50 (P-105) note for the series as part of my father's day present and also the announcement the RBZ made last week. My last major update to this set was in May 2021, a couple of months before the $50 note was released, so my $20 note description still said I thought the $20 note would be the last of the series. So an update was needed. The Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe announced in early April 2022 that they would be releasing a new $100 bill. At the time, inflation was running about 6-7% a month and about 66-72% a year. The RBZ committee at the time talked about how it needed to “remain focused on inflation reduction” while also pointing to rising global inflation and the Russia-Ukraine conflict – which had started only about 1.5 months prior at the time. The design of this note will look familiar to those familiar with Zimbabwean money. The front of the note is more or less identical to the other notes in the series with the exception of the color and the denomination and even the color seems very similar to the $50 note that immediately precedes it in the series. The reverse of the note features the Great Zimbabwe Ruins, which have not been featured previously in this series but they have been featured on the national coins and currency over and over again dating back to 1980 with the $1 coin. I think the first appearance of the ruins on a note was on the $50 bill of the 2nd series of the 1st dollar (P-8), which was released in 1994. Every time the ruins are introduced or featured in a new series of notes it is done with new artwork but the artwork always seems to focus on this one structure or feature of the ruins. I think this new design is notable also for the prominent placement of the milkwood tree. I bring up the old $1 coin from 1980 in part because, of all the prior artwork, this new note most reminds me of that old $1 coin. By Jun 2022, just two months after this note was released, annual inflation had spiked from 72% to 192%. Forever behind the curve with this series, the RBZ once again released a new note that could not even buy a loaf of bread when it was released. For all the jokes that got made about the $100 Trillion dollar note (P-91) at the time of its release, that bill was worth about $2 officially at release and could buy bread – and if you sold it to tourists at the airport for more than it was actually worth you could get a loaf of bread or maybe two. But these notes, at release, didn’t even buy you bread. Just two to three months after this note was released, in June and July 2022, you have some developments that are perhaps the most damning inditements of this new currency, the surest signs that this experiment in restarting a national currency has failed, and that this series may actually, finally, be close to an end. In June 2022, the country announced that the US Dollar and other foreign currencies would once again be legal tender in the country and would remain so for at least the next 5 years. This is an official return to the multi-currency system that reigned from 2009-2019 and which was brought to an end by the government outlawing domestic use of foreign currencies and the forced conversion of bank balances to the new dollar in 2019. This comes less than three years after the RBZ stated repeatedly in October 2019 that there was absolutely zero chance that they would return to the multi-currency system. One month after that, in July 2022 - last week -the country announced that they would start issuing gold coins later that month that could be purchased for the value of the coins + production cost and used in domestic transactions or kept as an inflation hedge. Actual gold coins, struck possibly even for circulation. Can you even believe it? If it happens I think that might be one of if not the first time that gold coins have circulated in nearly 100 years. I'm looking for pictures.... I wonder what they'll look like.... I need one of these things. Like Seriously. I'm going to have to get one. But... they're still supporting this zombie currency. It's dead. The people have rejected it. They've brought the multi-currency system back and they think they'll get to just take it away again in 5 years? Edited to add: My wife's father's day present to me also included 2 other notes. One is a 65 EPQ graded P-18 that Noteshobby had listed recently. I showed her the check / linked her to it (and the P-105, and the Congo note) recently when she was looking for ideas for a present for me because she considers me hard to shop for. This 65 EPQ example is better than the 63EPQ and 64EPQ I'd gotten graded last year. So it upgrades my "best possible set" of these checks but I'm not actually putting it in a competitive set with my other "best" checks. I'm putting it in my incomplete set that contains the now 3 of these things that I've bought from elsewhere. I just like the idea of those other two sets being entirely self-graded too much to introduce a pre-graded, bought note into them and ruining those -001 to -006 runs I worked so hard to make. I don't need to fight currently to have the highest ranked set of these so I like the style of keeping those other two sets "pure." But this note is now with all the others in the signature set I made to highlight these specifically. The Congo note goes towards my elephant note set - which I may get more seriously off the ground one day. I'll have to do some research for this one ... one day... as I have time.

