Our speaker, Fernando Martínez , CEO of David Feldman International Auctioneers originally scheduled for this Thursday is traveling on business. We had planned to speak to us on the road, but while Italy has many fine things to offer a traveler, unfortunately, a reliable internet connection is not one of them.

We have decided to postpone his Sperati talk to June 15th when Fernando can speak to us from Switzerland. David Feldman International Auctioneers is a great supporter of the hobby and has a presence at many events. In between preparing for their auctions, Fernando personally attends most of these events. Please stop by their booth to say hello and join us on

About the Program

Giovanni (Jean) de Sperati (1884 –1957) was an Italian stamp forger whose work “fooled” numerous experts, including Dr. Edward Diena and the Royal Philatelic Society London. Sperati wrote two philatelic works, "Philatelie d'Art" and ‘Livre d’Or’ (his personal collection of 234 rare stamps, all certified as genuine by experts) both translated and published by the B.P.A.. His works have become collectable in their own right and have been the subject of many notable philatelic exhibits, books and auctions. During his 1948 trial, Jean de Sperati convinced the French court that he was an artist, not a counterfeiter and simply “forgot” to clearly mark the stamps as forgeries and he promised to be more diligent about such marking in the future. The French jury did not totally buy that argument.

Please Join the British Empire Study Group (BESG) on the new date Thursday, June 15th 6 pm ET as we host Fernando Martínez in a free webinar to explore the life and works of this fascinating man.

Convert the Time to your Time Zone

Thursday, June 15th

6:00 PM - 07:00 PM (ET - NY) (11pm BST)

followed by an open Social

By registering you will receive a Zoom link and you can add the program to your calendar. - If you can not attend - that is fine - you will receive information about the recording.

Webinar Register (same button - just placed after the details)

This is a Free Webinar open to anyone who would like to attend. Please share.

All of our programs offer optional computer-aided close captioning for those who prefer to watch programs with captioning.

We offer Captioning Language Translation we now provide closed captions in many languages. The presenter will speak in English and your closed captions will translate his talk to (Chinese (simple), Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese, Russian or Ukrainian)

The APS would like us to report on our membership. Please click this survey link to be counted or share your reasons for not joining or send us an email to info@bestudygroup.org or reply yes to this email.

Thank you in advance for helping.

Survey Link

About Fernando Martínez

Fernando is the CEO, of David Feldman International Auctioneers based in Geneva, Switzerland. He joined David Feldman in 2020. He has a bachelor’s degree in Economics, Business Administration and Management and comes to David Feldman after almost 20 years working for leading international stamp auction companies. His main role is to expand the company’s worldwide business, strengthen its position in core international markets, and develop the company’s network of business agents. Fernando speaks five languages (Spanish, English, Italian, German & French) and his philatelic expertise is focused on Latin American and European countries.