R-1 Through R-5 Error: Ink Smears

Ink smears, according to Frederick Bart, are among the most common errors around. He estimates that a minor smear will show up as often as once every thousand notes. The problem with pricing these notes is that even tho major obverse ink smears are fairly rare (up to R-5), they don't have the appeal of many other errors. To me, they look more like bad mistakes than something fluky that went wrong at the mint. Worse is the fact that they can be faked (and often are).

Over the past two weeks, ending yesterday, eBay shows 23 recent ink smear auctions and only 6 of them sold. Here they are:


$5. Series: 1985. Condition: VF+. 3 bids. $30.55. Date: 4/25/10.


$1. Series: 1974. Condition: CU (64). 1 bid. $106.45. Date: 4/25/10. Full disclosure: I'm the one who bought this note. According to Bart's price guide, this note is worth at least $150. Interestingly, Bart's company is the one who put this note up for sale on eBay. Thanks, Fred!


$1. Series: 2006. Condition: VF+. 1 bid. $7.99. Date: 4/25/10. This barely qualifies as an error and certainly doesn't qualify as interesting to me. I'd have spent it. OK, no, I'd have given it to one of my students.


$2. Series: 1963. Condition: AU+. 4 bids. $10.45. Date: 4/23/10. This is about as minor as an ink smear can be; apparently the red ink on the portrait is from the red overprint (of the serial numbers). I'm not sure I believe this: The red of the smear doesn't seem to match the red of the serial numbers.


$1. Series: 2006. Condition: AU+. Date: 4/17/10. It's worth noting that two auctions featuring a very minor overprint smear did not succeed even for $24.50. It just looks too boring to be interesting to collectors. An almost identical note did find a buyer for $10.99 with one bidder.


$1. Series: 2006. Condition: AU+. Date: 4/17/10. 3 bids. $9.25.

Part of the problem is that sellers were asking too much on Buy-It-Now and Best-Offer auctions. But really, the main point is that for the most part, this sort of error is simply not very interesting to collectors (including me).