ComicLink's next Featured Auction Has Started Posting Books 17 17

[Ryan.]

8 minutes ago, Crowzilla said:

If the HG copies get bounced around that much, wouldn't that mean all the 9.8s get damaged on the way to CGC and already end up in a 9.6 or 9.4 holder?

And I think that 9.9 Hulk 181 would hit at least $300K today, regardless of past stories about it.

I didn't say all. But obviously some, potentially including those in 9.9 slabs. I didn't think that was even arguable. 

[Aman619]

It’s sure a mystery who these bidders and buyers are today.  A lot to try to figure out, but here’s two simple premises...  

number 1). we have seen the escalation of “highest grade madness” go from perfect 9.4s, to impossible 9.6s, to many years of first 9.8 insanity chasing, to building runs in 9.8.... so here we are at the next plateau: enough 9.9s to fuel a market.  When there were 35 9.6s the first 9.8 went ballistic.  Same thing now with the 9.8 column bursting at the seems. Grading may have gotten looser, and more unread moderns have gotten pressed and slabbed of late, but these books are still scarce out of the billions of comics printed.  CGC may have opened the door to 9.9s but they don’t give them away easily.  

number 2). Another comics collecting phenomenon we have experienced is at play with a new bunch of collectors:  we are shocked by these sales because in OUR experiences, mega keys were less than today’s cars cost, and many of these books like Transformers 1 are dollar bin non-sellers,  we have a well established sense of what comics are worth.  But repeatedly, over time, new collectors or speculators, or just people who decide one day that they gotta have something go and pay whatever it takes for it.. and at auction which as we know fuels these crazy hammer prices. And these people are fine paying the new (Absurd) price. They are new to these hobbies and weren’t collecting when we were so they don’t have the hard limits in their minds like we do.  Also, if they are young, they grew up with Moderns.  You know the mass produced stuff that was even worse then the Bronze carp that was derivative of the true silver Age classics. (from some of our personal perspectives).  
 

So long as the hobby keeps growing, and new collectors are the key to this,  the truth is, from an investment stance, they are right.  I paid some crazy prices in the oughts to upgrade HG key issues.  I was embarrassed to admit some of my purchases.  But it’s freaking 20 years later now.. the hobby demographics haven’t killed it, the death of print hasn’t hurt it, and those buys I made even have my financial guys respect.  Many of us have 40 years of collecting and have seen waves of such price increase phases. 

so yes I agree with all of you that this is whacked. and want to know WHO these new people are. And will they stick around post pandemic when there’s a lot more to do than scour the Internet buying stuff?  Or post Marvel/superhero pop culture hegemony?  I find it incredible that there’s so much new money at play, 50K comics add up to real money pretty darn quick. Let’s see where it goes....  if they win, we win.

 

[Mmehdy]

On 2/27/2021 at 10:26 AM, lou_fine said:

Well, from my reading of the original post, it seem pretty clear to me that he was not talking about just one or two specific billionaires driving up the entire collectibles marketplace.  

He was referring more to an entire generation of younger people with a different way of thinking and a different perspective on what's taking place in the world as compared to most of us old fogies on the board here, and I would tend to agree with his point of view here.  

The real issue here is how long are they going to stay.....their exit could be much quicker than a true comic book collector with a history of collecting..we might be old fogies, but heck we have incredible staying power....

[Aman619]

But we don’t buy like we used to, so we are irrelevant bystanders to the market.  Which is fine, others are leading the way now... in everything.. 

[Randall Ries]

2 minutes ago, Mmehdy said:

The real issue here is how long are they going to stay.....their exit could be much quicker than a true comic book collector with a history of collecting..we might be old fogies, but heck we have incredible staying power....

Which with much fewer words is what I was trying to illustrate. If they are somehow bored or don't trust Wall Street enough to go full guns again and see the collectibles market as a great place to invest in or even hide money, then they will. They are not collectors but speculators. They create what is called a "bubble". A "bubble" is what happens when things are artificially priced, then becomes unsustainable, then implodes. They seem to do ok. They then buy stocks low as other people who kinda needed the value for - oh - I don't know - retirement? Medical insurance as they age? - are left broke.

See. They can AFFORD to come in and mess with "values" and then bail out afterward. I am still amazed at what people have paid for an IH 181  last week. TENS of thousands for a 9.0? You say we have staying power. And we were essentially the driving force behind values. We made the OPG worth referring to. Many of us bought actually RARE books. Those books are still seeing only incremental value bumps. The golden age books. The actually rare books. And early silver age. And now we are expected to believe a lousy Transformer book is worth $40k to someone. What's next? Is a Rainbow Bright giveaway suddenly going to be "worth" thousands?

