Has anyone seen many of these non funded coins that still have the holo on their anyways get graded just for fun?
For sure. I had a beautiful (empty) buyer-funded Lealana graded by ICG.
ICG has graded dozens of crypto coins for me over the past two years -- mostly Casascius and Crypto Imperator. The staff are fantastic and very helpful. You can always give them a call if you have any questions, but your best points of contact on the forum would be anonymousminer and minerjones, who both have exceptional relationships with ICG.
I sent two redeemed 25 gold Casascius to PCGS, as ICG's slabs cannot accommodate a coin that large. Turnaround time was more significant, but they did a fine job as well.
Over time, I think ICG will continue to establish themselves as the world's-foremost grader for crypto collectibles. They are in the lead by a landslide.
I like ICG to an extent, but they are in the lead by default. ANACS was the only one of the major graders in the US who graded crypto coins for years, and would likely at least split business with ICG if they were still grading these coins.( Still don’t understand why they stopped). Now PCGS seems to be the “premier” crypto coin grader. Maybe they will start to open up and grade everything crypto coin wise before long, or perhaps already are? If they do, ICG graded coins will shoot way down imo. ICG needs to improve their slabs. Not only are they limited in size, the way coins are held in them is inferior to PCGS and NGC. The overall quality of the slabs as well as the labels are also inferior.
Although I believe PCGS embellished the grades for some of the first crypto coins they graded for Stacks (as do others) they are still considered the premier coin grader across the globe by a good margin. If I had a nice coin to grade and I had my choice, I’d spend a few more dollars on PCGS as it’ll carry more value for a number of reasons (as stated above), especially to those who are new to crypto coin collecting but not new to coin collecting. Collectors will feel safer/happier with PCGS vs ICG.
Don’t get me wrong I don’t dislike ICG. They are easy to work with, affordable, open minded, etc.
@Tread- if the hologram was put on by the maker, but unfunded, then yes absolutely worth slabbing. But I would never put one on myself and then send for grading/slabbing unless you plan to never sell it.
Also- Grading poker chips, satori’s / BTCC chips etc is just silly. Getting them slabbed and authenticated is a different story, however.
Tread you should share your convo with the head of NGC when you spoke about grading crypto coins w/them lol
