Cartel 241 Cert Shenanigans

Ran across this listing from the Cartel/Philip Ryle. A group of 19th century which are purportedly all MNH. The 241 has a 1984 PF certificate. The closeup of the stamp both front and back looks great. Go to the PF database however and the stamp was certified as USED. Yet another cautionary tale.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/US-Mint-Ba...AOSwzcpbQ4iH

http://pfsearch.org/pfsearch/pf_grd...lledfrom=lkp

*** Moved by Staff to a more appropriate forum. ***

Actually,The 241 cert is legit. The 'O' under symbol designates 'unused, original gum'

If it had been a canceled stamp how would that be denoted on the cert? I know stupid question but I'm trying to learn.

It would have had a "U".

The legend:

O - Unused, Original Gum
X - Unused, No Gum
N - Unused
U - Used

edit: you asked about the cert and not pfsearch ...

It would have said "Used".

Looks like a lot of stamps they've sold in different configurations multiple times before. The biggest issue with the cartel is their extreme and constant use of shill bidding. They do sell fake stuff sometimes, but it is the shill bidding that is the most consistent problem.

Rlsny:

I respectfully disagree....the misadvertising of the merchandise is a bigger problem than the shill bidding (IMO).

Sadly, as I have learned more about the identification and grading of stamps, the more I see many sellers taking liberties with their descriptions. There seems a large number of sellers rating their stamps as superb or XF that barley score a 70 on the centering grade. They usually have a hefty price tag to accompany their claims. I recently ran across an item that was claimed to be a 98J, and while it did have very large margins, the centering was no where near good enough to rate in the 90's....for what it's worth, I have run across a couple of examples of this on the APS store.

But this seller is a horse of a different color. This isn't a seller that is out to deceive stamp collectors.

Gotta love reading thorough this seller's sold items. Hey, let's sell the exact same items over and over and over again! Red flags if there ever were...

Fredc: in general I agree. But the cartel specifically is all about shill bidding. I learned the hard way a long time ago. I paid dearly for a very nice NH Scott 311. I eventually got is certified and it got a clean NH cert. the problem was that I paid too much due to shill bidding. Yes, fake and incorrectly described stamps is a big problem but the Cartel - this and all his many related accounts - use shill bids as a regular strategy.

Yes the cartel is all about shill bidding but it isn't intended to deceive or cheat stamp collectors. There is a much bigger picture here.

Stallzer - The cartel is ALL about deceiving and cheating people. Type cartel into the SCF search engine and read all about the doctored and faked stamps and certs. Shill bidding is only a part of the story.

Stamps are merely one of their fronts. I'd imagine very few collectors have been burned financially by them. Why do you think they sell the same stamp over and over??

Stallzer, rogdcam is correct. As far as reselling the same items over and over, just spend some time looking through their sold listings.

Are the same items listed over and over because the shill bidders are winning?

Actually they aren't about deceiving and cheating people. There is a much bigger picture here. I explained it all here and I'll bet dollars to donuts I'm spot on. They sell a bunch of cheap stamps to establish a "business" and then run out the "high end" material for their shill accounts.

https://goscf.com/t/58918&SearchTerms=315