lou_fine

It's called COGS, (Cost Of Goods) Since I don't live in the United States, not sure how American tax laws exactly works. Is it possible that you are thinking more in terms of business income taxes (buying & selling through an incorporated business), as opposed to just casual buying & selling not as a business since you have a regular job. This just might then be consider as capital gains when it comes to personal income taxes. Like Sharon said, however, hers is indeed the best advice here:

Maybe that's because they figure that they are clearly top dog when it comes to the OA market and hence no need to offer the same huge discount. This is clearly not so definitive when it comes to the comic book market, and they need to compete with their competitors like CL and CC.

It doesn't surprise me that they do what they do. What does surprise me is that the collecting community tolerates it. If collectors would punish books with those pressing-related defects by refusing to bid, the phenomenon would come to a screeching halt. From some of your posts here, it sounds as though you need to spend some serious time in the CGC sin bin with a triple dose of their hourly CGC juice in order to remove these aberrant thoughts from your mind and assimilate you back in with the rest of your CGC brethren here. Then you too can have the same insatiable urge to bid like there's no tomorrow on these Promise Collection books with the nice big numbered labels on the top left hand corner of the slab, regardless of the mouse chews, depressed staples, dust shadows, edge tears, etc. on the books themselves, hoping against hope that you will be the lucky winning bidder left standing when it's all said and done.

Speaking about rather unbelievable prices, even the consignor of this book here was totally shocked and did not expect this kind of price since there had been absolutely zero history to date that this book was going to sell for so high, even when the Ducks were in their big heyday over a decade ago: https://comics.ha.com/itm/golden-age-1938-1955-/four-color-178-donald-duck-rockford-pedigree-dell-1947-cgc-nm-96-off-white-to-white-pages/a/7244-94042.s?ic4=ListView-ShortDescription-071515 Sold for an absolutely astounding and totally out of this unvierse price of a stunning $90K.

Did every single 9.6 copy in existence end up in an overnight mailer for pressing and cleaning to CGC headquarters today? Well, I believe pretty much everybody here also said exactly the same thing when the last CGC 9.8 graded copy sold for $48K or thereabouts quite a few years ago, and to date, this Oregon Coast copy is the only additional copy to have found its way into a CGC 9.8 since that time.

Well, if you are talking about Subby books, the one from the Promise Collection that did the best was this absolute beauty here: https://comics.ha.com/itm/golden-age-1938-1955-/sub-mariner-comics-13-the-promise-collection-pedigree-timely-1944-cgc-nm-96-off-white-to-white-pages/a/7244-93153.s?ic4=ListView-ShortDescription-071515 Sold for a record setting $50,400 or way above all of the other Subby books in the collection and from my own POV, a much under appreciated classic cover and the best cover in the Subby run (even more so than the ever popular Subby 11) that's got it all from the classic bondage cover image utilizing the cobra snake right through to the hooded villians.

Yeah, from what I hear, the Asian movie crowd which they are apparently trying aim for will not be endeared to this actor as they feel he's just not good looking enough for the part. From my point of view, they should have found somebody that looks a lot more like this in terms of the Bruce Lee mold for the Shang-Chi role:

I hate to be the wanker, but I don't think that was ever a 9.9. The lower left corner has some wear and there are spine ticks along the black line border on the left. Well, if you guys checked, you'll notice that this book was graded way back right when CGC first opened their doors in 2000, and as such, was most likely graded according to the old standards that were in place at the time before CGC got a chance to fine tune them and also well before Heritage arrived on the scene back in 2002 to up their grading game and subsequent shenanigans. So yes, you'll most definitely never ever see this book sent back in for regrading as it would not have a chance at anything close to a CGC 9.9 grade now that the former go to messiah of pressing is in charge of grading at CGC, and with non-color breaking creases and spine ticks resting comfortably right up there at the top of his Hit Parade chart with a bullet.

What's the major difference from before since I really only go on there for their Event Auctions and I really don't see much difference there? I do notice the huge improvement in their auction archives as it's pretty much real time now, as opposed to waiting months on end for an eventual (if ever) update on their actual sales.

When did you become one of these FOMO driven crazed crypto guys? BTW: Absolutely love that beautiful All-Select 2 that you picked up from the collection as that's one of the two best covers in the entire run.

CCS has gone downhill since Matt no longer runs it. This is most definitely true and sad to say, but a clear and classic example of the Peter Principle in play here.

