tommyjasmin

There you go! That's an easy mis-click. Nice work Alex and Dan. Part of me wants nag CGC about QA, but realistically we have to expect a certain percentage of errors on any repetitive task requiring tired humans working long hours. But that Superman #1, ouch. On my one occurrence they fixed the label free, no hassle.

Take your dig at me Lazyboy, that's fine I earned it, but yes, of course I have seen error labels. I've gotten labels with minor errors. This one seemed unusual/suspect given the context (dealer with slabs that had been cracked open) and the type of error (incorrect title). I'm sure more exist but I don't recall offhand seeing other books labelled with the wrong title. As I said I spend very little time on these forums. FWIW, at this point I would bet the scenario Alex described is what went down.

Yeah, I'll buy that as a very plausible explanation. Thx Alex. Interesting deduction, however those two should be close, but not adjacent neighbors. See pic - this is Nostomania dropdown, not CGC, but they should be very similar. That said, I can see your reasoning as a way something like this could get out into the wild.

This boggles my mind. Sounds like there should be a final QA step comparing label to book! It would literally take seconds per book to add this (apparently necessary) step.

I stand corrected! Thanks Lazyboy.

Yes, absolutely Bob. Agree on all points. Have not been to ChiCon in ages, next time I'll find you and say hi. I'm guessing there must be an ongoing thread somewhere on the forums regarding slab security - I have my own thoughts on what needs to happen here going forward to protect the hobby. It's not cheap but it's necessary. I'm guessing many on these boards are aware of the analogous problem with counterfeit slabbed coins. It's gotten pretty sophisticated, including artificially "aging" the coin before fake-slabbing. So troubling. I realize most of you already know all this, apologies to the veterans. As you can see, I rarely pop on the forums, when I do it's usually to mention some new feature on the collection management site I created (Nostomania), but I try hard to limit that (he sez as he links again). ;-)

Dan - Thanks for the lookup, the plot thickens. I am certain the book within the slab was Jungle Action #11 (see pic), not an issue of Black Panther. If this was a mistake, and CGC sent back a Jungle Action #11 instead of a 9.2 Jungle Comics #11, the submitter would have been extremely upset and it would have been fixed right there, again just my opinion.

Bob and Larryw7 - I was not familiar with this guy, had never seen him set up at a show before. I know many of the regulars fairly well. If I could ID him, not sure I would want to call him out on a public forum. I made a point to speak to this guy a bit and try to suss him out, and one thing I remember is him commenting that he dislikes CGC. So I suppose it's possible he picked up the suspect CGC slabs from another dealer? Still, the vibe was not good. Most stuff was not priced and you had to ask, which I did, to get a feel for that too. It was at least 3X what a reasonable buyer should ever pay, IMO.

Dealers schlepping to shows where already hurting pre-pandemic. Last show I went to was a late 2019 pre-COVID Wizard World with a $65.00 admission price. Before knowing I had to grab ankles at the door, I offered to take my kid and a friend, and told the wife to come along too, but they all declined. That would have set me back over $250 just to get four people in the door. That's just not right. The room was very sparse, the mood among dealers very down. I spoke to most of them, and they were pissed. "Come on, let the kids in!" and similar sentiments. How are you supposed to get young kids into comics when they can't afford to walk in the door? Unrelated side-note, there was one shady dealer who was clearly cracking slabs. (Several I examined had been tampered with). Wait, I actually have a pic I snapped at that booth, hang on... Check this out - you can't tell me for a second CGC accidentally put a 1940s Jungle Comics label on a 1970s Jungle Action. Very disturbing.

