Jaydogrules

It was looking good right up 'til that last bidder. Not really. The shill placed his max bid way back at $1000. It was his fake bid that the legit buyers were competing against and, once again, artificially driving up the price. Frankly the seller should have canceled the bid the moment it was placed. -J.

+1 I pointed out the problems with the rampant shilling on this book literally months ago. It looks like it's gotten so obvious and epidemic that even the apologists can't deny it anymore. -J.

Unfortunately this is happening to a lot of sellers of this book on ebay. -J.

That's a good chart but the implicit logical flaw is discounting that every other book on that list was published in 1975 or before, at the very infancy of the direct market. You can't really compare high-grade populations of 1970-1975 books to 1976-1980 books any more than you can compare the vastly lower quantities of 1960-1964 books relative to their 1965-1970 counterparts. Yes -- there are _huge_ numbers of Star Wars # 1 out there. But there are also huge numbers of its peers -- Peter Parker # 1 (347 9.8s), Nova # 1 (134 9.8s) and She Hulk # 1 (755 9.8s). Likewise, it's specious to claim that these latter books weren't "slab worthy...since the advent of CGC" because these 1976-1980 books have only become truly valuable within the last 15 years. A 1977 book was 23 years old at the advent of CGC; vs. 38 years old today. The "reasons" why there are extreme amounts of SW 1 in a 9.8 out there (compared to actual BA keys) was irrelevant to my analysis. You are also lumping SW 1 with other "not-key", mass collected and hoarded books that only sell for a couple hundred dollars to maybe $700 max (that being Nova 1, which is also the beneficiary of a temporarily bloated movie hype bubble like SW 1). I do agree that SW 1 does belong in that same "value" tier as those books, but for the moment at least, it is not in that value tier, it is closer to the books I listed (at least in 9.8). Hence some of these nonsensical prices we are seeing on ebay for SW 1 need to be placed in a similar context, since this book is "as common as dirt" as they say, and readily available in mass quantities in a 9.8, as opposed to the bona fide BA keys that I mentioned, that are not. (thumbs u -J. So, the problem is Star Wars #1 is as popular or more so than some of the precious superhero keys? Yes it's right up there with rocket raccoon and star lord. -J.

That one makes sense....the two $2500 sales with the same serial number sold a month apart don't. A side effect of weird high sales, repeating over and over is helping legit sellers get a nice price from anyone who doesn't look too closely at the sales data. $1892 is probably right, but it looks like a steal. Those were both mine, someone who just signed on that day ended at my price, It turns out that it came from the same IP address and someone is manipulating these auctions on ebay / Buy it now. I don't expect to get that, I do expect to get offers to consider I did relist it again & yes it is the same serial number There is someone selling a 9.8 right now on eBay and is up to $1,825 with 4 hours left Yes and someone is jacking around with that dude's auction as well. http://offer.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewBids&item=161758004772&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2565 The nonstop shilling going on with this book is making it look like a huge turd. -J.

It might have been. But the value has been artificially inflated by those bogus ebay sales that are tainting not only GPA but the market perception of the book's "FMV" as well. Unfortunately, this is nothing new, particularly with common BA/CA/MA books. But the relentless shilling that's going on with SW 1 is truly legendary. -J.

That's a good chart but the implicit logical flaw is discounting that every other book on that list was published in 1975 or before, at the very infancy of the direct market. You can't really compare high-grade populations of 1970-1975 books to 1976-1980 books any more than you can compare the vastly lower quantities of 1960-1964 books relative to their 1965-1970 counterparts. Yes -- there are _huge_ numbers of Star Wars # 1 out there. But there are also huge numbers of its peers -- Peter Parker # 1 (347 9.8s), Nova # 1 (134 9.8s) and She Hulk # 1 (755 9.8s). Likewise, it's specious to claim that these latter books weren't "slab worthy...since the advent of CGC" because these 1976-1980 books have only become truly valuable within the last 15 years. A 1977 book was 23 years old at the advent of CGC; vs. 38 years old today. The "reasons" why there are extreme amounts of SW 1 in a 9.8 out there (compared to actual BA keys) was irrelevant to my analysis. That there are that many (and counting) was the beginning and end of my point. (thumbs u -J. Much broader market than any of those other books though, so I think the # of copies can be absorbed. I ninja edited my post on you. -J.

