CAC is the most misunderstood name in grading, because it refers to two different things that arrived sixteen years apart. One is a sticker applied to someone else's holder. The other is a complete grading service with its own holder. Telling them apart matters, because they are priced differently and they mean different things.
The sticker came first
Certified Acceptance Corporation was formed in 2007 by John Albanese — the same dealer who helped found PCGS in 1985 and founded NGC in 1987. His stated purpose was to combat inconsistencies in grading by the leading services.
CAC did not grade coins. It reviewed coins already graded by PCGS or NGC and asked a narrower question: within the grade this coin has been assigned, is it solid? Coins that passed got a sticker on the existing holder.
- A green bean means the coin meets CAC's standard for its assigned grade. Fewer than half of submitted coins receive one.
- A gold bean is rarer still. It means the coin exceeded CAC's expectations for the grade — in effect, that CAC believes it is undergraded.
The premiums attached to stickered coins exist precisely because the review is strict and most submissions fail it. A green bean is a second opinion from a party with no stake in the original grade.
CACG is a grading service
In 2023, CAC expanded into full third-party grading, beginning full operations that October. CAC Grading authenticates, grades and encapsulates coins in its own holders, from its facility in Virginia Beach, Virginia. The stickering operation continues separately from Bedminster, New Jersey.
So a CACG holder is a primary grade. Nobody graded the coin first. Albanese hand-selected the master graders — Ron Drzewucki and John Butler — and the service grades to the same strict standard the sticker was built on.
This is the distinction to hold onto:
- A PCGS or NGC holder with a green or gold bean is a coin graded by one service and endorsed by another.
- A CACG holder is a coin graded by CACG. There is no sticker, because there is nothing to endorse — the grade is theirs.
What this means when you are buying
The practical consequence is that CACG populations are small and young. A service that started grading in late 2023 has certified a fraction of what PCGS and NGC have certified since the 1980s. A CACG MS 65 on a classic coin is not directly comparable to a PCGS MS 65 population, because the denominators are nothing alike.
What you are buying with a CACG holder, or with a bean on a major-service holder, is strictness. The service exists because grading drifted, and its whole proposition is that it does not.
How to check a CACG coin yourself
- CAC Grading Cert Lookup — enter the certification number and confirm the coin and grade.
- CAC Grading Population Report — how many examples CACG has certified at each grade.
CACG holders also carry a QR code linking to the service's own photography of that exact coin, which is a genuinely useful check that the coin in the picture is the coin in the holder.
For stickered coins, verification runs through whichever service graded the coin — PCGS Cert Verification or NGC Certification Lookup — with the bean itself confirming the second opinion.
CACG coins at assay house
CACG holders are a small and deliberately chosen part of this catalog. Browse what is in stock across all coins, or by service: PCGS and NGC.
- The other services: NGC · PCGS · ANACS
- Start here: Coin Grading Explained