For some reason CGCs in-house pressers seem to have more depressed staples than others pressing books. That's because they don't have much time to do the pressing job properly and with the necessary due care because of the huge backlog that they have. And it supposedly doesn't really matter in the end anyways in terms of the grading because the CGC graders apparently know that this kind of defect is due to their own in-house partner pressing company, and as a result, don't really take this particular defect into account when it comes to the determination of the final grade for the book. Although some would call this an obvious conflict of interest, in the corporate business world, they simply call it the realization of business synergies in a vertically integrated industry.

Although I would personally consider both the Jon Berk and Promise Collection auctions to be like a virtual once in a lifetime generational event in terms of their overall magnitude, I also feel they are 100% different in terms of their nature. Jon Berk's collection was a post generation collector's private collection compiled with love and passion over an extended period of time during his adult collecting years. Generational and historic in the sense of a collection made up of many books which could seemingly never ever be found in the marketplace, let alone in any graded condition at all, whether unrestored, Conserved, or even Restored. A collection in which he has often shared with the hobby place not only physically with his many collector friends, but also through the many articles that he had authored throughout the decades and which surely helped to grow the hobby over the years. As he had stated, he considered himself to be the fortunate caretaker of all of these books over the decades and saw the auctioning off of them as his way to pass them onto the next generation of comic book collectors to love and care for them the way that he had. As such, it was probably a complete success as his collection did end up landing in the hands of many many dedicated and long time passionate comic collectors and it's certainly a special and nice feeling to know that Jon will be able to enjoy the benefits of his collection in his retirement years as its most certainly well deserved. To me, the Promise Collection is an Original Owner collection compiled with love and passion over a short period of years by a teen or young adult during his shortened collecting years. Generational and historic in the sense of a collection although made up of many books that can be found in the marketplace, but generally not in the uber high grade condition which these books were originally maintained in and subsequently with its potential maximized for sale as necessary. A collection which noboby but the family themselves even knew existed for over 70 plus years and the ownership of which will continue to remain anonymous as per the family's wishes, even in the midst of the auctioning off of their books which will surely help to grow the market going forward. Although the collection was compiled due to the passionate love of one brother for the funny books and then maintained over the subsequent decades by the love of the other brother to his fallen sibling and one deep enough to keep his promise to his brother right through to the very end of his own life last year, even though other members of the family had apparently wanted to disposed of the collection years earlier. Unfortunately for the hobby, a collection that appears to be targeted more towards the deep pocketed collectors/investors as opposed to the "regular" comic book collectors like the majority of us on these boards here and also one in which the two brothers will sadly not be able to enjoy the benefits of from either a financial or historical legacy point of view upon its disposal. From a personal collecting point of view, although I was the fortunate winner of several of Jon Berk's books in his auction as I am sure many others here also were, by Day 4 and 5 of the auction, I was already regretting not having bid more aggressively on some of the truly HTF rare books in the earlier sessions in hopes of adding them into my collection. With the Promise Collection, although I didn't win any of the books here in this first batch (and probably the same in future batches going forward) as I am sure many others here also were not, I don't regret for a single minute not bidding higher on any of these books here because I get the feeling they were never really intended to be passed onto collectors like me anyways. Especially since at this later stage of my own personal collecting life cycle and rather oddly with this age of certification now fully upon us, I am really much more into the actual underlying book itself, as opposed to the condition of the book itself, especially in terms of its subjectively determined graded label which on occasion I find rather perflexing or questionable to say the least when looking at the book itself. Nevertheless, big huge congrats to the boardies here who MANNUP to pick up some of these absolutely gorgeous Promise Collection books like the classic Schomburg All-Select 2 and the absolutely stunning copy of Flash 86.

Sounds as though the difference between the 2 certificates is simply nothing more than Heritage's take, with the Promise Mitch's Mile High certificate clearly netting them more. How do you arrive at that conclusion? The Promise certificate means the consignor keeps more of the total proceeds, and Heritages nets less. Clearly my bad as in my rush to reply I made the usual typo which I have now corrected in my original post, as noted above.