The vast majority of what I've bought the last few years has been from a large PMG Authorized dealer, and it's mostly pretty low value modern stuff. While I suppose anything is possible, I doubt one of the larger international PMG authorized dealers would jeopardize their relationship with PMG to sell fake notes in fake holders. So I don't lose much sleep over it. Just my 2 cents.

There are few holes left in that set. And the ones that are left are not trivial to contend with. From here it's mostly upgrade or bust. And if you look at several of the series / subsets they're 100% complete.

No. It would make the new ones inconsistent with the old ones, and I rarely prefer less identifying information vs more. Also, I'd much rather just have to look for "P-1d" when looking for a note I want than have to check the 4-5 other things I'd have to check to know a P-1d vs P-1c vs P-1b vs P-1a. Also, with some of the things I collect, the difference between the "a" and "b" is the watermark, and the sellers rarely show the watermark in pictures. PMG will also often indicate a type 1 or type 2 watermark on the label, but that gets me back into the mode of having to look at 4-5 things to know what variety I'm getting vs just having it on the label.

69s always get my attention, but they're rarely offered at prices I find attractive.

I mean, back when I started the 68s just weren't there at affordable priced. And then for a while I was picking up 67s and 66s for cheap from BNW. And it won me an award. So no regrets! Lol. But I will keep bumping them up where it makes sense - but I'm not paying $60 to upgrade a 67 to a 68. Yeah. The switch to the Digital Bolivar (no new added zeros) with no new design I think is not going to be kind to this series from a collector standpoint... but... I'm in it. Working up to expanding this to coins as with Zimbabwe but that's still slow going and something has come up that may shift my focus back to the 10G set.

So, I saw this thing come up and knew it was higher grade than what I had. I added it to my watch list and then never followed up or look at it. I got a notification last night from eBay that it was ending. It had no bids and a price of $27. The seller - who I buy from often - had a BIN option on it in another listing for $35. Just for fun I put in a $27 bid as the minutes were ticking down. I thought mine was a 66 EPQ but I didn't feel like I had time to check. I won it though! It turns out the one I had in my set was a 67 EPQ. So this was only a 1 point, minor, upgrade... but it's an upgrade. The set gets slightly better, slightly stronger... slightly closer to being acceptable to Mike's lofty standards. The seller's image is of an AB. I wouldn't mind if this turned into another case where what they actually send me is an AA, because what I have in my set already (the 67 EPQ) is also an AB. So that could be nice. I guess we'll see. The serial number on the note they image is interesting - Not fancy, but interesting. Somehow I doubt this is the one I'll get but... interesting to look at nonetheless. Edited to add: A few months ago I finally bit the bullet and bought a 66 EPQ VEN104a just to fill the whole in my set. The same seller with the above has a VEN104a in 67EPQ now, finally... If I'd realized this last night I might have grabbed this for combined shipping... as it is, now, I'm just going to sigh, roll my eyes, and be a bit annoyed. I am still waiting to see if pre-graded Digital Bolivars will start showing up on eBay. If I can get them pre-graded in good grades for good prices I'll probably expand the set to include those and update the name from just "Strength and Sovereignty," but I don't really want to go through the hassle of grading these myself. I think the uniformity and sameness of these is hurting collector interest though and that might hurt dealer interest. I'm noticing that P-110 through P-113 don't seem to have done well, but P-114 did because it has a new back and, of course, it is the 1 Mil.

Yeah. A seller we both use for coins took quite a while to get an order out for me and now the post is taking a while. It'll get here eventually. 🤷‍♂️ Fortunately I'm not in a rush on that.

Yeah. I hear ya on that one. I tried to have the Fuertes notes tied up before I started the Soberano notes and I'm going to probably buy the 1M Bolivar note before I seriously consider getting the Digital notes. The 104 is just a gap I'm going to tolerate for now just because I don't want a 66.

I mean, it could be worse. From August 2008 to Feb 2009 the RBZ released the entire 27 note 3rd dollar run (some with varieties) and the 7 note 4th dollar run. 34 notes in 6 months - not including varieties! Venezuela was also kinda painful this year. They put out 8 new notes, not that I've gotten into most of that - I only have 2 so far, but 2 of the three that have been out a while. The 5 new ones are still working on trickling through.

Thanks for the new slots!