Revenant

On 10/2/2021 at 9:48 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Thanks for the reminder. 

Definitely a sweet pick up at a good price, but what am I missing? Why do these have separate Pick #'s as opposed to a variety Pick #?

I don't know... All I can say, in the politest way possible, is that the SCWBN is not always... entirely... internally consistent... it feels like?

So... P-28 and P-30 have different dates of issuance with one being 10/1/2005 and 2/1/2006. But P-23 has varieties a, b, c, d, e, AND f and the only difference between e and f is the redemption date. And they would have done that with categorizing 23, I would think, before categorizing this as 28 and 30...

With 29 at least it seems likely that they had a different printer, but I haven't found a source that confirms this for me. But that still leaves me wondering why we don't have P-28a, P-28b, and P-29.

I'm wondering if they Printed the 28s themselves, then printed the 29s through G&D, and then printed the 30s themselves or had someone else print them for them, and they decided to split the 30s out into a new pick number because of the shifting back and forth.

On 9/27/2021 at 6:03 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Is there any connection to the statue of the unknown soldier? Is there a statue of her in the same park? I'm assuming there is since they are depicted on the same note.

Given that the tomb of the unknown soldier is in the National Heroes Acre, I'd be surprised if there isn't a statue to her somewhere in that same, very large, park. No clue why they decided to use here or that statue here though. The tomb / memorial to the unknown soldier is only shown 1 other time, on P-81.

On 9/19/2021 at 4:46 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Links to other notes,  yeah I might have to steal that idea when I start building the descriptions for mine.

I may not / probably won't actually implement it as links. Probably just, "Go look at this not for more."

On 9/18/2021 at 6:47 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

$20 for a 67 EPQ P64 in 2019 sounds about right, I was kind of expecting the 68 EPQ to sell for around $40-$60. Since I was pretty amped up about this note I put an $87 bid on it and walked away thinking that should be more than enough. I agree that the collector base for these is thin, very thin in my estimation, as there was only two bids on this note. Mine and the snipe. 

The Agrochecks aren't popular. They get more attention than the relatively obscure traveller's checks but that doesn't say much. There's more of a collector's base in the 1st and 3rd dollars. I think the new dollars are relatively popular. But the 4th dollar and anything 2nd dollar seems mostly unloved.

I picked up my 67 EPQ P-64 for about $17-18 in early 2019. If I remember right it was bought either right before or right after Sam's birth but I think Sam had been moved from the level 3 to the level 2 NICU around that time. Crazy stuff. I don't know that I'll ever upgrade that one.

Just be patient. The collector community for these is thin. I think it's mostly like 10-20 people for Zimbabwe depending on the series / set.

On 8/13/2021 at 5:47 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Yep, whew!

Looks like my new notes are arriving today from Noteshobby And my P3s arrived at my in laws yesterday - I'll see them this weekend.

On 8/18/2021 at 6:15 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

If you're looking for a preview check the population report and look for an increase. It should be easy since it's doubtful there are any other Z-coins being graded.  I'll do that quite often as they update the pop reports on Tuesdays and there is usually at least a few days between when the coins are graded and when they ship. 

It's a good tip but they need to make it to the graders first. I'm guessing there must have been some world coins hitting at highers tiers that are bumping back my moderns. 

On 8/4/2021 at 5:57 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Well I dragged my feet long enough for the turnaround times to jump up to 64 days for moderns. I took a gamble that times would get better and I lost.  At least I got to pick up 1 - 2 more coins to add to the submissions. I probably won't send another until next year.

Well, I think you will be waiting a while on those. It arrived there 6/7, entered on 6/24, "Scheduled" for 6 weeks since 7/7 and all they'll say is "you're in the queue, I can't tell how far back, wait time is now 61 business days."  It was like 49 when I sent mine in. I guess I'll see if I know results by Sept 1.

On 8/13/2021 at 6:52 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

I've seen the raw Zim 50 being sold by noteshobby, which all of them have this weird crease at the security strip, so I expect those to show up soon. They've had the 1MM Bolivar as well so I'm not sure what the delay is, other than there is maybe fewer collectors of Bolivars than ZIM dollars.

I don't know. They've had all the others, up to VEN111, in pretty consistent supply I feel and they have been selling them. Not 104 though. Not if you want something nicer than 65 EPQ. 

On 8/13/2021 at 6:08 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

You could always snipe me on a new Zim 50 when they start showing up. 

I think that's still a ways away but I could be wrong. I keep looking for the new 2021 Venezuelan notes to start popping up in PMG holders and so far it hasn't happened. I'm starting to feel confused and frustrated with that one. 

On 8/13/2021 at 5:47 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Yep, whew!

Ah. Well, nuts. I'll have to continue looking for ways to make your life more difficult now. 

On 8/12/2021 at 4:53 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

until I get shipping confirmation

I got my shipping confirmation this morning. You?

On 8/12/2021 at 4:53 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

That's me.

HA! This is cracking me up! 

Uh oh, what if they forgot to pull down their listing and they don't have the note. They'll cancel my order, now I'm going to be all nervous until I get shipping confirmation. 

 

Ha! I guess you'll just have to sweat that out a bit. 👿 Who's the Ninja now?  (Maybe both of us. ) 

On 8/12/2021 at 3:06 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Well, you forced my hand. I've been watching a P85 for months now and I pulled the trigger on it today after I finished reading this.  Didn't want to take the chance of leaving it in my shopping cart incase this Journal Entry inspired someone to snap it up. Now I just need to wait for a nice juicy P87 to show up.

Combined shipping, the only way to buy notes. 

If you snapped up a 68 EPQ from Noteshobby I think you'll be leading me by 9-15 points soon even with this, but don't get lazy. Dealing with that 69 EPQ you have on the P-83 is going to be a challenge to deal with though.  

