Attendance at the January Florida United Numismatists (FUN) show soared along with precious metals prices. I missed the show, but it was a real banger. Here are some reports. -Editor

"Here's a photo of the FUN registration line, which was much longer than the photo shows. Thursday attendance was reportedly over 10,000, and I believe it. The aisles were quite congested and it was surprisingly difficult to move around the floor. Rising precious metals brought out the collector community in full force."

"I've heard the recently concluded 2026 FUN show described as lots of things...Epic...One For The Ages...Amazing...A Barn Burner...and plenty of other superlatives as well. It was all of those, and maybe even more. Hard to know for sure, since we haven't had time to complete our post-show work, but I can report that sales were spectacular. Demand for good quality collector coins was as strong as I've ever seen, with customers - both collectors and dealers - snapping up interesting, scarce, rare, and/or choice coins without hesitation. One dealer who was truly enamored with our great selection of Capped Bust halves, from our own stock as well as those from the Kenbrook collection, bought quite a few at the the pre-show Wednesday morning. After selling those at his table in the afternoon, he came back for several more. Clearly, he sold those, since that same sequence repeated three times on Thursday! On Friday, a guy asked for a specific Redbook variety in a very specific grade/holder, and since we had just bought one that was an excellent fit, out it went. We generally don't sell coins in less than 20 minutes, but it sort of felt right at this show! The sheer number of invoices written was certainly a record.

"I've also heard about all kinds of attendance figures, and whatever the "official" figures prove to be, I have no doubt they'll be high. But there is one thing I know and have absolute confidence in: Thursday was the most crowded bourse floor I've seen at any show, ever. I felt a little like a running back just trying to maneuver to the restroom. Many times, the aisle - whichever aisle - was so crowded, there was no choice but to stop and wait for an opening. Yes, record high metals prices helped spur interest. Yes, the "penny" ending and the Stack's auction of those sets including special gold strikes helped for sure. But we were overwhelmed with good old-fashioned, rare coin collectors attending and doing business - seriously and with purpose - at a gigantic coin show.

"So, winter FUN 2026? 10 out of 10. A+. At least as good, and possibly better than ANA in OKC last summer. Bring on the next big show, which for us is Baltimore in March."

"We left off last week before the actual show opened in Orlando, and we really didn't know what to expect when the main event started — what we experienced was unlike anything in recent years. Setup on Wednesday afternoon was quite active amongst the dealers and it was generally a very good start for the show. We sold a few coins, continued our buying spree, and we got the booth ready for Thursday.

And when the doors opened, it was more like floodgates as a deluge of collectors came storming into the hall. And if you went up to Registration, you saw a line that went on and on and on. The folks in the booth had to develop some crowd control methods, and apparently, the line stretched to a 90-minute wait. In speaking with someone on the FUN Board, they apparently ran out of registration slips for the week by NOON on Thursday. In other words, we saw a record attendance right off the bat. I didn't get away from the table very much on Thursday, but when I made my way to get a water, the aisles were filled with people, and it was difficult to make my way through the masses.

The best part of the crowds? They were not just looking, they were buying and selling throughout the day. We didn't see as many collectors selling as we have in the past, but the number of buyers was off the charts. In fact, we had a record amount of total collector sales during the 3-day event. In total, we sold more than double what we sold in the 7-day ANA World's Fair in August. And this was without having any 6-figure coins finding new homes. These were real collectors buying coins in the $1,000-$20k range.

To say that the show was "great" would be an understatement! We came away from the show with a TON of exciting coins for auction and a good feeling about the overall coin market. A busy and active start to what looks like a promising 2026 full of coins!"