kimik

Comics being accepted as investment collectibles, and more importantly the world being awash in free capital, are the big drivers of the price jump in comics and almost every other collectible right now. Hopefully it lasts as long as the 1988-2003 bubble did. That was a fantastic time to make I was just in junior high and high school back then, but selling cards and comics to friends and other local collectors during a bubble was a fun and very lucrative learning experience.

🤞that your estimates are hit sometime this year.

How is the economy in your area? I think that has a lot to do with the availability of material. It was bad here in Alberta prior to COVID due to the two year downturn in the oil and gas sector. Then when COVID hit and there was a shutdown, that led to more layoffs. As a result, stores were buying collections from last summer to Christmas on a weekly or bi-weekly basis. One store owner landed what he called a once in a lifetime collection - mid to high grade late 40s through mid 50s books, and then basically unread SA and BA books from 1964 until the late 70s (unfortunately, the collection's owner took a small break from buying books when he went to university and first started a career that cost him the early SA Marvel keys). Another landed three nice BA and CA collections in one week in November (luckily I had first pick of one of the collections and nabbed some nice stuff for decent prices). There was a bit of a lull in January, but now a couple of stores I go to for back issues regularly are seeing collections come in the door again as the economy is still slow. The bad part is now you have to hit the stores 2-3 times per week to keep on top of things, instead of once every two weeks.

I know it is not a Bronze Age book, but the 1.5 XMen 1 closed at $7800 tonight as well. You could buy 3.5s for less a month or two ago. The other Bronze XMen closed decently as well. Looks like the XMen run up continues unabated.

Looks like the entry price for X-Men 1 has jumped again. This sold on Heritage tonight for $7800 including the BP: https://comics.ha.com/itm/silver-age-1956-1969-/superhero/x-men-1-marvel-1963-cgc-fr-gd-15-cream-to-off-white-pages/a/122108-17648.s That means a 2.0 would be $8500+? Or, maybe even $10K?

BA Marvel keys are relatively easy to play. The pattern has consistently been IH 181 jumps, and the other keys follow over the next year or two. It was only a matter of time for GSX 1 to hit that level.

Ah, so your submissions will be done next week.

Omega Supreme was my favorite Transformers toy. My parents got it for me for Christmas, and it was such an awesome set to play with. They did a great job introducing him/it in the Transformers comic as well.

Looks like you did not get the memo about increasing the faster grading incentive payment amount at the start of the year.

And, don't get me wrong, it is a gorgeous lower mid grade copy that will present very well in a slab.

There is something funky happening at or just above the bottom staple in addition to the other things I stated above. It looks like it either a staple pull or small spine split - either one would increase the chance of popping the bottom staple during pressing if you do not use someone good. It looks like the top edge tear may go into the first few pages which will drop the grade.

What does it sell for? Looks like $15-$25 on eBay currently.

Looks like a 6.5/7.0 now, and with a press you might get it to a 7.5/8.0. Some of the creasing will be tough to totally clean up with a press near the spine. Too much pressure and you punch the staples through the cover.

In current shape, I am leaning to 2.5 due to what appears to be significant non color breaking bending and creasing on the cover. Press and dry clean it, and 3.0/3.5. It is a great looking copy for the grade. Congrats.

Awesome news! Tynion has been telegraphing this in his blog for a while now (great source of spec info if anyone is interested), and it looks like the Toddfather's comments are translating to sales on eBay now. Nothing crazy, but a few more copies being snagged.

The rule of thumb I go with is to buy multiple copies of keys when I am hunting for them. It makes it easier to part with a copy/multiple copies down the road if prices spike. Timing the sales is the hard part. I went from 5 X-Men 1 and 10 GSX 1 at the end of 2019, to just one of each now by starting to sell them last year. Should have waited another 12 months.

Absolutely. Comparisons in this crazy world we live in, if Bitcoin can go up 450% past year, if Tesla can go up 750% this past year, well 233% for a comic isn’t exactly out of reach. Regarding comics, other comparisons could be TMNT1, ASM300, UF4 in the past year probably over 250% gains in many grades. Yeah, everything is running now. Look at how many Copper and Modern books in 9.8 are selling for several thousands now after being in the $200-$500 range last year. It is a great time to be a collector with a lot of inventory in all sorts of different hobbies.................

I quite enjoy these quirky markets as it means you can have two 1st appearances to sell at inflated values instead of just one.

This one looks like he sold out faster than expected on the original set, and then decided to do a new one after the fact.

The difference in my view is that the artist captures the $$$ from a different color scheme, while the publisher does not have to pay them for variant covers using already published pages/old covers/pieces of panels (e.g. that "McFarlane" Venom variant Marvel did from a couple years back that was just the character from a previously published panel). FWIW, I am not chasing them, and will not for the simple reason that the artist exclusives do not maintain value well long term. I would rather do a bulk pre-order at a discount to get the ratio variants on books with 1st apps or covers that I think will age well - they tend to hold up better.

You can say that about every comic book then. Prices were dead in the water for every key until the first wave of movies in the early 2000s. Then they took off again with the success of Avengers and have not looked back.

I have no problem with creators doing this. They do not get paid a ton to begin with, and their career peaks are rather short for the most part, so they need to cash in while they can. I hope every decent artist does this and sells out every issue. Now, when the publishers do it with hack jobs on ratio variants or use internal page artwork as the variant covers to cut corners, I am not a fan of that.

If you are an X-Men fan from the 80s, you want both GSX 1 and X-Men 1. Hulk and FF have been in an decline in popularity for 40+ years now. Hulk 1 is still Hulk 1, but the character's significance in the eyes of new collectors is not what it once was, even with the Universal solo and Avengers team movies featuring him.

Collecting views are a generational thing, which is why older collectors view FF 1 as the most important Marvel book while the majority of post-1970 collectors would view AF 15, and likely ASM 1 as well, as being the most important. It was not that long ago that Dell Disney books were considered the most valuable in the hobby. I have owned multiple copies of every Marvel SA key except for FF 1. The reason - the FF have been an insignificant property for my entire collecting lifespan so there was no need. I did not chase Hulk 1 either, but landed a few copies in collections that I promptly sold, for the same reason. For me, Hulk 181 >>>>>>>>>> Hulk 1 due to Wolverine being the mainstay of the X-Men. For older collectors, it is definitely Hulk 1.

And all three are more important than Hulk 1 now based on character popularity.