So those were fun detours and Bob has plenty of new business ideas, but I was hoping for more commentary and possible explanations for the price insanity. The consensus so far seems to be: As wombat and others noted, stimulus might explain low-end activity, but not the jumps on expensive keys. NOTE: the comic index tracks low-grade uncertified sales also, not just high-end CGC. As PKJ noted, most collectibles are very hot, not just comics. The only other collectibles "stock" index I am aware of is the PCGS 3000. It showed decent, but not insane growth in 2020. (Pic below) I could, and may, create in index for coins as well. It's a fair amount of work though. As alexgross noted, the "new office" for many is a likely factor. I think this is a big deal - many people are "working" from home now, with little or no supervision. That means more browsing eBay and more clicking on Bid buttons. We know a lot of people are hurting, really struggling, and our hearts go out to them. As (Buzetta and Poekaymon I think?) noted, however, others are actually doing quite well during the pandemic, with ironically, extra disposable income. Maybe much of this insanity is just the very wealthy diversifying their investments? This wasn't touched on, but studios (mostly Marvel) finally getting movies right drove a lot of new interest and demand for comics. I'm not sure how to quantify that. Please chime in with your thoughts folks, is that a fair summary, or what did I miss? Apologies if I did not fairly/accurately translate some of your intent/statements.

Just make sure and leave instructions to place your five favorite comics in your coffin with you. :-)

Hi Poekaymon - was there tracking on the package? Assuming so, both sides can determine the last known location of the package with a date, online. If you go into the post office, they have additional detail including photos of the package along the way. Obviously, nothing is perfect and packages do occasionally go missing, even with tracking.

Hi Number 6 - I don't know what this is telling me, that it turns out there are loopholes and buyers can get free books? If so, that's nuts. If tracking shows a package was delivered, what more is a seller supposed to do, hand-deliver it?

That feels like a tough one. If a seller prints a shipping label on eBay, the address is correct and there is a tracking number. The package might travel slow, but I don't see any open loopholes for the buyer with those conditions met.

Buzzetta - agree. Dealer-to-dealer "sales" should not be included in sales data, IMO. I do not allow "anonymous private seller to anonymous private buyer" sales into the Nostomania database, to the extent I can detect them, which isn't all that difficult. I'll go a step further - I could (but won't go there) provide documented cases of of some big dealers inflating the sale prices of pedigree sales in Overstreet market reports. I know this with 100% certainty because on a few occasions I was the one who purchased the book.

Best reply so far

Hi E5150 - nope, random won't work. I can't say zero bias slipped in, of course, but I tried to be very fair and follow the criteria you pasted in. They are all listed, feel free to comment, I'd love to get your take. Selection critiques are very welcome - the list can be altered. Just like on the S&P 500 - companies come and go over time.

Hi Lazyboy - it sounds like you think a correction is coming? I have seen corrections on a few books (Pic 1), but very few. Every year I expect a correction on ASM #300, it never arrives.

Hi PKJ - not disagreeing with you, just a clarification that for many, that stimulus number is not $600, but $600 X 4 = $2,400 (self, spouse, two dependents).

Doing your part to lower supply and increase demand! Hopefully "coveted" titles like Newmen, The Pact, The Others, and Ripclaw. (Now watch these get optioned).

At the close of the most recent Heritage Signature Auction, the comic book stock index I created jumped 3.3% to an all-time high of 1,643.58 (Pic #1). I've never seen anything like the sales this year, and particularly in this auction. I know everybody is marveling at the sale of the CGC NM 9.4 Batman #1 for $2,220,000.00, and rightfully so for the hammer price. However, as a percentage of current Nostomania value, that was a decent, but not insane jump. The real movers were books like Detective Comics #359, CGC NM/MT 9.8 at $132,000.00 (Pic #2). That was 4X Nosto value, and I doubt anybody else was close, if they even compute a 9.8 value. Batman #227 CGC NM/MT 9.8 for $31,200.00. Fantastic Comics #3 CGC PR 0.5 for $20,400.00, and so many more. You picked a good hobby folks :-)

Hi Alex - pretty sure all three were Heritage. There was a Signature auction ending that day. You can click through to the source of each sale below the ticker charts on the site. www.alexgross.com

Hey all - AF 15 seems to be shrugging off the pandemic, three fresh sales the other day, with an average increase of 55%

Hey all - just wanted to alert collectors of a new feature on Nostomania that lets you Easily view price trends going back a decade (going to expand this even further, we have the data) Trace the sale back to the original auction page, no matter how old. Here's a sample, say you are researching ASM #300. See pic. Note the price trend - very hot a decade ago, cooled off slightly for many years, very hot again now. This is easily visible looking only at the CGC 9.8 pattern. What's great is if you over over a sale, there is a link you can click that will take you to the original auction page. Enjoy folks.