Weekly Market Watch

This market watch examines ebay CT sales for the week of September 1 thru September 7. It was an active week with 46 CTs sold, including a few significant pieces that brought big dollars. CTs that sell for over $100 are described as HD CTs, and those that sell for over $75 are described as D CTs -- highly desired and desired respectively. But of course, you could get lucky and grab something you really wanted for few dollars! Remember that luck favors the prepared.
     There were three HD tokens sold this week. All of them are rare. The highest price paid was for a cut rectangle, dated 1864, from Otepopo in New Zealand; it sold at auction with one bidder for $250. The other two HD pieces sold for BIN prices of $125 each -- these were Canadian CTs from Eldon and Kingston, both located in Ontario. These three sales are detailed below.
     Of the 46 CTs sold this week, 28 sold for under $20, whereas another 13 traded in the middle range below $50. Two pieces were bid past this mark, plus the above-mentioned HD tokens. These numbers suggest that CTs continue to represent an inexpensive collecting challenge for the most part -- so join in and get one or two! 
     The week started off bright and early with 16 CTs offered by cobwrightfortishe on September 1st. These were mostly eighteenth century pieces -- all from the Andrew Macmillan collection. This assemblage included several squares with incused designs from Argyll and a set of molded squares from Monymusk in Aberdeen. As usual, the quality was high for the most part. A very nice square from East Kilbride in Lanark led the way with five bidders competing to produce a hammer price of $68. This piece showed horizontal lettering in four lines and was dated 1777; this rather staid design was lightly ornamented with a couple of stars and dotted border (B3652). Squares of this type represent a particular style that was popular in Lanark and Ayr at about the same time as the Glasgow squares. Here is the link: East Kilbride CT.
     The New Zealand CT that brought in a whopping $250 was sold with one bid. This is the third highest price paid for a CT this year, sitting behind the pair of of Dunfermline CTs that sold in July and the just a tad higher than the BIN price paid for the Allegheny PA token sold in the first week of August.
     I am not familiar with NZ CTs, but Burzinski cataloged the piece as coming from the parish of Herbert in Otago (B5446). The token is inscribed with the name Otepopo, as this was the old name of the community (here is another example of Burzinski using the newer name in the index). It is apparently a very small town surrounded by pastureland. The Otago region is located in the southern part of the South Island of NZ. This region was settled by Scottish immigrants of the Free Church who arrived in March of 1848 on two ships. They had embarked from Greenock in Renfrew. The principal city in the area is Dunedin.
     As you can see by the photo, the token appears to be in nVF condition with fine grained surfaces and ashen patina with lighter highlights about the devices. It is labeled as "rare" -- of note, Burzinski did not have an image of this one. The link is here: Otepopo New Zealand CT.
     As for the pair of Canadian HD CTs, these pieces sold at a fixed price on the same day -- I would guess that they sold to the same buyer who recognized that these tokens are listed as "rare" in the Charlton catalog (CW242 & CW276B2). Interestingly, both pieces have been for sale for nearly a year before finding the right buyer. One and a quarter is not that much cash -- now, don't you wish you had got one of them? They were sold by citcns, a Canadian dealer that I have purchased some nice CTs from and that I recommend. The links are here: Eldon Ontario CT and Kingston Ontario CT.