High Value Stamps With Perfins

Just looking for opinions.

What is your view of a high value stamp that is also a perfin? Do you consider it worthless in terms of standard CV? Do you degrade it by some percentage? Do you ignore the perfin and value it normally?

No real motivation to this post, other than curiosity as to how people are viewing them these days. I have a fair number of perfins, stuck in a drawer someplace. Some are "worth" more than others, at catalogue. (or not. haha)

US Perfins (even on high value stamps) are generally considered to be less desirable than a non-perfinned stamp of the same Scott number. Of course, perfin collectors are the audience for such items and sometimes those collectors may pay a premium if the stamp is a desirable item or relatively scarce as a perfin but there's also a very limited population of collectors who would be interested in such item(s).

The same can be said about precanceled stamps, too. They are worth less than catalog in terms of "value" but if you market it to the right audience that has a specific interest in such items, there's no telling what the market could do.

It's all about supply and demand.

Thanks for your thoughts wt1! So... if you had a stamp that had a CV of... say... $3,000, but was a perfin, how would you catalogue it? Would you try to find a non-perfin version for your collection?

wt1...I think you got it half right..haha

The demand has to be there for the supply to affect the price...Cause if the supply is there, there is no value unless the demand catches up with it..Just my silly opinion.

Robert

I don't think there would be any US stamp that would catalog north of five figures that are normally found with a perfin.

To use a lesser example, I have a number of Scott #573 stamps with perfins. They were often used by banks back in the day to send registered mail. Although the used catalog value of the stamp (without perfin) is $15, the perfin generally diminishes that value.

In fact, a quick look at ebay "sold" listings suggests that the #573 stamp sells as a used perfin in the $1 to $2 range; without a perfin, the used stamp generally sells for 3x that amount. Of course, centering and condition will add or detract from the stamp's value.

Hi Polimom,

Interesting question, and wt1 stated correctly that the price for any stamp (perfins included) is based on supply and demand.

If you look at a Canadian stamp, Scott 158, the Bluenose, which is a favourite for most collectors you can get an idea:

1. A 'normal' bluenose (Scott 158) catalogs (Unitrade) for $50-Used/Fine and $100-Used/Very Fine.

2. A 'perfin' with the OHMS perforation (Scott OA158) catalogs (Unitrade) for $500-Used/Fine and $750-Used/Very Fine.

The reason for the higher price for the OHMS perfin is that it is listed in the standard Unitrade catalog, so most collectors of Canadian stamps want to include it in their collections, but as the supply (the number perforated with OHMS) is much smaller than the standard issue stamp, the price has increased.

Now you look at other Bluenose perfins which were perforated with "BT", or "CNR", or "SUN/LIFE", etc. (There are about 31 different private perforations of the Bluenose), and they valued at less than the standard issue Bluenose. Even though the quantities or these perfins are much less than the "OHMS' perfin, they are not collected by as many collectors, so the price is lower. The only time that these 'private' perfins increase in price is if there are two or more Canadian perfin collectors bidding on the same item.

Here is a link or a part of my website that lists the various Bluenose stamps, that include perfins. http://www.stamporator.com/Scott_0158.html

stamporator -- fascinating that having the perfin listed in a (regular) catalogue makes the difference. Even more interesting (to me, anyway) that a perfin is listed in Scott at all. It's almost as if they are mainstream.

Are there other instances of perfins in Scott? (I gather only "officials" would be there regardless) Your Bluenose perfins are the first time I've heard this. I wonder what would happen if offical perfins started being included across the board (or maybe they are and my catalogues are just dated...?)

stamporater - that's a well made picture you're making concerning demand/market vs scarcity. Interesting!

Polimom - there have been several perfin issues for different countries that are not officials. E.g. France C5a and C6b, that's 1930 airmals with perfin 'E.I.P.A 30'. These were issued at an exhibition in Paris, and I will never afford any!

As our resident perfin collector states what you want is a scarce perfin on a common stamp, not a common perfin on a scarce stamp.

LOL!! The resident perfin collector gives sage advice, stallzer.

I was not thinking, though, to try to collect them. Rather, I was trying to understand how to catalogue the stamps I have that are coincidentally perfins. If one has a fairly rare stamp that catalogues at "$x", then short of trying to sell it, should one simply use the catalogue value for one's records?

Given that you want to simply catalog a stamp versus trying to sell it, I've identified my stamps by Scott No., using full catalog value with the additional comment that it is a perfin. You can then always go back and adjust the value at any time.

Whether a perfin is worth only 5% or 95% of the catalog value of a non-perfin stamp is not relevant until you sell the item and since we all know that even non-perfin stamps are only worth a small percentage of catalog value anyway, it's unlikely to make a significant dent in one's stamp collecting inventory no matter how you decide to list it.

Currently, there is no price catalogue for Canadian Perfins (I also think it is the same for other countries). BNAPS has produced a Perfin Handbook ( http://www.bnaps.org/PerfinHandbook...Handbook.htm ) for Canadian Perfins that is a great advantage over prior publications. It also provides a 'Rarity Factor' for each perfin.

However, the rarity factor is for the Perfin in general. ie. There may be many thousands perforated on a 1 cent (common) stamp, which results in low rarity factor, but there may only be one sheet (100 stamps) perforated on a 5 cent or 10 cent stamp. So although the perfin may be easily obtained on a 1 cent stamp, the same low rarity factor is applied to a 5 cent stamp which really is very rare and when becomes available, commands a higher price.

Another factor is the orientation of the perfin. There are eight (8) possible basic orientations of the perfin versus the design of the stamp (plus double, triple, and multi-orientations). For the perfin collector, these orientations also result in varying price differences based upon their rarity.

I would suggest that you heed wt1's last post in regards to cataloging your perfins, but when the time does come to sell, then consult one of the Perfin societies to obtain the best information to price your perfins.

Australia perfin "OS" are popular in the eras between 1913/1930.

It is very hard if not impossible to detect a forged perfin OS on a mint stamp.

Even some expertisers will not give a certificate for a used stamp with a perfin. Even if the cancel ink can be seen in the cut of perfin.

Most Australia KGV stamp perfin OS's sell for many times that of a stamp without a perfin.

But in the 80's perfin forgeries became so rampant that perfin never seen before on certain issues started to appear on these stamp issues and were selling for huge amounts of money.Especially in the 1913/45 Australia Map & Kangaroo issues.And again the large perfin OS.

This destroyed the price and interest of collecting of many perfin stamps.

As time has gone by the perfin has become more popular again so our catalogues would like us to believe.

Hunh. Interesting about the perfin forgeries, KGV. I'd wondered about that, probably worse than overprints to detect.

Thanks Blaamand, for the examples of non-officials that are catalogued. I spend most of my time looking at GB stuff, my range of experience is pretty limited.

stamporator, too bad they haven't been able to put values on some of them, but I can see the problem. I guess it would be pretty hard to know what a corporation did with their stock of stamps (and in what quantities).

I've paid so very little attention to perfins, all of this provokes thought (a good thing! Thank you!).

Perfins were often used on US revenues and there is a separate value for them in the Scott Specialized (not sure if also in the Volume 1) - it is typically much lower.

This thread sent me off to my perfin drawer, where I found a couple of officials: one from Canada and one from Australia. Pretty sure they're worth very little (as stamps or perfins), but it was fun to be able to catalogue them nonetheless.

Last question (maybe. haha): If one has a very nice stamp (centering / color / cancel), that is also a perfin that is catalogued, does one have the option of cataloguing it as a stamp instead of a perfin, for purposes of CV?