That's a good chart but the implicit logical flaw is discounting that every other book on that list was published in 1975 or before, at the very infancy of the direct market. You can't really compare high-grade populations of 1970-1975 books to 1976-1980 books any more than you can compare the vastly lower quantities of 1960-1964 books relative to their 1965-1970 counterparts. Yes -- there are _huge_ numbers of Star Wars # 1 out there. But there are also huge numbers of its peers -- Peter Parker # 1 (347 9.8s), Nova # 1 (134 9.8s) and She Hulk # 1 (755 9.8s). Likewise, it's specious to claim that these latter books weren't "slab worthy...since the advent of CGC" because these 1976-1980 books have only become truly valuable within the last 15 years. A 1977 book was 23 years old at the advent of CGC; vs. 38 years old today. The "reasons" why there are extreme amounts of SW 1 in a 9.8 out there (compared to actual BA keys) was irrelevant to my analysis. You are also lumping SW 1 with other "not-key", mass collected and hoarded books that only sell for a couple hundred dollars to maybe $700 max (that being Nova 1, which is also the beneficiary of a temporarily bloated movie hype bubble like SW 1). I do agree that SW 1 does belong in that same "value" tier as those books, but for the moment at least, it is not in that value tier, it is closer to the books I listed (at least in 9.8). Hence some of these nonsensical prices we are seeing on ebay for SW 1 need to be placed in a similar context, since this book is "as common as dirt" as they say, and readily available in mass quantities in a 9.8, as opposed to the bona fide BA keys that I mentioned, that are not. (thumbs u -J.

The are 346 9.8s of all flavors of Star Wars #1. There are 373 Spectacular Spiderman #1s. There are 150 Nova #1s. There are 99 Ms. Marvel #1s, although Ms. Marvel is a late player to the game. There are 210 X-Men #121s. (And this all assumes no duplication!) I don't know if that is "far, far more 9.8 copies than every other bona fide BA key", but Star Wars #1 has been the most important book of 1977 since the beginning. Of course, it's going to have more higher grade copies than most....but it still doesn't beat PPSS #1. It probably will...but a lot of the other "bona fide Bronze Age keys" from this era still aren't worth slabbing. When I say "bona fide keys" I am referring to books that indeed are (and have been) slab worthy in nearly every grade other than 9.6/9.8 since the advent of CGC. (I don't consider PPSM to be a "key" either BTW, and I'm a foaming at the mouth Spider-man fan). In that regards, SW 1 blows every other book out of the water with its copious amounts of 9.8's that have already been slabbed even prior to the speculative movie hype that has bloated its apparent "FMV" to its current levels. Here's just a small sampling for comparison: ASM 129, 9.8's- 93 IH 181, 9.8's- 26 GL 76, 9.8's- 2 X Men 94, 9.8's- 26 Conan, 9.8's- 37 WWBN 32, 9.8's- 11 TOD 10, 9.8's- 24 Marvel Spotlight 5, 9.8's - 2 Star Wars 1, 9.8's- 346 In many cases the tremendous amounts of SW 1, 9.8's exceed those keys books' numbers in 9.8, 9.6, 9.4, etc. combined. -J.

That's a nice looking copy you have there. I've never heard that rumour before about some of the copies that were sent to SDCC being damaged. I do know that there was another pallet of them shipped a month earlier to Heroes that same year, however, and they were given out there as well. (thumbs u -J.

Somebody dropped $2k for this today ? http://www.ebay.com/itm/Showcase-22-VG-4-0-First-Appearance-Of-Silver-Age-Hal-Jordan-Green-Lantern-/181793043009?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a53b5b241&nma=true&si=DWMp%252Bw5vqRcT9ehfzLJhNkcGebU%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557 -J.

This. Are the two of you sure about this? I remember the Star Wars comic book did not catch on until issue #3 was out or around the time the movie debuted. I remember Star Wars #1 were already going for $10 or more at the time. If there was any hoarding done, it was probably not done by the collectors of the day. Sure, there were more copies available in the marketplace afterwards, but these were most likely from unsold initial returns sitting in the distributor's warehouses which were now being actively hunted down. This was probably one of the first "off the shelf" books to go up in price like that so quickly and was most likely one of the first books to start the subsequent hoarding that would become commonplace with Modern books. Anybody remember Dazzler #1, now that was a really hoarded book. Yes we're sure. Star Wars 1 is not a "rare" book. It was bought and stored in hoards as the movie was an immediate success. As many like to say on these boards, "it is as common as dirt". -J

Not sure... there are fewer than 300 copies of CGC 9.8 Star Wars #1... and 62 (GPA recorded) sales in the past 12 months. Marvel prints a new volume of Star Wars #1 and there are tens of thousands of buyers for the new books. Is it possible that the announcement of six new Star Wars movies in the next 6 years brought 100 new people to the 9.8 Star Wars #1 market? It will bring tens of millions to the theater, so would it bring 0.001% of those to the market? If so, 100 new buyers competing for 62 copies could easily triple the price. What if there are 500 buyers for those 300 copies? The prices wouldn't be falling anytime soon. If the census floods to 3,000 CGC 9.8 copies due to all these hoards, sure... expect the bubble to burst. Not sure about 300... or even 500 copies at CGC 9.8. If this is how simply the market worked then literally almost no price for a 9.8 copy would be "too high" (and fear not, there are far, far more than the 350, 9.8 copies out there than we see on the census now, which are already far, far more 9.8 copies than every other bona fide Bronze Age key). When already we are observing strong resistance at even the $2000 level and even then, that price realized (almost exclusively) in obviously shilled ebay auctions/BINs that spike the GPA numbers and create a false "value" that is then supported by bandwagon collectors and panic buyers. It is when those leave the market for a book that the "correction" will inevitably occur (as it always does). This is, unfortunately, a sad reality of the market nowadays. -J.