A friend a few years ago was talking about comics he lied. One was G.I. Joe. And I couldn't for the life of me understand why anyone would want to read a rag like G.I. Joe. A book based on a toy and then later a tv show. But it occurred to me later he was at the right age where he grew up watching the show then got interested in the books as a result. So sure. I can see it. But assigning them values 3 or 4x what say a Bat #9 in 9.4 would get? That's nuts only because of the sheer number of G.I. Joe books still lying around.

Whatever is going on is unusual. Especially the auction things.

[Randall Ries]

1 minute ago, Aman619 said:

But we don’t buy like we used to, so we are irrelevant bystanders to the market.  Which is fine, others are leading the way now... in everything.. 

How can we buy like we used to with people expecting $40k for a Transformers #1?

[adamstrange]

1 hour ago, Randall Ries said:

A friend a few years ago was talking about comics he lied. One was G.I. Joe. And I couldn't for the life of me understand why anyone would want to read a rag like G.I. Joe. A book based on a toy and then later a tv show. But it occurred to me later he was at the right age where he grew up watching the show then got interested in the books as a result.

In the case of GI Joe, Shooter, Goodwin and Larry Hama worked with Hasbro from the start of the GI Joe 80s revival.  Yes, the toys were among the most popular 80s toys, but so were the comics and animated TV show based on concepts and characters from Marvel.  It should not be a surprise that someone who grew up reading those books would later be interested in getting the best copy or pages of the original art.  Pride and joy of one of the biggest art collectors on the Boards is the complete art to GI Joe 21, a wordless issue.

Edited February 28, 2021 by adamstrange

[adamstrange]

1 hour ago, Randall Ries said:

How can we buy like we used to with people expecting $40k for a Transformers #1?

I doubt I'm ever going to buy any uber-high grade Transformers, but then they were never on my wantlist.  I welcome Transformer collectors to the hobby, while hoping they don't start collecting GA for a few more years. 

[Randall Ries]

27 minutes ago, adamstrange said:

In the case of GI Joe, Shooter, Goodwin and Larry Hama worked with Hasbro from the start of the GI Joe 80s revival.  Yes, the toys were among the most popular 80s toys, but so were the comics and animated TV show based on concepts and characters from Marvel.  It should not be a surprise that someone who grew up reading those books would later be interested in getting the best copy or pages of the original art.  Pride and joy of one of the biggest art collectors on the Boards is the complete art to GI Joe, a wordless issue.

That's great! I never saw the value in it but that's beside the point. I was trying to illustrate my friend likely grew up with it hence the attraction. We all collect what we remember to larger and lesser degrees. I collect Adams stuff from the late '60's-early '70's.

[Professor K]

4 hours ago, Randall Ries said:

How can we buy like we used to with people expecting $40k for a Transformers #1?

"We got no food, we got no jobs, Tranformers #1's are selling for 40K!" 

Edited March 1, 2021 by Professor Chaos
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[Randall Ries]

31 minutes ago, Professor Chaos said:

"We got no food, we got no jobs, Tranformers #1's are selling for 40K!" 

Real Mad Max sh%t, right?

[lou_fine]

7 hours ago, Aman619 said:

But we don’t buy like we used to, so we are irrelevant bystanders to the market.  Which is fine, others are leading the way now... in everything.. 

As long as we own the books that some of these crazed buyers want, we are 100% relevant to the marketplace, especially if you are willing to part with some of the "scraps" from your long held personal collection.  

[lou_fine]

7 hours ago, Randall Ries said:

How can we buy like we used to with people expecting $40k for a Transformers #1?

As long term comic collectors YOU DON'T.................  what you do is YOU SELL into this crazed marketplace and hopefully in time before the bubble bursts.  

As I had stated in one of my previous posts here:  In this red hot crazed comic book marketplace, one collector's worthless drek (i.e. hopefully any of OUR BA or CA books brought at cover price) is another collector's priceless treasure (i.e. hopefully one of these deep pocketed newbie buyers willing to pay 5-figures for our former drek books).  

   , THE MONEY, that is!!!    

