Numismatic Guaranty Corporation has announced that it has passed the 20 million coins in certified coins. NGC said that it has received submissions from 43 different countries spanning 2,600 years of history. The earliest ancient coin was from as early as 600 B.C.E.
“While 20 million graded coins is a huge accomplishment and we celebrate it, we really are focused on the future,” said Mark Salzberg, chairman of NGC. “We look forward to continuing to push the industry envelope to develop and implement innovations that benefit not only our loyal customers, but the hobby as a whole.”
While this is quite an accomplishment, NGC has to be watching its competition. Over the last few months, the Professional Coin Grading Service has innovated far more than NGC with new services that will benefit the community. While both PCGS and NGC added plus grading to their service to mark premium quality coins, PCGS’s “Big One” that included the PCGS Secure Plus™ service. Coins grade through Secure Plus will be scanned by an optical device that will map the surface of the coin creating a digital signature of its characteristics that can be used for later reference and to compare them with other specimens including the same coin possibly resubmitted.
In addition to Secure Plus, PCGS also introduced the PCGS Coin Sniffer,™ a technology that will recognize the use of chemicals on coins submitted to PCGS. Between the surface and chemical analysis, PCGS is leading the industry in the use of technology to improve on the certification service.
Having been an advocate for the use of technology to assist in the grading process, I feel that this use of technology places PCGS ahead of all grading services. If NGC wants to remain in the top tier of coin grading services, they must integrate technology into their service or risk falling behind.
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