In 2010, the Professional Coin Grading Service (PCGS) and Numismatic Guaranty Corporation (NGC), the rare coin market's two leading grading services, introduced "Plus" grading for high-end coins graded XF45 to MS68. A plus symbol (+) is added after the grade.
ā For a coin to earn the + designation it has to be in the top 10-20% of that grade. We aren't talking eye appeal, although that is considered as part of it. The coin has to meet all the technical criteria such as strike, luster, contact marks as well as eye appeal. Not just a pretty coin, but a coin that's "all there" and may have been referred to as "a liner" in the past. āReference sources 1234- Don Willis, President of PCGS, a division of Collectors Universe, Inc. (NASDAQ: CLCT)
1925 Peace Dollar MS64+
I came across an interesting article written in January 2018 "Buy the Holder, Not the Coin" that talks about collecting coin holders instead of coins, which I thought sounded strange, but it is no different than collecting other coin related stuff such as numismatic books, auction catalogs and coin albums.
As a forever noob in US coin collecting, buying slabbed coins helped me learn about the Peace Dollar which I am enthralled about. I don't know when I will "graduate" and learn enough about my chosen US coin to collect. Perhaps in the future, I will be able to offer an opinion on a possible grade of a raw Peace Dollar coin.
I have this MS62 grade Peace Dollar, and have had it for two years. To this date, I still cannot make out the difference between the MS64+, the MS64, the MS63 grades of Peace Dollars and this one. For now, I believe that gaining sufficient knowledge in coin quality is a tremendous advantage, especially if one is into slabbed coins that always comes with varying premiums based on coin grades.
I think I will echo the saying... buy the coin, not the holder!
1926 Peace Dollar MS62
These are my previous post on my Peace Dollar Collection if you care to take a look: