COI

I don't get accused of being "too nice" very often. On the internet or in real life. You've never jumped the gun and made a bunch of assumptions? It happens all the time, everywhere, especially on the internet. Most people have a hard time admitting they're wrong, and many people even go the other way and double-down into their stupidity. No real damage was done here. He only really owes an apology to MCS and C-Link, and maybe he did apologize to whoever he spoke to over there. Not totally writing people off for making a mistake might also make the world a better place. One of the reasons people rarely apologize on the internet is that it tends to be a no-win strategy. People don't really want apologies, what they like is the pile-on.

He made a mistake, spoke to MCS, then made a follow-up correcting those mistakes. He could've done better, but at least he did something. It's not easy to admit when you're wrong, especially in a public manner/on the internet, and many people who find themselves in similar situations don't do even the bare minimum to set the record straight. I would cut him a break.

It's okay to get things wrong, but this guy should've reached out to MCS or Comiclink for comment first, before publishing his suspicions. Especially since he's a dealer himself and has his own auction site. I'm sure he would want that courtesy extended to him if it were a sale on his site that was in question. Hopefully, someone will link him to this response; if he's operating in good faith, he will either take the video down, or publish a follow-up. These creators on social media need to stop being so reactive just to make content. This is the reason why there's so much bad information on the internet.

Good question. I'm not capable of giving any really comprehensive answer because I'm out of touch. The stuff I track and bid on seems to be chugging along just fine. Nothing is on fire, but I'm not seeing tons of bargains either. I've also been steering clear of spec fodder and am trying to buy books that most of the hype peddlers would call "dead"; you know, anything other than a first appearance. My guess is that if you exclude speculator fodder, things mostly seem to be where they would've been if the mass psychosis of 2021 didn't happen. Which is good, IMO. Stable is better than 'hot' if you actually like to collect this junk.

I find it funny that this discussion always revolves around top end sales; mid-higher grade AF 15s, ASM 1 in 9.6, Hulk 181s in 9.8, etc, as if these data points can tell you anything about the market as a whole, particularly its "health". Or that you can glean how many people are "real collectors" vs speculators. These sales, and the pool of buyers who regularly participate in high five to six figure sales, reflect a tiny proportion of the market. As such, most of the people discussing these sales aren't buying or bidding on these books and most of what we get are anecdotes about why they're buying or selling any particular book at any particular time. Hundreds to thousands of books are trading hands every day at $50 to $5000; this is the lion's share of the market. They're not the headline grabbers, and I get that maybe these types of sales are too numerous for any one person to wrap their heads around, but these discussions are overly fixated on a couple of Hulk 181s in 9.8 or some low six figure key someone took a bath on in the last 8 months. There's a lot more going on and it's kind of ridiculous to focus on the whims of a very small pool of buyers at the deep end, as a basis for sweeping generalizations of the market as a whole.

Thankfully, no. But it still bothers the F out of me.

I was 21 when I joined the boards. Age has nothing to do with it, this place just sucked a lot less pre-2010.

It's the price that determines whether or not this is a good buy, not the wrap on the book.

It certainly puts you in a pinch if you need to turn them into cash quickly.

Nope, not personal. A little snarky maybe, but your argument about hoarding relies on predicting the future (a time where people no longer hoard), hence the crystal ball comment. It was an attack on your argument, not you.

Okay then. This sounds like someone who can't have a discussion without making things personal.

While you've got your crystal ball out, even if I take your point that people hoarded H181 in the past and continue to hoard H181 today, why would hoarding stop in the future? If people like and believe in ASM 300 or H181 enough to hoard it even at today's high prices, what would get them to stop? Hoarding is a function of demand. I thought the same way you did 20 years ago, and I've been wrong for 20 years. It's easy to keep kicking the doomsday can down the road because you can never be proven wrong.

Good point. Memory is short. Most books are doing fine relative to where they were in 2019, but there was a blip in 2021 and so now, the fact that books aren't going up week to week means that the hobby is dying or the market over-saturated in some people's minds.

I really don't want to beat a dead horse here, so I'm going to respond to this and leave it here. Two 9.8s sold for significantly less in no small part because the geniuses behind these sales, whether the consignors, auction houses, or both, decided that there could be three 9.8s for auction at once at a time where the market is receding, and somehow, that was okay. You have to take circumstances like that into account when you look at prices realized. That's a liquidity issue. Do you really think three NM/NM+ AF 15s being auction off in the same week would each hit record highs? When you get to six figure+ pricing, there's inherent volatility because the pool of buyers is way, way smaller. Timing and poor strategy is enough to bungle sales for even the best and rarest books. You're also only looking at two 9.8 sales and ignoring the rest of the market, so you're cherry-picking data. Please find me examples of lower grade or mid-grade H181s dropping by 50-75%. What I can show you is an AF 15 that just sold on Heritage in mid-grade for about 50% under its peak. So again, you're cherry-picking your examples. Finally, you're not addressing my main point which is, yes there is a difference between books published between 1962 and 1974, and this difference is reflected in the fact that a mid-grade H181 is mid 4 figures, while a mid-grade AF 15 is in the mid-5 to low 6 figures. Is that not a big enough difference in price for you to signify the oh so exalted status of AF 15?

My only point is that AF 15 also had a huge spike. And it's also dropping right now in a way H181 actually isn't. Why is it okay for AF 15 to spike but not H181? If you find it unsettling that they both spiked, fine, I can understand that psychologically because I also found the last two years unsettling. But you seem to think the rules are different for AF 15 than they are for H181, and I'm not sure why you think that other than the census numbers, which you keep referencing. That's all I was responding to. I said nothing about long term investment, the health of the market or anything like that. I'm not cheerleading for books, nor am I suggesting people buy in, sell off, or anything in-between. I see no reason why AF 15 can't be compared to H181 as key books. A copy of AF 15 isn't the Gutenberg bible, it was published 11 years before Hulk 181 and there are less available. That difference in availability is why you have to pay roughly 10x more for an AF 15 than a H181 in comparable grades. That's all.

Right now, we know that 1) Hulk 181 is one of the most sought after books in the entire hobby; 2) entry level for a complete copy is at around $3K. Past prices and availability aren't relevant. Yes, I remember when mid-grades could be bought all day for $300; now they cost $5000. A NM was $2500, now it's close to $20K. Where are these hoards of copies? Is 20K for a near mint not enough incentive to at least submit the books? AF 15 in mid-grade was 5k; now it's 100K, or close to it. In a market where AF 15 in mid grade is a six figure book, Hulk 181 in mid grade at 5K makes sense. Arguably, these are the two most sought after books in the hobby; as such, the difference in availability of the Hulk 181 vs AF 15 is reflected in the price: 5K vs 100K in mid grades; in top grades, low six figures vs low seven figures. I'm bearish on the long-term future of this market and I'm no fan of rampant speculation driving dollar bin dreck. As a collector, I'm also not fond of the prices I have to pay for books now. But let's be logically consistent and not pick on books based on our individual collecting sensibilities. Old school collectors like rarity, but rarity is only one part of the equation. It's simply inconsistent to pick on books like Hulk 181 and ASM 300, when the difference in the supply of these books vs their early silver key counterparts is already reflected in the prices they command.

Exactly. A book priced as high as Hulk 181 is going to be slabbed; and for many copies, not just once. And considering that it's highly unlikely that every resubber is going to send the older label to CGC to update its census, the numbers are inflated anyway. Even putting that aside, there are just over 16,000 copies graded. 16,000 copies of one of the most popular books in the hobby.

What does this mean? Hulk 181 is currently $3K for a low grade copy, because the book is in tremendous demand. If the book were rarer but the current demand was the same, it would be much more expensive. You can call that speculative if you want, but it follows logically from where the book currently is. The market doesn't care about what any of us feel the book should be worth. Do you think AF 15 thrives on speculation? Do you think Wolverine is far behind Spider-Man in popularity?

The market has already taken supply into account; everyone knows how many Hulk 181s are out there. If the book was rarer, an entry level copy would be $30K, not $3K.

Devil's advocate: why is buying a book solely for cover art such a bad thing? That's mostly what golden age collecting is based on, outside of key books, and the SA is also filled with "classic covers" that command a premium. I'm asking this purely for conversation; I don't own any variants. Putting aside the economics of it, what's wrong with people buying solely for art, or specifically, cover art? Or collecting artists? There's lots of cognitive dissonance around this stuff. People will say b-b-b-but manufactured collectibles in the same hobby where almost every book of value is pressed and resubmitted multiple times to change the number on the label, and the "serious" vintage collectors decide what to buy based on those same numbers. It all comes down to the classic "what I collect is great, what you collect sucks" as well as what I'll call "vintage bias", where people arbitrarily distinguish between the authentic collectible and the inauthentic collectible by waxing nostalgic about some era where men were men, collectors collected, and kids walked 10 miles to school in the snow.

Cool, thanks man. My copy:

Sweet. I haven't seen many MJ copies. Do newsstand copies command a premium on this book? Mine is a newsstand, but I haven't really been paying attention.

Nice copy, and I would agree with you. But it's looking as though the market was overheated for most things, common and uncommon alike. The upside on this one is demography. The guys and gals who want this the most will keep the demand up for the next several years, even if it dips a little here or there. Beyond that, who knows?

I get your point, but this is part of the game. It always has been. There may not have been this much volatility 20 years ago, but there wasn't much of a short term potential upside either. If you're going to collect, you pay the going rate for the stuff you want and hope for the best; at the very least, your consolation should be getting to own a book you care about. We're in a bit of a correction now, and part of the correction involves scaring off buyers who are in it for a quick buck. If someone can't handle that their book has decreased in value less than a year after they bought it, then it's unlikely they were going to hang around long either way.