Guatemalan Manzana Jade Slab

Guatemalan Manzana Jade Slab
Photo Credit: Paul’s Rok Shop

Guatemalan Manzana Jade Slab

Buy It Now Price: $120 (price as of 2019; item no longer available)

Pros:

-This light-green Manzana jade slab comes from the Motagua River valley in Guatemala, which was the source of the jades so prized by the Mayan civilization.

-It measures approximately 4.5 inches (11.4 cm) tall by 4 inches (10.2 cm) wide by 0.5 inches (1.2 cm) thick and weighs a substantial 501 grams (1.1 pounds).

-Manzana, the Spanish word for “apple”, is a moniker sometimes applied to pleasingly light-green varieties of jadeite jade from Central America.  Manzana jade was one of the Mayan civilization’s most treasured materials.

-A quick density calculation verifies that this piece is indeed genuine jadeite jade.  To do this we take the weight of the stone (501 grams) and divide it by the slab’s volume (11.4 cm x 10.2 cm x 1.2 cm = 139.5 cm3).  This gives us a density of 3.59 gm/cm3, which is close enough (given the specimen’s slightly irregular outline) to jadeite’s range of 3.25 to 3.45 gm/cm3.

-One of the great attributes of this Manzana jade slab is its shape; it is the perfect size for turning into a bangle bracelet.  Not only that, but the slab’s quality is particularly high, with a fine, even color and some evidence of translucence.  This is especially important because only the best quality jades are fit to be carved into bangle bracelets.

-This Manzana jade slab, like all high quality Guatemalan jadeite jades, is an incredibly underappreciated tangible asset right now.  In addition, they are rarely treated via bleaching or dyeing, meaning that you get a perfectly natural gemstone in a world overrun by synthetics and fakes.

-With a buy-it-now price of $120, this Manzana jade slab is selling for only $239 a kilo.  I find this price to be absurdly low given jadeite jade’s rarity and the excellent quality of the piece.

 

Cons:

-The eBay seller who is offering this jade slab, Paul’s Rok Shop, will stop selling rough jades by the end of June 2019 due to the low profit margin involved.  So if you are reading this article anytime after that date, it is likely that this specific piece of jade is no longer available.  For any who are interested, I recently wrote an article on the tragedy of losing this fine jade dealer.

 

Read more fascinating Antique Sage gemstone spotlight posts here.

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Read in-depth Antique Sage investment guides here.

The Vintage Costume Jewelry Collecting Fad

The Vintage Costume Jewelry Collecting Fad
Photo Credit: Housing Works Thrift Shop

Vintage costume jewelry is a hot trend right now.  A quick search on eBay will reveal over half a million examples for sale, ranging from the 1930s to the 1980s.  And it sells too.  Almost 200,000 pieces of vintage costume jewelry have sold on the online auction giant over the past six months.

Although inexpensive jewelry has been with us since the time of the Roman Empire, modern costume jewelry really came about in the 1920s.  This was a period of incredible prosperity and loosening social mores for women.  Newly independent women began looking for ways to experiment with jewelry as a fashion accessory.  Unfortunately, traditional jewelry made from precious metals and gemstones was far too expensive to wear casually or haphazardly.

This was the pivotal moment in history when the renowned French fashion designer, Coco Chanel, spawned an industry.  In the late 1920s she released a line of costume jewelry that allowed women to indulge in their wildest jewelry fantasies without breaking the bank.  She was soon followed by other well-recognized vintage costume jewelry brands, such as Trifari, Coro, Christian Dior, Miriam Haskell, and Napier.

The nascent costume jewelry industry soon received an unexpected boost from the advent of World War II.  This global conflict restricted access to traditional precious materials.  Suddenly gold and platinum from South Africa no longer reached Nazi-occupied Europe.  Likewise, rubies and sapphires from Burma were cut off from the West by the Japanese occupation of Southeast Asia.

This meant that costume jewelry was often the only game in town.  It was made from inexpensive and readily available materials like gilt-brass, silver, plastic and glass rhinestones.  However, considerable effort went into its design and marketing to ensure a high quality product that appealed to a broad range of women.

In spite of its storied history and interesting designs, there is something about vintage costume jewelry that really bothers me.  Specifically, I’m worried about the extreme prices that some people are willing to pay for what amounts to faux jewelry.  To be blunt, costume jewelry – even brand-name vintage pieces – shouldn’t be reaching the exceptionally high prices that it is.

The vintage costume jewelry market has all the hallmarks of a fad.

