lou_fine

I'd rather have a 9.4 AS 3. Criminally underrated book. Now that's a very interesting adjective to be using for the book, as I believe Anthony Chiofalo would completely agree with your assessment of the AS 3 book. Especially since he ended up paying $200K to the lucky winner who had paid some $49K for the CGC 8.5 graded Billy Wright copy of All-Star 3 in the Heritage Auction only a short week earlier.

Well, if it's another one of those so-called private "sales", then some of the boardies here would NOT considered it to be an actual sale.

All I can say is that sure looks like a couple of shockingly right out of this world prices for the CGC 2.0 copy at $72K and the previous CGC at $192K. These entry level bargain hunters are definitely paying a high price for their copies on a price per point basis, while the $192K sale definitely appears to be an outlier to me from my own personal POV, even though I am sure some here will disagree with that sentiment. Personally, I've always loved More Fun 73 and was dead set on acquiring a nice copy for my personal collection back in the early 90's. Especially since I figured that all of the other earlier DC first appearance/origin issues were beyond my price range by then, plus the bonus point of 2 key first appearances in this book in terms of both Aquaman and Green Arrow. Unfortunately, the few copies that I did run across were at best only in the VF range and asking for $4K or thereabouts. I figured if I was going to have to pay that kind of money for that book, it had better be a nice fresh copy and a book in the type of condition that Fishler used to called a "killer copy" at the time. Never did run across a copy in the type of condition that I wanted back then and made the classic mistake of waiting way too long to find just the "right" copy that the book ended moving well above and beyond my purcahse price point.

No conspiracy theories! No cover ups and/or no pleading of the Fifth here!!

Based upon how you laid out the scenario here which I would not disagree with, why would you say that there is some risk for the buyer here? Especially if the Initializer in this process is also the Finalizer, and as such has the final say on the determination of the final grade.

What kind of credibility hits are you referring as I am aware of the silly one to do with the grading of "invisible" comic books, but not much else. Definitely nothing at all compared to the time in 2005 or thereabouts with the whole Jason Ewert fiasco and when the issue of pressing first came to light on these very boards here. Now, that was most definitely a time when CGC's credibility was at rock bottom.

Totally agree with you since it's rather quite obvious that grading standards have changed from the time when CGC first started as compared to what we have today, and sadly, not necessarily for the better. Being a long time collector from well before the days of CGC, I personally prefer the old school grading which CGC seems to have initially started with before it evolve (or is it devolve ) over time into a grading system whereby the additional revenue generating types of defects seemingly kept moving up on their hit parade chart with a bullet. So yes, it's quite possible that Dave's current copy might indeed present and look much nicer from a simple visual presentation POV, even though it might still conceivably grade out slightly lower if graded in today's grading environment. Then again, he might simply have gone for his current non-pedigree copy since it's completely unrestored, whereas this is certainly not the case with the Church copy.

Because we are not talking about the previous grade on the book here, but the CURRENT grade on the book which they clearly knew when they did their press release.

I am quite sure that this same process is still in place for all regular resubs where the Joe Average submittor like you and me mails their book and submission form into the Receiving Department of CGC and the book then trudges it all the way through the regular grading process until it makes its way right up to the Finalizer who then determines the final grade for the resubbed book. In any business, there are customers and then there are customers, and not all customers are treated equally. Since CGC is clearly a business, it only makes business sense and totally understandble that there are customers/books and then there are customers/books, and not all customers/books are treated equally. This then should not be a big concern if certain customers/books receive special preferred treatment or services as long as it does not mean they receive special or preferred grades because after all, that is the bottom-line cornerstone of their business. As such, this type of customer/book does not simply mail their book and submission form into the CGC Receiving Department, but instead the book is most probably brought into CGC and starts their process at the top of the food chain in order to determine the best process for the book before it is then placed into the system at the appropriate step. I am sure we would all want to get this preferred treatment for all of our resubs, but from a pure business POV totally understandable why we do not and this is fine with me as long as the book is still graded the same way as all other books. Yes, totally weird as I've never understood why they didn't simply grab a blank CGC submission form and used that new serial number instead of reusing the same old CGC serial number again.

Saw your post earlier today and made a call down to Halperin in his Heritage Dallas corner suite and he agrees 110% with your post here.

I think this was most likely done at a time when restoration was seen as a positive that ADDED VALUE to a book, similar to today where we now see more subtle forms of what was once also considered to be restoration as now nothing more than "maximization of potential". Clearly no added value to the book from a conservation point of view, with the sole purpose being undisclosed grade enhancement in order to get added value into your bank account. Clearly we have not learned anything from our past mistakes and instead of eliminating it, have now actually institutionalized it as part of the whole grading process. Like Matt has alluded to in some of his interviews in the past, he has managed to level the playing field for all collectors within the marketplace. Unfortunately not in the way that some collectors would like in terms of eliminating the comic book doctors, but instead we all now have to wallow around in the same mud pile lest our books do not receive the grades they deserve when submitted in for grading. Then again, it is what it is and as long as you understand the rules of the game and how it's supposed to be played, you really can't complain too much if you want to continue with your collecting passion.