Sounds as though the difference between the 2 certificates is simply nothing more than Heritage's take, with the Promise Mitch's Mile High certificate clearly netting them more. I believe if you are just a regular consignor without the ability to negotiate anything at all with Heritage, the standard SP is probably 15%. So for example, if a book hammers for $1K, then this means that with the 20% BP, the final result which we all see is $1,200. This means that if the seller has the Promise Certificate for this $1,200 sale, they would end up netting $1,080 or 90% of the final total price including the BP. If they had Mitch's Mile High Ceritifcate instead, this means that although they will not be charged the SP, they will have to forgo the 20% BP to Heritage and thereby net only $1,000 or 83.33% of the final total price including the BP, giving Heritage 16.67% of the final total price. Of course, if you are an absolute nobody and buy relatively insignificant books and do not receive one of these certificates and unable to negotiate anything at all with Heritage, that means you will end up paying both the 20% BP of the hmmer price and the standard say 15% of the hammer price. So if we use the same example with a book hammering for $1K, this means the final result will be the same $1,200 with the 20% BP. The biggest difference being that the consignor will also have to forgo the 15% SP or $150 which means they will net only $850 or 70.83% of the final total price including BP, with Heritage taking a whopping 29.17% of the final total price. So, unless you are offered a special deal by Heritage based upon the dollar value of your consignment or a skilled negotiator, all of a sudden, either CC or CL looks like a much better deal at only 10% or possibly even slightly less, if you believe they can give you the same final auction results or thereabouts.

I've won books from Heritage before and have not received one of these certificates for any of my winnings to date yet. Maybe it's only for bigger dollar books where they figured they've made big money on them already and they can hopefully do it again.

Do you think some of the books would have trouble doing that if they were to be consigned again? With the odd exception such as the All-American 61 and possibly a couple others that sold early, most definitely YES. That's why they include "and family member" in their Auction Certificate since they assume that the book(s) will most likely be passed down to their heirs before buyers will even think of reselling because who in the world wants to lose big money.

New record for the book in that grade? Far from it as I believe they've now had about 4 sales either at or over the $60K price point within the past few months alone. Based upon these recent auctionsales results, I would have to say that the CL copy for $42K is the outlier here on the low side.

No, you don't need to have an account as I am not even signed in and if you click this link here, it'll take you right to the book with about 50 minutes left to go for this GSXM 1 lot here: https://www.comicconnect.com/item/911142

Well, if you click onto the real-time link in my post up above, you can see that it still has 3 more hours to go until it hits the 3 minute buzzer for their additional extended bidding sessions where the action usually heats up for the real hot books.

Well, the next one is bound to be more than the CL $42K copy as this one here on CC that ends in a few hours from now is already at $54K: https://www.comicconnect.com/item/911142 I guess we will just have to wait and see what kind of action takes place once the 3-minute buzzer sounds off.

True. Also, the fact that the 42 K was graded a while ago might inhibit some buyers who have deep pockets. When you are dealing with 9.8's ...every little discrepency becomes a factor And when it comes to CGC 9.8 graded copies of GSXM 1, I guess it really depends on the eyeballs that happens to be looking at it at the time because they are so common as to show up in almost every single auction nowadays. Perfect case in point, being this CGC 9.8 graded copy ending in a few hours from now in their CC Event Auction and already at $54K (or already $12K above the CL copy), and my guess is that it should get a few more hits once the 3-minute buzzer rings on this lot here: https://www.comicconnect.com/item/911142

Well, besides the defects and wear, I believe he's referring that even if perfect, the miswrap along would take the book out of 9.8 contention. I am not so sure about this since this book here was notorious for terrible wraps and I believe CGC supposedly does not downgrade for publishing problems such as this, but not sure if this would apply for condition grades of 9.8 or not? This is the single one and only book that I ended up buying so many multiple copies of (i.e. 4 or 5 copies) back in the day, because no matter how many copies I flipped through because they were ALWAYS readily available, they were never ever quite perfect from a wrap POV and I was seemingly never ever satisfied with the copies that I had. Although I loved the Gulacy run and the only reason why I picked up the SME 15 first appearance issue, I stopped this bad habit of mines once the book hit the $3 price range because that was just getting far too expensive for my taste.

It is. Then again, not that surprising since the article was written by somebody who has a personal passion for comic books, and the last half of the article was really a Q&A with Lon Allen from Heritage who's been dealing with comics for decades now. I guess it also doesn't hurt when one of the Forbes family members is apparently an avid Flash collector in addition to his Russian Faberge egg collection, as per an article he wrote himself in an early issue of CBM back in the 90's.

Are you trying to say that CGC exists to show that they like most people, also don't know how to grape properly?