For example, almost 600 eBay listings of vintage costume jewelry from major makers sold within the past 6 months (as of May 2019) for more than $200.  Fully 49 examples even sold for more than $1,000.  And there are undoubtedly many other high value sales of lesser known makers as well.

Now many people might argue that it isn’t possible to buy “fine” jewelry – vintage or otherwise – for only a few hundred dollars.  So what is wrong with paying a couple C-notes for a very nice (and sometimes historically significant) piece of vintage costume jewelry?

My complaint is that vintage costume jewelry is not (and never will be) investment grade.  Sure, if you love it, buy it.  Just be aware that you are collecting, not investing.  Vintage costume jewelry will never reliably appreciate in value like a piece of fine vintage jewelry.

Let’s examine a real life comparison between a piece of vintage costume jewelry and a piece of fine, albeit modern, jewelry:

 

The Vintage Costume Jewelry Collecting Fad - comparison

Photo Credit: Floridas-Ultimate-Treasures & Cutterstone

The piece on the left is a late 1940s Jewels of Tanjore brooch by Trifari.  It is made from vermeil (gold plated sterling silver) and set with glass stones.  The design was inspired by the Indian jewelry of the British Maharajas.  It sold on eBay on November 11, 2018 for $359.95 (plus $6.00 shipping).

The contemporary Modernist piece on the right is a sterling silver and 14 karat gold pendant by Cutterstone, a small artisan jeweler based in Calimesa, California.  The piece was cast using a hand-carved cuttlebone mold, which is destroyed in the production process.  It was then laboriously hand-finished and set with a natural, 1.27 carat purple-pink, marquise-cut sapphire and a smaller, 0.24 carat beryllium-diffused, round-cut orange sapphire.  I purchased it on Etsy in 2016 for $365 (plus $3.50 shipping).

The Trifari Jewels of Tanjore brooch was mass-produced in a factory by the thousands.  It is likely that hundreds of them are still extant today.  I (generously) estimate the scrap value of the sterling silver used in it at $10 to $12.

In contrast, the Cutterstone pendant was individually designed and hand-made by an experienced craftsman.  And due to the cuttlebone casting, there will only ever be one in existence.  I estimate the intrinsic value of this piece to conservatively be around $300.  As an FYI, I featured a pair of luscious Cutterstone sterling silver earrings in one of my recent Spotlight posts.

The vintage Trifari piece cost $365.95, delivered; the Modernist Cutterstone piece cost $368.50, delivered.  They were effectively the same price.

 

Affordable Vintage Karat Gold Jewelry for Sale on eBay

(This is an affiliate link for which I may be compensated)

 

And yet the Cutterstone pendant is a one-of-a-kind work of art that will undoubtedly age into a fine antique over time.  Its organic lines and superb sense of proportions are truly stunning.  The very real, very enticing, very high quality sapphires merely sweeten the deal.  It is a consummate investment grade piece of jewelry.

On the other hand, this is as good as it’s ever going to get for the Trifari piece.  It is a mass-produced brooch with very little intrinsic value.  Its design is solid, but not particularly original or groundbreaking (there was a lot of Indian-style jewelry being released in the 1940s and 1950s).  Yes, it does have a famous brand name attached to it, but it is a name intimately associated with costume jewelry.  Trifari is no Tiffany & Co. or Cartier.  This is not an investment-oriented piece of jewelry, despite the fact that price trends have been quite favorable for vintage costume jewelry over the past decade.

One of these pieces is a great buy at $370 and one is not.  The worst part is that both pieces use the same primary medium – sterling silver.  Yet there is still a world of difference between them.

In my opinion it would be wise for jewelry collectors and connoisseurs to avoid buying vintage costume pieces at anywhere above $100 or possibly $200.  It is simply too easy to find compelling examples of real jewelry at the latter price point to fool around with fake or junk jewelry, vintage or not.

 

Cutterstone Hand-Crafted Jewelry for Sale on Etsy

(These are affiliate links for which I may be compensated)

 

Read more thought-provoking Antique Sage gems & jewelry articles here.

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Read in-depth Antique Sage vintage jewelry investment guides here.


3 Troy Ounce VPS Silver Bar – Crack Jenny’s Teacup

3 Troy Ounce VPS Silver Bar - Crack Jenny's Teacup
Photo Credit: Barry’s Postcards

3 Troy Ounce VPS Silver Bar – Crack Jenny’s Teacup

Buy It Now Price: $110 (price as of 2019; item no longer available)

Pros:

-This limited edition 3 troy ounce VPS silver bar features pirate cutlasses, oxidized surfaces and Vollmer Poured Silver’s skull and crossbones logo.