Does that mean anyone paying more than $350-$400 for a CGC 9.8 Amazing Spider-man #300 should have their head examined? . There have already been six movies and the book was still had for five or six hundred dollars until less than a year ago. People didn't just suddenly realize there was a comic book adaptation out there that they had to have it any cost. The difference now is that we are passing through an age of shamless and relentless shilling. It is books like this that people are referring to when they speak of a market crash and overly bloated speculative bubbles popping. -J.

I had one on eBay for a bit at $2000 or best offer for 30 days. This comic is very prone to manipulation. I only received a few offers, the high being $1200 or so although ones in auctions were as high as my buy it now option. Giving proof they were very manipulated. I have 100% feedback so it is not like mine was avoided for low feedback or negative feedback. I wound up selling them through direct sales locally for $1700 each. The feedback here has been very wise. Trickle them out. It would have been wiser to trickle them onto the census but that's after the fact and I'm sure others have stock as you do. So it will rise greatly indeed but I suspect the sooner they are sold the better at this point. Probably one of the most "manipulated" books on the market right now. -J.

This book is so ridiculously over valued it's not even funny. Do you know how many people/collections are out there like this guy's with that many copies? A WHOLE LOT. Star Wars 1 was a massively hoarded book since Day One, and every hobbyist knows that. Anyone paying more than $700-800 for a 9.8 copy needs to have their head examined. -J.

I also picked up a copy of the Italian ASM 667 Dell'otto. Thank goodness Matteo had a second copy ! Book was packed and shipped in a timely manner and Matteo was very easy to deal with. Highly recommended ! -Jay

Not bad. At least it's a blue label. (thumbs u -J.

That's great, I'm glad you were able to snag a copy. Not many of these babies to go around, in any condition. -J. Thanks J. I know you are a big fan of the 33 as well. Of course I am. It's one of the most important Batman books ever published. Everybody knows that. -J.

That's great, I'm glad you were able to snag a copy. Not many of these babies to go around, in any condition. -J.

Damn dude. -J.

I think it's kind of cool that the only three new 9.8's that have hit the census in the last year + are boardie books. -J.

There she is, looking good my man. Our exclusive little unofficial club officially expanded to five members today. -J.

I don't necessarily disagree with you. I'm just pointing out the potential prat falls in buying a book (particularly a modern) at the very peak of hype that's caused by some kind of announcement. Especially when said modern is as ultra common and readily available in a 9.8 as NYX 3 is. -J.

With those kind of extreme high grade census numbers, its definitely a book you can be patient with. -J. Yeah patiently wait and pay more later. This book I'm glad I picked up last year in NM. These are already looking like speculative/ hype prices based on Marvel's recently announced decision to call the character "Wolverine" for a while in a new title. Additionally, the overabundance of nearly 1000 9.8 slabs on the census (and counting) will always keep this book's price in check. -J. Yah, I used to think the same thing with New Mutants #98 and look how that turned out. I say if you can buy NYX 3 do it now. The characters are not in the same league at all, and how have things really turned out for NM 98? NM 98, a Copper book, is 13 years older than NYX 3, with (currently) 1966, 9.8+ copies on the census, representing 26% of total copies. NYX 3 is a modern book, released in the CGC slabbing era, that already has 925, 9.8+ copies on the census, representing 48% of total copies. Those numbers exceed even The Walking Dead 1 (in fact, a far more appropriate potential comparison, but still, not really), which itself has "only" 809, 9.8+ copies (138 less than NYX 3) on the census representing 36% of total copies. As popular as Deadpool is, with multiple hit titles, variants, crossovers, movie appearances, etc, NM 98 still cannot reach $750 consistently in a 9.8. NM 98's massive census numbers in a 9.8 also keep its price level in check. X-23, as a female derivation of an existing character will have an even greater task maintaining these speculative price levels as even more 9.8 copies of the book continue to hit the census, let alone if the newly launched title and attempt at characteyyr re-branding is anything less than a blockbuster when it is released, and even more so when the actual Wolverine is inevitably resurrected. In other words, patience with that book is a no-brainer. -J. It's already high, the real time to have bought the book would have been at cover price when it came out. Think about it though,it's the only really significant Marvel character to have come out in the modern era. Miles Morales, "Spider-Gwen", and Lady-Thor fans will beg to differ. Personally I put all those characters in the same category, as not-original creations that were just spun off from previously existing characters and/or concepts for the "diversity" bandwagon. X-23 pre-dates that "movement", and as such was (at least up until now) the most interesting of the group. Unfortunately now Marvel seems to be shoe-horning her in there with the others, by just re-naming her "Wolverine". Instead of letting her be her own character and chart her own course, Marvel evidently believes the only way she can sell books is (as with the other characters mentioned) in the shadow and footsteps of the brand name recognition of a far more famous (and original) version of the same character. -J.