 

[Aman619]

Problem is, as we have repeatedly seen here, we keep reaching these points of no return.... and years later those prices are darn cheap.. there’s a new thing going on now.  Well it’s the same thing... people who want comics and have the cash. Is a crash coming.. the answer has always been yes.  Soon... but it never does.  

maybe soon based on this irrational exuberance... or it’s just yet another rise in interest and prices.  Let’s face it, our hobby has caught the attention of pop culture, what we’ve always dreamed of.  Let’s see where it goes!  We aren’t the geeks anymore ...

as someone pointed out here recently. If you suddenly are interested in buying a key comic book, and never followed the market, you buy what you want at the price it takes to get it. Today’s prices are too high for us, but for them, it’s what they go for.  

[Mmehdy]

20 minutes ago, Aman619 said:

Problem is, as we have repeatedly seen here, we keep reaching these points of no return.... and years later those prices are darn cheap.. there’s a new thing going on now.  Well it’s the same thing... people who want comics and have the cash. Is a crash coming.. the answer has always been yes.  Soon... but it never does.  

maybe soon based on this irrational exuberance... or it’s just yet another rise in interest and prices.  Let’s face it, our hobby has caught the attention of pop culture, what we’ve always dreamed of.  Let’s see where it goes!  We aren’t the geeks anymore ...

as someone pointed out here recently. If you suddenly are interested in buying a key comic book, and never followed the market, you buy what you want at the price it takes to get it. Today’s prices are too high for us, but for them, it’s what they go for.  

I would say the GA/SA market will not be as stable going forward, as in the first 40 years with Overstreet slowing down the speculators with a gradual price increases year to year. That stability which we have become accustomed to is out the window the minute speculators run rampant in our GA/SA comic book world. They are not in it for the Comic Book, the art...they are in it for a profit.....GA books could be widgets or bitcoin or Gamestop shares. This "splash" will have gravity of prices eventually correcting itself back to the normal course of supply and demand and price growth based upon actual collectors and not jacked up demand and price growth.

Edited March 1, 2021 by Mmehdy

[tabcom]

 

 

I don’t know where they came from or where they are going, but they are making it more entertaining to watch.

Edited March 1, 2021 by tabcom

[tabcom]

Any gold stackers out there?

Perhaps it's dislocation causing panic buying.

 

[Aman619]

13 hours ago, lou_fine said:

As long as we own the books that some of these crazed buyers want, we are 100% relevant to the marketplace, especially if you are willing to part with some of the "scraps" from your long held personal collection.  

We are Relevant only in the sense that we COULD AFFECT THE MARKET, but only if we sold our books. As long as we sit on them we are irrelevant to current sales. 
 

we all know that the dentist has a better copy of all the biggest keys ..  but he is the poster child of my sense of an irrelevant collection because they are never coming to market. The market runs on what it has to work with, not what’s in a safe somewhere. Especially if they’re still unslabbed like most older collectors gems. .  

[buttock]

1 hour ago, Aman619 said:

We are Relevant only in the sense that we COULD AFFECT THE MARKET, but only if we sold our books. As long as we sit on them we are irrelevant to current sales. 
 

we all know that the dentist has a better copy of all the biggest keys ..  but he is the poster child of my sense of an irrelevant collection because they are never coming to market. The market runs on what it has to work with, not what’s in a safe somewhere. Especially if they’re still unslabbed like most older collectors gems. .  

That's why SA Marvels will always do well.  Everybody wants them and they're always changing hands.  

[lou_fine]

3 hours ago, Aman619 said:

17 hours ago, lou_fine said:

As long as we own the books that some of these crazed buyers want, we are 100% relevant to the marketplace, especially if you are willing to part with some of the "scraps" from your long held personal collection.  

We are Relevant only in the sense that we COULD AFFECT THE MARKET, but only if we sold our books. As long as we sit on them we are irrelevant to current sales. 
 

we all know that the dentist has a better copy of all the biggest keys ..  but he is the poster child of my sense of an irrelevant collection because they are never coming to market. 

Not necessarily true because wasn't it the Dentist himself that was releasing some of those early Quality runs and early Pep runs into the marketplace a few years ago through Heritage Auctions?    

For sure, not his long term keepers like his Action and 'Tec runs like what everybody focuses in on when they think about his collection, but like I said, what he might view as "disposable scraps" to him.  I remember buying some of these so-called loose scraps from Dave back in the day, and surprisingly or not I guess, a few of them are now in Overstreet's Top 100 with a couple more just under this level.  

Like I have said, maybe it's all relative as some of his worthless drek books from his personal collection would be viewed by me as priceless treasures in my own  personal collection.