Weekly Market Watch

This market watch examines ebay auctions from July 21 through July 27. This week, no CTs sold for over $75, so we do not have any HD or  D tokens to report. But we do have one CT that came very close.
     It was a slow week overall. Some of the regular sellers from Scotland did not post listing, so sales have been down to a trickle. Only 15 CTs were sold on ebay this week. All but two sold for less than $20. As mentioned last week, several stock Canadian tokens were traded at very low prices -- I think these are very good deals.
     One CT sold at a BIN price of $73. This one was sold by coin-cabinet on July 21 (just yesterday). I have purchased from this dealer before and found the dealing to be quick and easy; the price was very good -- I got the Guelph oval with the dove in the center about a month ago (CW-260).

This image is from The Charlton
Standard Catalogue of Canadian
Communion Tokens, 2000.

     The CT that sold this week was from Saint Paul's Church in Fredericton, New Brunswick (listed as NB-212A in the Charlton Catalogue). This undated cut-rectangle was described as XF and sold below the book value of $90, so it appears to be well-bought. The piece was issued with a Bible verse on the reverse. This is the more scarce of two issues; the other one has a blank reverse. One curious detail of this sale is that the CT was not pictured!
     One other Canadian CT sold for $48 from the same seller. This piece was from Saint Andrews Church in Kingston, Ontario (CW-276B). This one is an oval, dated 1823. It was pictured and described as being in XF condition -- it sold at just below the book valuation.
     These sales show how close the book values provided by the Charlton guide are to the actual buy-and-sell figures. I have found the book values to be an accurate indicator of the marketplace more often than not. The recent sale of the stock tokens noted above represent a striking exception to this however. On the other end of the range, I suspect that rare pieces will be hotly contested and prices could soar above the book values, as the Canadian CT market is active and well-developed. Nonetheless, I recommend that you get the Charlton Catalogue; it is well-organized with pictures, history, and valuations.