There has been some discussion of Anthony Valvo's posts on the recent sale of the Showboat dollar chip on eBay. Though you might be interested to know that Valvo has a two page color spread in this month's ANA club magazine, the Numismatist.

There some nice pictures of Sands and Sahara plaques, as well an an implied offer to sell these. I've included scans of the two pages in this post and the next. Those familiar with these casino plaques will immediately recognize that the ad confuses the known population of Sahara 1000 palques with those from Sands. The first photo showing Valvo with his boot on a cabinet of Sands plaques talks about Sahara plaques in the text, and makes reference to a known population of only 52 plaques. On the facing page is a table set up with players and stacks of Sahara plaques. This photo shows at least 9 Sahara 1000 plaques. From info posted on Jim Folis' serial-number registration page, we know that 200 of these were made, and about 25 have been located in the hands of particular collectors. The number of existing sets of Sahds plaques is not known to me, but it is many fewer than the number of Sahara plaques.

I don't know whether this is just an ad by a seller not very familiar with Las Vegas casino history, or an attempt to give greater value to Sahara casino plaques, but if you see this ad, be careful in responding to offers to sell these. Valvo has posted here before, and apparently has a very large accumulation of obsolete plaques, mostly from europe. He markets these mainly to home players who like flashy chips and plaques for their games. I'm not sure, but don't think he is a CC+GTCC member. He does say he's an ANA member.

(Image removed at the request of the copyright holder)