• When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.

The Great Collectibles Bubble: Waiting To Pop?
1 1

343 posts in this topic

2 minutes ago, Poekaymon said:

Monkey hate change.

It's like the answer to the prayer!  :tonofbricks:

On the other hand collectors and collectables are very near and dear, if I walked in and said I'd pay $10,000 for your hair, wouldnt you then look at me and question? Naaaaah .... wait really? Naaaaah, you're pulling my chain

 

WrHYcDK.gif

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, ADAMANTIUM said:

I've said it before....

People complain that movies are driving prices, and then when movies aren't the reason driving prices up, it's the same complaints....

Not at all. I fully welcomed and embraced the effect movies had on the comic book market.

But that was at least easily identifiable.

The waters are far too murky now. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

19 minutes ago, Darkowl said:

Not at all. I fully welcomed and embraced the effect movies had on the comic book market.

But that was at least easily identifiable.

The waters are far too murky now. 

Right. When I mentioned movies/tv driving prices, it wasn't a complaint. Just an observation. I expect that sort of thing. Just don't expect others to deny it. Marvel Comics are especially good at making movies. DC - with a few exceptions - stink at it. Probably why DC movie comic titles aren't see much of a bump.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, Randall Ries said:
36 minutes ago, Darkowl said:

Not at all. I fully welcomed and embraced the effect movies had on the comic book market.

But that was at least easily identifiable.

The waters are far too murky now. 

Right. When I mentioned movies/tv driving prices, it wasn't a complaint. Just an observation. I expect that sort of thing. Just don't expect others to deny it. Marvel Comics are especially good at making movies. DC - with a few exceptions - stink at it. Probably why DC movie comic titles aren't see much of a bump.

Cool thanks for clarification  :)

I myself sometimes wonder why, as its hopefully never ending.  I just hope any newcomers to the hobby, be it from card collectors or what not, find the hobby enjoyable and stick around long enough for minor keys too....

Seems to be a lot of competition out there, which is usually healthy for a market  ;)

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, ADAMANTIUM said:

 I just hope any newcomers to the hobby, be it from card collectors or what not, find the hobby enjoyable and stick around long enough for minor keys too....

 

That's actually a really good way of looking at it. (thumbsu

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I am fascinated that here in Germany the fast majority of people dont seem to get the fact that 2020 will go down as a historic year like 1914, 1776, 1789 or 1492. They think that their life will go back to 2019 soon. If they behave and obey. They are so wrong.

So when this goes down it will go down long and hard and the guys with cash will be kings. Then they can buy for pennies on the dollar. First the c will flood the market, modern stuff, manufactured gold. But then the better stuff comes to the market because people will be forced to sell. 

 

Edited by GermanFan
Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, GermanFan said:

I am fascinated that here in Germany the fast majority of people dont seem to get the fact that 2020 will go down as a historic year like 1914, 1776, 1789 or 1492. They think that their life will go back to 2019 soon. If they behave and obey. They are so wrong.

So when this goes down it will go down long and hard and the guys with cash will be kings. Then they can buy for pennies on the dollar. First the c will flood the market, modern stuff, manufactured gold. But then the better stuff comes to the market because people will be forced to sell. 

 

I agree with the statement that we won't be going back to what we once knew. I am not an epidemiologist and so lack the knowledge to refute COVID findings. Was it created in a lab? Was it the results of eating raw bats from a wet market? Is it a technique meant to usher in Agenda 2030? I do not know. What I DO know is COVID is real. Plus, fear is a very good control method.

And so, I have to wonder: What makes ANY of us think cash will survive?  We have all seen what can happen when the Stock Market is shaken. Even a little. Money could easily become worthless. Only tangible items would be worth anything. Especially food. And clean drinking water. Comic books would be good for starting a fire. If there is nothing to back up the value of money, it goes bye-bye.

We only know what we are accustomed to and what we have experienced. History shows things can change drastically overnight. Ancient Babylon - a World Power - was considered impregnable. And so they got overly secure. Cyrus simply diverted the river and lowed its level enough to invade Babylon through a sewer grate. Babylon was overthrown while they were partying.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/24/2021 at 3:33 PM, Randall Ries said:

You are welcome. I thought it deserved some attention and not just getting glossed over. The article is a bit scattered but likely geared toward people who have no idea about this market. Still run into people who are amazed at what sums comic books can yield. Mentioned a sale of a Bat 1 for over a mill to a kid I buy coffee from. He said "Wow! I'll have to check and see if I have one of those!" Truly was amazed and flabbergasted. Sure. LMK if you do. Pretty sure he DOESN'T "have one of those". Nice lad, though.

