Martin Sinescu

On 11/24/2021 at 2:03 PM, jhutton2 said:

I bet this is a Canada specific policy 🤦.   PayPal started to get their act together a few years ago for international transactions, seem to be going backwards now.

more steps for buyers and sellers 😬 as well as long wait periods for accessing funds

Not Canada specific. As @Black_Adammentioned, they are holding funds from ours and another transaction to Canada pending confirmed delivery, but they did this for a sale in the US the same week as well (I did receive those funds around midnight of the day after the package was delivered). According to their rationale, I am "high risk" because I have not sold in a while (note that I sold through the bay and received funds via PP up until mid-January of this year and have been a paypal member for 21 years). I will now have to reestablish my credibility through them with consistent sales (not direct quotes, but that's the idea) before they will allow me direct access to my funds. I've been waiting over two weeks now for the money from my sales to Canada while the deliveries to Canada take slower than expected. Meanwhile paypal is daytrading with my money. I'm probably not doing anymore direct payments through paypal, sounds like MCS and CLink will be my next avenues.

On 11/8/2021 at 10:28 AM, Black_Adam said:

Sold, thanks!

Just the GS Defenders left for now. May add more books later.

This grail is on hold pending receipt of payment!

ASM 45 and Bats 241 are on hold pending payment.

Giant-Size Defenders 3 CGC 8.5 (1st Korvac) $400

Astonishing Tales 25 CGC 9.4 (1st Deathlok) SOLD

Batman 241 CGC 9.6 (Classic Neal Adams cover!) ON HOLD PENDING PAYMENT

Amazing Spider-Man 45 CGC 9.6 (3rd appearance of the Lizard) ON HOLD PENDING PAYMENT

I'm putting a few books from my personal collection up for sale, all are White Pages with excellent wrap/centering. CGC holders are in excellent condition with no cracks, chips or other major damage. Books are as follows:

• Amazing Spider-Man 45 CGC 9.6 (3rd appearance of the Lizard) SOLD $1500 
• Batman 241 CGC 9.6 (Classic Neal Adams cover!) SOLD $900
• Astonishing Tales 25 CGC 9.4(1st Deathlok) SOLD $750
• Giant-Size Defenders 3 CGC 8.5 (1st Korvac) $400

Buyer pays shipping (Flat $18 via USPS Priority Mail in the US, fully insured and double-boxed). Shipping to Canada flat $40. No other areas outside the US, sorry!

No Hall of Shamers or Probation List

First posted Take It (or some variation thereof) gets it, PM's are fine if you wish to remain private and I will post if it does sell, but PM's can be trumped by a post in the thread.

Payment by Paypal (goods and services only), check or money order.

No returns, item will be fully insured in the unlikely event any damage occurs.

I have been on the boards randomly buying and selling for over 10 years as well as buying/selling on ebay for over 20 years (ebay ID qburt with over 2000 feedback, IIRC)

Feel free to ask if there is anything I have not covered!

For sale is one of the toughest, most sought-after Modern books: CGC 8.0 Ultimate Fallout 4 (1st Miles Morales) Newsstand Edition! Very few sales of this book are recorded on GPA and the only two for 2021 are a 9.2 for $7000 back in May of this year and more recently a 5.0 sold for $3000 in September. This copy presents nicely for the grade with a few small spine tics on the front, but the back does have a very small tear along the bottom edge right of the middle, so it's unlikely this would press to a higher grade. Asking $5000 plus shipping to US (flat $40 via UPS or USPS Priority. double-boxed including insurance/signature confirmation) or Canada (price based on buyer's location) only!

SOLD

No Hall of Shamers or Probation List

First posted Take It (or some variation thereof) gets it, PM's are fine if you wish to remain private and I will post if it does sell, but PM's can be trumped by a post in the thread.

Payment by Paypal (goods and services only), check or money order.

No returns, item will be fully insured in the unlikely event any damage occurs.

I have been on the boards randomly buying and selling for over 10 years as well as buying/selling on ebay for over 20 years (ebay ID qburt with over 2000 feedback, IIRC)

Feel free to ask if there is anything I have not covered!

6 minutes ago, valiantman said:

Somewhere between sportscards and Charizard there are tons of actors who have cards in sets for their TV/movies and artists who can easily sign a Marvel card as they've been signing Marvel comics.  CGC would need to attend sportcard shows for athletes, but the actors/artists are already there at conventions where they're witnessing signed comics/magazines.

Very good point, I hadn't considered that. Could possibly also keep people from getting ridiculous sigs on comics that have tenuous connections to the autographer just because they had to take advantage of CGC and Celebrity X being in the same building at the same time.

2 hours ago, valiantman said:

The video shows the graded card with "center" (centering, centered, a separate subscore?) - bringing CGC to the concept of "centering" as a stand-alone factor in grading.  Could CGC graded comics with subscores for centering, corners, surface (the standard BGS subscores) be the next innovation?  If so, what happens to all those high grade comics with bad centering?  Value plunge?

This touches on one of two thoughts that occurred to me today while discussing this with a co-worker. CGC almost completely ignores centering, yet it's incredibly crucial for achieving high grades with PSA/BGS (or get the OC qualifier if it's way off). I wish CGC would adopt this, but, like many things, they're set in their ways as is the hobby. If nothing else, it's amusing to think the card graders are grading under a different set of criteria than the comic graders, yet under the same banner.

7 hours ago, Lest 2 Art said:

Why is the card grading scale so much different than the comic grading scale? 

