As I see it, the biggest problem with graded (slabbed) notes is that, unlike with coins, once a note has been slabbed in plastic it's essentially impossible to verify the grade and the originality of the note. The grade of a slabbed coin can be verified fairly easily as coins are graded by looking at them in the perpendicular direction. However, to grade a note properly you have to look at it obliquely using a parallel light source if you want to detect any small paper disruptions on high grade notes or if you want to determine whether it's been washed or pressed. Once a note has been slabbed in plastic it's virtually impossible to see minor paper disruptions on high-grade notes and whether the note has been washed or pressed. It's no use looking at the note obliquely as the best you could then do would be to grade the plastic holder!
Another problem that I haven't seen mentioned before is that the slabbing plastic provides mechanical support for the note inside. If the note is unusually limp for the grade (perhaps due to chemical processing or washing), or if there's a "knife edge" fold that has seriously weakened the paper at the fold line, you would never find out unless you cut the note out. There are other potential problems if a note has been chemically treated since residual chemicals could seriously affect the fabric of the note over a long period of time in a confined space.
Yet another problem with slabbed notes is that although the grading companies will usually tell you if the paper is "EPQ" or "PPQ", i.e. original and unmolested (in their opinion!), they will never ever tell you if the note has been washed or pressed, repaired, conserved, etc. They will however tell you if there's some ink writing on the note but who needs to be informed about something that's so obvious for everyone to see! At least the coin grading companies will usually say things like "Cleaned" or "Polished" on the holder.
Note grading (slabbing) differs in several significant and fundamental ways from coin slabbing and it's prone to many more problems in my opinion. With slabbed coins you can pretty well verify whether the assigned grade is correct or not and whether the coin has been processed or cleaned. However, with slabbed notes it's next to impossible to verify the grade of a high grade note and whether or not the note has been processed. You have to rely 100% on the opinion of the company (or should I say the human beings) that graded the note. If, for example, a grading company were to miss a very small imperfection on an otherwise gem unc rarity then you could well be overpaying by many thousands of dollars!
« Last Edit: October 04, 2007, 09:12:59 am by Ottawa »
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" Buy the very best notes that you can afford and keep them for at least 10 years. " (Richard D. Lockwood, private communication, 1978).