-This artisan hand-poured silver bar weighs 3 troy ounces and is made from solid, .999 fine silver.

-Vollmer Poured Silver, also known as VPS, is a precious metal micro-foundry located in the picturesque Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts.  All VPS silver bars are individually designed and hand-poured using traditional methods by the studio’s founder, Devin Vollmer.

-Modern hand-poured silver bars are becoming increasingly popular among collectors because of their superior workmanship, pleasing compositions and interesting visual effects.  I consider hand-poured silver to be a stealth tangible asset investment suitable for the adventurous alternative asset investor.

-This VPS silver bar is #4 of a strictly limited edition run of only 5 specimens.  This is an incredibly small mintage in the world of hand-poured silver, where limited editions of 100 or 200 examples are the norm.

-This VPS silver bar comes with its original certificate of authenticity signed by Devin Vollmer himself.  It also identifies the work’s name as “Crack Jenny’s Teacup” – a reference to pirate slang from the 17th and 18th century.

-There are many different small companies that specialize in hand-poured silver bars, including Yeager’s Poured Silver, Bit Bullion, Mutiny Metals and MK Barz.  But in my opinion, none of them can compare to the sheer artistic character and aesthetic qualities of Vollmer Poured Silver bars.

-I believe this Crack Jenny’s Teacup silver art bar is well worth the $110 price tag.  The low asking price also means that this VPS silver bar is attainable by investors of even modest means.  This is an underappreciated advantage in a world where it can be difficult to open a brokerage account for less than $1,000.

 

Cons:

-The cost per ounce for this work is $36.67 ($110 asking price / 3 troy ounces), which is on the high side for a silver art bar.  Artisan hand-poured silver bars from other makers can often be found in the $25 to $30 range.  However, given the absurdly low mintage and tremendous artistic beauty of this VPS silver bar, I feel the higher cost per ounce is justified.

 

Read more fascinating Antique Sage bullion spotlight posts here.

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Read in-depth Antique Sage investment guides here.

Buying Bullion at Spot with eBay Bucks

Buying Bullion at Spot with eBay Bucks
Photo Credit: Eric Golub

Update: EBay Bucks is effectively defunct at the current time.

Let me tell you a story that every hard asset investor should love, a story of discounted precious metals and buying bullion at spot.

EBay recently sent me a marketing email alerting me to a 10% eBay Bucks promotion they were running over the next couple of days.

What is eBay Bucks?  It is a rewards program that rebates a percentage of any eligible eBay purchase.  EBay Bucks accrue all quarter long and are then paid out as a voucher that can be used for any additional eBay purchases after the end of the quarter.

So for example, rewards accumulated in July, August and September would be paid out in early October.  These vouchers are only good for 30 days after they are issued, so you need to be fairly quick about using them.  Any unused amount will expire after 30 days.

Under normal circumstances eBay Bucks accrue at a 1% rate, meaning that for every $100 in purchases, you will receive $1 in eBay Bucks.  But every so often the e-commerce platform announces promotional periods where rewards accrue at 8%, 10% or even (very rarely) 15%.  These supercharged rewards can be very lucrative if you are shopping for precious metals, antiques or other tangible assets.

After receiving my 10% eBay Bucks notice, I immediately went on the prowl looking for cheap gold or silver bullion to add to my cart.

In my case, I decided to buy a roll of pre-1965, U.S. silver quarters that was listed for $111.75.  Let’s walk through the economics of my acquisition together.

The spot price of silver at the time of my purchase was $14.36 a troy ounce.  Each $10 face value roll of junk silver quarters contains about 7.15 troy ounces of pure silver.  Therefore, each roll had a melt value of $102.67.

This means I was paying $15.63 a troy ounce – an 8.84% premium over spot.  This was an alright, but not great price.  However, this was before we factor in the eBay Bucks bonus.  These rewards were worth $11.18, which effectively reduced my purchase price to just $100.57 per roll, a -2.05% discount to the going spot rate.

But wait!  I’m not finished yet.

I also own a rewards credit card that pays me back 1% on all purchases.  Double stacking credit card rewards with eBay Bucks is a surefire way to reduce your cost basis and stretch your investing dollar.  There are many rewards cards out there that offer 1% to 2% rebates, a topic I explore in greater depth in an article titled “Using Credit Card Reward Points to Buy Hard Assets“.

The 1% refund from my credit card lowered the cost of my silver quarters to only $99.45 per roll.  That means that I picked up over 7 troy ounces of bullion for only $13.91 an ounce, -3.14% below spot!