And it was the sports card thing that got me reading about all this. They really were dead in the water only a few months ago. Suddenly they were on fire. Then start seeing people paying goofy money for IH 181. Goofier than usual. Then the 9.8 Transformers book. Nah. That's more than some 30 something with feelings of nostalgia. Something is not right, here.

As a small business owner, I took all the "help" I could get. If we fail, well, I am too old to be doing what I used to do. Body is beginning to fail. We pay more taxes than most people typically do and so I felt absolutely FINE with it.

One could at least make the argument that Hulk 181 introduces the most popular character to come out of the 80s and that the Transformers book was always undervalued, as is most of Mantlo's work.  But it's worse than that.  When some goof pays $1700 for West Coast Avengers 45, presumably not understanding that the same money would get him an 8.0 Avengers #57, then we're now talking about guys flipping bits of plastic.  It's not fundamentally about the comic collecting hobby anymore.

Edited by RonS2112
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/24/2021 at 4:26 PM, Randall Ries said:


So what we are seeing HERE is a bunch of people who either HAD a lot of money to begin with or weren't affected all that much by COVID. They could work from home or telecommute or whatever it is that they did. Their income wasn't affected. NOT the case with us or restaurants or bars or anywhere that one would go out to so they could blow their cash, etc. Like concerts. Small venues shuttered. Musicians doing webcasts instead.
 

Wow.....your post really misses the boat.

"....people who either HAD a lot of money to begin with or weren't affected all that much by COVID".  OR they are people over-leveraging themselves with money they don't have, because they think they can make the easy buck.  And THOSE are the people who are going to bail the first time they get left holding the bag on a book on which they spent 3x what they should have.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/24/2021 at 6:43 PM, IronMan_Cave said:

Why a lull in the market cause people to panic? You assume only speculators buying these items at inflated prices.....you ignore that there are some really rich collectors buying these with no intention of selling or no intention to make profit out of it

 

I love it that some of you guys seem to have a mental image of "Mr. Rich Fat Cat Collector." This image seems to assume some guy who lucked into his money, and is serious enough about comic collecting that he's going to keep his books forever, but remains ignorant enough about the hobby that he's still willing to acquire his version of Micronauts #33 at a crazy price.  How many of this sort of individual do you think exists?

It's a lot easier for me to imagine a stereotypical hipster who read an article about getting rich flipping comic books and is now spending crazy $$$ because he's pretty sure the next buyer is still out there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/24/2021 at 9:05 PM, Randall Ries said:

Because a lot of people were making a ton of money from it, I guess. At that time, a 6% interest rate seemed low. Seems like they were pushing low interest rates pretty hard.

I remember when it all ended. One of my clients was elderly and her goal was to have 1 million in her savings account. She had a clothing boutique in Manhattan and sold it. Retired. She saved that money and was saving more. She got to 947,000. I showed up one day and she had lost half of her savings. A lot of people got virtually cut in half.

Enron bailed out. The housing market took it in the pants. People lost their 401k's. The value of their houses. Their jobs. Their retirement savings. People who were working and trying to invest. And lost. And people laughed. "Oh I'll just buy low, now! Har har har!" Right. Criminals stole their money legally and had the nerve to laugh.

You are fundamentally correct, but your post misses part of the story.  By the time "a lot of people were making a ton of money," the writing was on the wall.  People were still buying and selling sub-prime loans in 2006, even though they knew there was going to be a reckoning in 2007-08.  Because they were at that point gambling on their ability to pass off that "hot potato" loan to another buyer.  And many succeeded.  It's the guy who gets stuck holding the hot potato who ultimately takes it in the shorts.

I see a lot of parallels to the comic spec market right now.

Edited by RonS2112
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 3/24/2021 at 11:45 PM, Poekaymon said:

This is a great example of the mistake people make out of fear.  Worrying that it's going to drop a bunch of points is exactly what I meant by saying that trying to time the market is a losing strategy.  In the long run, it doesn't matter if it drops a bunch of points.   

I'm probably into the ocean here, but I'll spend one paragraph trying to explain.  You might be surprised to know that even if you had somehow managed to invest at all the worst times in history, as in, right at the peak of every bubble we've ever had, and precisely the night before "you hear the pucker all around the world," you're still vastly in the money today?  To put it another way, investing at absolutely the wrong times still beats not investing at all.  This is not an opinion, it is mathematical fact.  

 

Yes, but you are talking from the perspective of a person who's into the market for the long haul.  The equivalent would be someone (like me) whobought their 70's and 80's comics off the rack at cover price.  That isn't generally the kind of person who causes bubbles in a market.  It's the short-term get-rich-quick guy we're talking about.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
1 1