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Lessons Learned, Investor Builds Portfolio of Stamps
(Rich Lipski - Twp)
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"Being a bond trader, I wasn't about to pay face value," Gross said yesterday, as workers set up booths on the vast convention floor. "I told him I'd pay him $1,800 and promise to make him my dealer as I built my collection over subsequent years."
"He said 'No deal.' I said, 'Sorry.' I figured the person I wanted to do business with would have to be flexible."
Eventually he settled on such a person, Shreve, who serves as Gross's "philatelic adviser." For years, he did not publicly identify himself and was known in auctions only as "Monte Carlo," spurring widespread speculation in the stamp world. He identified himself only recently and agreed to interviews about his collection for the first time this week, to publicize the Philatelic Expo.
Just as he intensively researches the characteristics of fixed-income securities before he buys them, Gross built a library of records of past auctions at his home in Laguna Beach, Calif. When he is considering buying a stamp, he researches its history at auction. By examining what price it sold for in 1928, for example, and 1953, 1974 and 1992, he can get a sense of whether the stamp is sufficiently rare to appreciate at roughly the same rate as U.S. economic growth.
This helps him avoid the trap his mother fell into -- buying stamps too common to rise in value over time.
Moreover, it is his strategy to make purchases only when he feels he has some edge on price, such as when a seller is eager to unload a stamp. He said he has followed that strategy consistently ("I have bought well," he said) -- with one exception: the Z-Grill, part of an experimental production in which only 1,000 were made. Two are known to exist; the other is on display at the National Postal Museum.
That was the last stamp he needed to complete his collection of mid-19th-century U.S. stamps. In that case, he lacked leverage.
"I think they knew I was an eager buyer."
The World Philatelic Expo, held in the United States once every 10 years, is at the Washington Convention Center 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. each day through June 3. Admission is free.