There sure is as I clearly remember holding it in my hands along with the Church copy of Adventure Comics 40 back in '94. In NYC for the first time and visited the Metro offices when Fishler pulled out both of these Church books that he was about to send out and asked me to take a close look at them to see if I could spot anything wrong. I remember pointing out the area on the Cap where I thought some work had been done and Fishler said that was indeed the area as both books unfortunately had a small amount of resto work done to them.

What do you mean because the proof is right here, as like they say, a picture is worth a thousand words:

I hope you are NOT actually referring to me in your comment here since you quoted my post in your response here? Especially since I generally agree with the point which you are trying to make here.

Go back more than 20 years when there was still no Heritage, but Greg Manning was still there while Sotheby's had already come and gone. Didn't ComicLink start out as an auction website pretty much from the get go?

You mean CGC announced what was reported to it by the private parties ? You do realize that it's quite possible this was really more of a 3-party transaction with CGC being one of the 3 private parties involved at an earlier "unofficial" stage of the party. As such, this would then pretty much guarantee a win-win-win situation for all 3 parties involved. Edited since I gave it a bit more thought and it's actually more of a 5-party transaction if you include the 2 comic book brokers, including our very own @VintageComics fellow boardie , with all 5 parties winning out in the end.

Are you really tryimng to say that all comic book sales are invalid except for those sold through a public auction process? I remember it was not that long ago when virtually ALL comic book sales were done so-called "privately" beween a dealer and a customer and virtually no books were sold through a public auction process.

It's really based upon the amount of the color touch because the Superman 1 and I believe the More Fun 52 both had very MINOR amounts of color touch while the Adventure 40 had a very SMALL amount of color touch on it. So, I would assume this means "small" is more than "minor" and enough to have the book cross over into the PLOD threshold.

Why would you say this now results in greater transparency since you have now lost the grading history (i.e. prior grade and prior date graded) for the book as the only information that now shows up for the book would be the current grade and date? And NO, I somehow believe this change is in place for only certain books because how would CGC know if a regular Joe is resubmitting some random book through the regular submission process for a resub that they should be keeping the old label serial number.

I believe you are confusing this with the Church copy of More Fun 52 as both of these books came up for sale in one of the early auctions (possibly Greg Manning ???) within CGC's first few years of existence, with the More Fun 52 encased in a blue slab while the Adventure 40 had the much dreaded PLOD label attached to it. I can't seem to find a scan for the Church More Fun 52, but I believe the blue label notes stated something like "very MINOR amount of color touch, glue on spine of cover", while the Adventure 40 had the following on its PLOD label: I still remember this because although both books had restoration listed on it with the only difference being just one key word, the mere fact that the Adventure 40 had the stigmatizing PLOD label resulted in it selling only for a huge discount to top of guide, while the More Fun 52 which was once formerly co-owned by Borock himself managed to sell for a huge premium (or was it a multiple ???) to top of guide.

That is interesting. How can one be certain that once the book is taken out of the blue holder for regrading that it won't be re-holdered in a restored or conserved slab? Surely one might seek assurances beforehand, which seems to diminish to some degree the whole notion of objectivity. I remember being down at the SD Con's in the early 90's or thereabouts and whenever the Church copy of Superman 1 came up, collectors back then kind of looked down upon it as they said it had been a restored copy that then went through some further work to have its restoration removed. I guess they didn't removed it all completely, but enough to have it received a blue Universal label when CGC came into existence years later. As for your last two questions, some boardies would probably say that you should be asking, what is the opposite role of the Finalizer?

For those who were saying that the Cap 1 sale push that book into the #3 position, I guess they must also be saying this sale has now pushed Superman 1 into the top position in terms of being most valuable comic book.

Close, but no cigar as Action 1 and 'Tec 27 was up there right from the start although your FB 26 was indeed up there tied in 9th spot with 9 other books including Flash Comics 1 and All-Star 3 (check out the list at the 1:00 mark): And sad to say, but also tied in 9th spot to this beauty of a book that actually managed to decrease in value in Overstreet Good valuation by $1 in the 46 long years between 1970 and 2016 if you took the Warren Buffet approach with respect to long term investing:

Tell me it ain't so with New Fun 1 as I had that book in there with Funnies on Parade as part of my Top 5. Seriously though, I still remember the days when Marvel 1 was considered to be the most valuable book in the hobby, at least according to the Overstreet Guide back then.

I'd argue that one record setting and possible outlier of an auction result in and of itself does not mean that comic book valuation history is rewritten.