Spink, eh?

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Looting Matters reports (The Baltimore Coin Test Case: The List ) that the Baltimore Illegal Coin Import stunt utilised coins from London-based coin dealers "Spink"
How odd it is that Spinks was (a) apparently unaware of the not-so-new-by-the-time-of-this-sale import requirements for coins of China and Cyprus purchased by their clients, nor (b) were able to supply the piece of paper required by the CPIA that they had been exported in accord with the MOU signed between China/Cyprus and the USA. I wonder how many more of Spink's coins would be ineligible for import into the US if the CPIA was applied across the board? Is that not the point of this whole sorry exercise?

More to the point, the photos which the ACCG exhibited of those cash coins to my eye do not look like they had been lying corroding away in the ground for centuries, are these not the sort of fakes with which western markets have been flooded in recent years? They have what looks like chemical patina. Are these actually the coins sold by Spink? I challenge the ACCG or Spinks to publish detailed photos of all 23 of these unprovenanced coins; let us see what ACCG dealers were buying. It may well be that a court case is unneccessary. If Spink in fact does not know where those coins came from, how do they know they were legally obtained and/or not recently made and "matured" in a pig-pen?

What reputable coin dealer cant actually manage a proper attribution and lists coins as: "bronze coins more than 100 years old"? answer: Spink.

(I note that the ACCG does not figure on their lengthy list of links, apparently they do not consider they do collectors a service, nor dealers).

Vignette: in this manner Spink suggest to new collectors where they can get their coins from, freshly dug-up hoards not old collections. In the UK such hoards should be reported through the Treasure process, in the case of those from foreign countries (except the US and Sealand), they will need an export licence - how then can Spink say they "don't know where they came from"? (Their FAQ contains nothing on "origins" and the legalities of collecting dugup coins).

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