 

Cost
Cost Per
Per Troy
Roll Ounce
Original Cost  $  111.75  $    15.63
eBay Bucks  $  (11.18)  $    (1.56)
Credit Card Points  $    (1.12)  $    (0.16)
Final Cost  $  99.45  $    13.91

 

And the best part is that you can scale this strategy too.  The seller had 10 rolls of silver quarters for sale.  It would have been easy enough to buy multiple rolls – and they all would have been below spot.

In fact, the deal was so good that I eventually opted to buy 2 rolls of the junk silver quarters.  I simply couldn’t resist constitutional silver at less than $14 an ounce!

But eBay Bucks do have some minor drawbacks you should be aware of.

For instance, all items listed in the “Bullion” category under “Coins & Paper Money” are specifically excluded.  You usually can’t receive rewards on these purchases.  EBay excludes these listings because their profit margins in this category are simply too low to allow for any discounts.

But there is a great work-around for this unfortunate situation.  Any gold or silver item that isn’t listed in the “Bullion” category is generally considered fair game.  While this does limit your buying choices somewhat, it still allows you to pick up bullion at or near spot in many instances.

There are two specific types of bullion coins that can most often be found outside eBay’s “Bullion” category: pre-1965 U.S. 90% junk silver and pre-1933 semi-numismatic U.S. gold coins.  These kinds of coins often trade at only modest premiums to spot to begin with, making them perfect candidates for an eBay Bucks discount strategy.

I find the semi-numismatic pre-1933 U.S. gold coins to be a particularly intriguing choice for the precious metal stacker.  If you are at all familiar with gold, you know that fractional (less than 1 troy ounce) gold bullion coins typically sell for hefty premiums.  For example, it isn’t unusual for major dealers to sell fractional-sized American Gold Eagles for 6% to 16% over spot.

Yet I found a well-respected dealer, Liberty Coin, selling random date, $10 Liberty Head gold coins in XF (Extra Fine) condition for only $695 (with free shipping).  Factor in 10% eBay Bucks and 1% cash back on a credit card and you are looking at a net cost of just over $618.  With gold trading for $1,283, this means the $10 Liberty Head gold coin (which contains 0.48375 troy ounces of pure gold) is selling just under spot.

Not only do you avoid paying any substantial premium, but you also get a more than 110 year old U.S. gold coin in reasonably good condition with numismatic potential!

Buying Bullion at Spot with eBay Bucks - $10 Liberty Head

For those who are more even adventurous, some other possible bullion coins would be pre-1967 Canadian 80% silver coins and European fractional gold coins, like British sovereigns and French 20 franc pieces.  I personally have seen deals on Swiss 20 franc gold coins that put them at -4% to -5% below spot when combined with eBay Bucks, although you might have to wait patiently for a bargain that good.

Of course, it is sometimes possible to find reasonably-priced modern bullion coins like American Eagles or Canadian Maple Leafs that are listed in non-bullion categories, making them eligible for eBay Bucks.  Although fairly rare, I wholeheartedly recommend these deals if you can find them.

Another potential drawback with eBay Bucks is that they are limited to $100 per transaction.  So if eBay is running a 10% rewards promotion, you will only earn the full amount on a purchase up to $1,000.  If the item in question is more expensive than that – say $1,500 – you will still only accrue $100 worth of eBay Bucks.

EBay also limits program participants to $500 in total eBay Bucks per quarter.  This would cap you at $5,000 in aggregate purchases per quarter, assuming you only took advantage of enhanced, 10% rebate rates.  I don’t think a ceiling this high should be a problem for most people.  But if you’re a big spender, it is good to keep in mind that eBay’s largess does have its limits.

The eBay Bucks program is only open to U.S. and Canadian residents.  Sorry, but if you hail from Great Britain, Continental Europe or the Land Down Under, you are out of luck.

A final consideration is that eBay Bucks are technically an unsecured obligation of the e-commerce giant.  Although it seems quite improbable, if eBay were to declare bankruptcy between the time when you made an eligible purchase and the end of the quarter when vouchers are normally issued, you would get nothing.  This is not something I believe will happen, but I’ve noted it here for the sake of completeness anyway.

Despite these minor drawbacks, eBay Bucks are a great way for the precious metal investor to buy bullion at spot.  I use the program myself and can highly recommend it.  If you liked this unconventional approach to hard asset investing, you might enjoy a related article I wrote about building your tangible assets using eBay flash sales.

 

Read more thought-provoking Antique Sage investing articles here.

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Read in-depth Antique Sage investment guides here.