Edit: Also, if I'm being completely honest, I bought this today after watching it for quite a while out of fear that you might buy it if I didn't, and I wanted this upgrade at the price I got.

I doubt this will induce anyone to buy this that wasn't going to before (other than you), because, while I pay attention to prefixes on these and find them interesting, they don't get you registry points - unless it's "ZA" for a replacement note. So there's no reason for this to interest others.

On 8/11/2021 at 4:50 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Did all twelve of the notes you submitted have that printing on the back? I don't remember that being on all twelve, not that it should be the difference between being labeled canceled or not, but it's just a difference between the three notes posted here that might mean something. It's hard to tell a lot of the time if there is just an omission/mechanical error or if something changed in the way notes are designated. In the end I usually come up with a theory and assume I'm correct until I prove myself wrong.

I think 7 of 12 have the printing on the back but that hardly seems like it would matter for STAMP Cancelled.

I would tend so say In. They make me think of the Traveller's checks - not really notes or currency, but, for some odd reason they got pick numbers assigned and now I can be a little freak about collecting them.

That's cool though. Part of the demise of the old "2nd World."

On 8/4/2021 at 5:57 PM, Fenntucky Mike said:

Well I dragged my feet long enough for the turnaround times to jump up to 64 days for moderns. I took a gamble that times would get better and I lost.  At least I got to pick up 1 - 2 more coins to add to the submissions. I probably won't send another until next year.

Ouch! I'm hoping I'm only 2-3 weeks from grades on the z coins now. I also probably won't do anything again until January or February now, but I have already picked up 2 more z coins for grading.

On 8/4/2021 at 6:15 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

What were the grades on those? 

PMG is definitely not as backlogged as NGC, , my NGC submission was "delivered" last week and I don't expect to see those coins back until at least December and I'm probably being a little optimistic. Congratulations on the soon to be complete set, always a good feeling. Now just don't do something crazy like collect by serial number prefix or replacements. 

They were 65s and 66s I think

I already have several replacement notes and I list prefixes in my sig set for a reason. 🤣

More on this later but I could also do a deep dive on branch stamps and dates on Traveller's checks. 🤣 My wife will be thrilled.

My NGC submission arrived on 6/7 or 6/8. They entered it 6/24. Went to "scheduled for grading" on 7/7 and has been there for 4 weeks. It just is what it is. 🤷

On 7/21/2021 at 7:41 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

EDIT: Taking a quick look at this set, specifically Pick 103, the P103a has a notation on the label "Sign. #1"  and P103b has a similar notation "Sign. #3". What happened to Sign. #2 and no slot for a P103c? I'll have to check this out later, something isn't quite adding up.

My guess would be there was a 2nd signer in the middle but that denom wasn't issued / printed during that person's brief tenure.

The RBZ notes have the signatures of the governor and you have some sub-picks that have a signature for a governor that was only in office a few months, making those types relatively rare.

Side note, but I do agree that most of the a/b/c notes are signatures but you don't get some where it's a change in watermark or a change in another security feature.

Way to go. I remember the feeling when my Zimbabwe set hit 100 notes - although some of those where US dollars that I include for my narrative on dollarization - and then it passed up 100 Zimbabwean notes later. 

On 7/20/2021 at 9:09 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

It always amazes me how quickly the packages arrive from this seller. 

I'm 100% onboard with this line of thinking, it's just not worth it in my collecting areas at least, and I'm much more inclined to leave a slot empty for my newer sets as opposed to buying a "filler".

It has hit the United States at this point and is estimated to arrive here on Saturday. Pretty fast as usual.

And, yeah, sticking to my guns for now on VEN104. If we get to the end of the year and are coming up on the awards deadline I may buy a cheap hole filler just to have the set complete though. That might make me cave. We'll see.  

On 7/20/2021 at 8:57 AM, Fenntucky Mike said:

I want to know who is paying to have all these notes printed? Venezuela skipped out on the bill to TDL at one point but Zimbabwe has no problem funding new issues of banknotes, seems odd. Somehow I have a feeling that we (the U.S.) are funding this. Like we helped financed the NBU's rebranding through USAID (U.S. Agency of International Development).

I doubt it. Venezuela was super dependent on the oil and gas industry. By the end it was basically 80-90% of their government revenue, and the oil exports tanked. Because they weren't maintaining the equipment, not only did the value of the exports fall when the price of oil tanked in 2014, but their output dropped by 50-60% if not more. Zimbabwe still has a few export industries - the most important of these is probably the gold mining industry, which brings in foreign money - usually US dollars. I expect gold mining and raw materials export is probably a big part of where Zimbabwe is still getting foreign cash these days. You also have to remember that the economy had "dollarized" until 2019. When they introduced the RTGS they force-converted all the US dollar bank balances of the population into RTGS and used that to effectively seize or nationalize a lot of US-dollar savings in the country. I suspect at least some of that helped with the printing of these notes, among other things. They seized the reserves for the RTGS dollar in Feb 2019 or thereabouts and the new non-bond-notes released in November 2019 IIRC.

Edited to add: The $200 million and $50 Million dollar credit facilities that funded the Bond Notes and Coins also didn't come from the US or even the IMF. They came from the African Export-Import Bank.

I've wedged images of my gas ration coupons into my signature set using a P-15 certification number. That at least gets images of those into the set.

31 minutes ago, Fenntucky Mike said:

Haven't had time to check it out yet but I'm very excited to do so, probably this weekend, work's been crazy busy. I'm sure it'll be great.

Probably for the best. Lol it has been getting updates every evening and in the mornings when I decide I'm done talking to annoying clients for a little while.