It copies the sports card graders' scales. The other thing that occurred to me is that this would've been one area where CGC could've brought a real advantage to the table: More increments at the high end of the scale. While PSA continues to stay with their troglodytish 9 or 10 for the high end, CGC could've brought over the 9.0/.2/.4/.6/.8/10 differentiators. BGS has a 9.5 in between and you even get a side of sub grades with that to help identify whether it is a strong or weak overall grade (which I prefer and would put me firmly in their corner if I were actively collecting), but CGC just seems to have copied the BGS scale (ironic, since Beckett owns their chief competitor) rather than try something that would make them stand out. Missed opportunity if they go that route and really a bit timid if I'm being honest. 

And my opinion on the sig series is that it would be great if they do go into sports cards. I have plenty of signed cards from when I went to BB card shows as a kid that I probably can't sell for Jack as there's no authentication to go with them. I think it would be a big asset for them to do this at a player signing (do they still do conventions? I'm assuming so) and might be enough to get sports card collectors to try them out. It's a moot point if their intention is just going after the CCG stuff primarily (CCGGC?) as I don't think Charizard signs much these days.

52 minutes ago, Myowncollector said:

Cgc is a known brand. If they wanted to they could become the #1 option in card grading.

PSA is a better known brand. So is Beckett. Way better. Without knowing the numbers internally, I think it's still pretty safe to guess that PSA does a much higher volume and dollar amount than CGC. The only way CGC could make any noticeable impact on these two would be to do it cheaper, faster, with higher quality, more accuracy and significantly higher resale value. In other words, no chance.  It's simply not viable in the long term unless you plan on running your business into the ground at light speed. Beckett was a game-changer when they came in. They had the name-recognition in the card hobby, a higher-quality case and a more sophisticated grading scale.... they still couldn't and can't knock PSA off the top. I can only see CGC doing this to capture a small niche of the market. Just like with comics and other collectibles, there are small nuances and secrets to grading/authentication, so I wouldn't really trust CGC with cards any more than I would trust PSA to grade comics.

Pulled this out of an original owner collection of two long boxes. Random mix of late 80's into 90's with newsies and directs.

\

And I was like.....

41 minutes ago, jjonahjameson11 said:

 Yes, it was a big deal immediately after it was published in 1983, and it’s value rose quickly as a back issue.

however, by the time you started collecting in the late 80’s, it’s value was relatively stable and would continue to remain so for many, many years.

it was only in the past 4 years that the book started to rise again in value.

Yup, right after I sold my Canadian 9.8. 

Wow, I've been looking for a White Page 8.5 with a nice wrap and it's been very tough. Beautiful lineup! 

1 hour ago, D84 said:

Am I the only person who doesn't like this cover?

It transcends the standard monthly comic cover. I love that it's disturbing, risky and surreal. It's also a contemporary, striking and original realization which perfectly complements the character. Honestly, you shouldn't want to look at the Joker: He represents madness, cruelty, murder -- the worst of humanity. Yet this image has the power to draw you in because you really have to get into the detail of it, going against the viewer's (most likely) initial reaction to be somewhat repulsed. From there, it provokes further thought about his relationship with the Bat. Is it pleasing to look at? Perhaps no, but I think it is one of the best, most faithful interpretations of the crazy, psychopathic Joker I've ever seen.

4 hours ago, Hollywood1892 said:

I might have posted this already 

Again, I wouldn't say cover alone drives the value as the OP requested:

• A Joker appearance will already cause at least a modest bump in almost any Batman issue.
• It had a low print run relative to the rest of the series. 
• It's both the penultimate issue from a writer/story that is held in very high regard by fans and of the original 'Tec run itself.

No doubt the cover is most of the recognition, but these other factors have substance beyond the eye candy and all come together for this one book which helped justify the higher price as it began to escalate.

Hulk 340 has a lot more going for it than just the cover.

12 hours ago, BlowUpTheMoon said:

Chrome keeps me logged into GPA for days.  The old GPA didn't do that.

This has been my experience since the redesign and I'm on Safari. I used to go nuts getting logged out every 30 minutes, now I don't even have to keep a tab open. In fact, I shut my computer down last night and haven't been on GPA in a day or two -- just opened a new tab for GPA and I'm still logged in. Not sure why other are getting different results, I assumed this was an update in the software that went along with the redesign and I thought it was a great idea.

4 hours ago, Corona smith said:

Slowly filling holes. 

Nice. This arc has been on my back-burnered list of priorities to seek out. I kind of have a few "classic" modern Marvel storylines I'd like to complete. I've got all of Lady Bullseye, most of Old Man Logan, and bits n' pieces of Winter Soldier. Planet Hulk has been another from that same time period that I'd like to put together, but I'm so scattered all over right now I haven't really sought it out.

4 hours ago, Corona smith said:

Maybe we were separated at birth?! I get so angry when I get a bunch of damaged rare newsstands And it’s caused by bad packaging. These last ones I knew were going to be bad when I was handed the package and you could feel the books sliding every which way. The whole way home from the post office cussing out the seller for being an imbecile. 

Yep, that gut-punch when you think you're about to wrap your hands around a solid block of comics and it ends up feeling like oatmeal in an envelope.

5 hours ago, MGsimba77 said:

Hey wait a minute didn't you have a 45? I thought I saw you post a 9.6?

Yep, I've got that, too. It just didn't make it to the "top shelf".