canickus

sign me up

room for one more?

On 11/1/2023 at 10:26 AM, KolmarAvenue said:

Has anyone tried to get the registry points updated for these?

They seem low, and some seem bananas low. Of course I say that after I've added a few books to my registry set! All the way up to #22 ranked set 30 Cent Marvels! Watch out @canickusI'm coming for that banner!

I am not as active on the boards as I used to be.  It is great to have more folks going after the set.  Let me know if you need any help - the variant mafia got me through the set!

i will try again - bombed out last time.

speaking of boom.  This was a good result on a Kid Colt 35 center.  They don't come up for auction much, so when they do - it is always fun.

On 1/25/2023 at 12:56 PM, fsumavila said:

Wow, a 9.4 and a 9.0?!! Amazing find, congratulations!!

Boom.

in, please.

31 minutes ago, silverseeker said:

I was wondering the same thing...I bid on a few books and was tracking a few others, and lost visibility to all of them as their auctions ended...

on the top of the search function - click the comics down arrow and go to sold.

13 hours ago, ProcessedMeatMan said:

I was very confused about that 129 result. Was it signed or Mark Jewelers or something? I tried looking it up again but can't find it. 

Here is the reason.  CGC doesn't differentiate between direct sales copies and news stand copies.  As you get later into the X-Men 94 -143 run, there are many more high grade copies of the direct sales version than the news stand copies.  

For example, if you search the Heritage archives for past sales of X-Men 129 CGC 9.8 - you will see 27 sales.  26 direct sale books and 1 news stand book.  That should give you an idea of the relative rarity.

There are 300 or so CGC 9.8s of that issue.  I don't know, but I think that at most 15 to 20 of those are news stand issues.  All in all, as strange as it seems, that was probably a pretty good transaction for both the seller and buyer.

3 minutes ago, MGsimba77 said:

Well yeah that 88k was an ace that's for sure if that's what happened. I'm sure the consignor will gladly take the money from the GXM but at the same time I bet they were hoping for a little better than 60k. The same applies to the 45k IH181 9.8 recently. 

I think you are right.  Since this was around a $20k book at the beginning of the year, I am certain that the consignor is happy.

3 hours ago, lou_fine said:

And yet at the same time, if you read the first line of the auction listing description above, it would appear that it is also no longer a $67,900 book where it was just a couple of short weeks ago.   

True that! It is like a lot of hot books right now in that it is hard to gauge the value and where prices will settle out.  Many of these will show a grow, plateau, grow, plateau cycle.  I am guessing that the book is $55,000 to $75,000 range right now - but that is just a guess.

1 hour ago, Dr. Love said:

Those digests were quite something.  $4K each for the Honeymoons.

I'm actually even more surprised at the My Love Life #7 6.5 for $802, flabbergasted at the First Romance #1 9.8 going for $2,050, and the Movie Love #8 9.0 going for $1,261 - that's beyond shocking.

I know compared to what's going on out there these numbers are chump change - but in my world...it's real money.

 

 

The First Romance 1 is a pretty special book.  CGC 9.8 1st edition with white pages, bright white cover and a File Copy from 1949.  The next highest graded is an 8.5 File Copy.

No pun intended but is is always nice to see Romance titles getting a little love...

Just had to use the go back machine to see what x-men prices have done over the last decade or so.  

An x-men 129 just sold for over $9000.  It was a nice one and a newstand copy which drove the price, I think.

Those were not great deals in 2008.  They were good normal deals.  Today, they would be unbelievable deals.

t appears that GS X-Men 1 is not a $20,000 book anymore...

8 hours ago, lou_fine said:

Especially since we were alrerady saying the $40,500 for the CL copy last month was already rather looney bin, what can we then say about this copy here for $67,900:    

https://www.comiclink.com/auctions/item.asp?back=%2FAUCTIONS%2FSEARCH.ASP%3Fwhere%3Dsell%26title%3Dgiant%20size%20x-men%201%26ItemType%3DCB%26CGC%3D%23Item_1468605&id=1468605&itemType=0

For $67,900 all I can say is what the heck is going on with that bottom left spine portion (i.e. Marvel Comics Group) or is that just a fugly crushed staple indentation there?     

This is a real nice Giant-Size X-Men 1 book, and I have looked at a lot of them.  Well centered (full Wolvie claws), and you can read the Title information on the side of the book because the front left black line is practiclally on the edge.  What is especially nice about this example is the bright white cover.  A lot of Giant-Size X-Men 1 books have a lot of cover bleed through (like picture below). but this is a full bright white cover - which I think is one reason for the high price.  The Comic Connect 9.8 currently in auction is also very attractive this way with no cover bleed through and it is already over 31k with a couple of weeks left before close.

Here is a pic of a typical cover showing the normal cover bleedthrough.

2 hours ago, batmiesta said:

This is bugging me, you put in the asking price and it was turned down? did you get in touch to find out why?

Called the number and left message but no response.  I think that the seller figured the market had moved and do not want to follow through on the sale. 

On 3/3/2021 at 10:42 AM, batmiesta said:

A copy of G/S Man-thing #1 in 9.8 has sat on the pedigree site for years with no takers at $650, after the Clink auction turned out the G/S frenzy it has been bought, lets see if it turns up in a month or two.

That book definately did NOT trade for $650.  Pedigree did not accept the bid even though it was at their full listing price. 

I don’t think I am unique but I like comic books AND money. 

One additional point to consider since you specifically asked about Giant-Size Super-Stars 1.  You see any CGC 9.6 or 9.8 copies available for sale?  I see two 9.0, one 8.5 and one 8.0.

The higher prices will chase some more out of collections, but they will be listed at a new higher price point.

- my two cents  

This is part of my point and what you are seeing across many asset classes including collectibles.  High(er) Inflation is coming, in fact, it is already here.  As a country, we have been printing money like crazy - this will show up in higher prices.  Bank on it.

We can gape in awe at the new price points - I remember thinking back in the day that a nice Star Wars 1 for $100 bucks was ridiculous.  I mean, it has a cover price of 30 cents, or 35 cents if you were unlucky (or lucky, as it turns out).  Today, I wish I had a long box of them in the closet.

Prices of collectibles always fluctuate, but my experience as a collector is "to buy the best that you understand."  You wouldn't have gone wrong buying a lot of nice books at GPA highs over the last 10 years.  Let me illustrate with Giant-Size X-Men 1 CGC 9.8.  Here are the high GPA prices for each of the last 10 years.  Each year the low GPA was significantly less but someone set the GPA high.  I would feel just fine if I was the purchaser of the high priced book each year and had them sitting in a box in the closet.  I would feel even better if I was the buyer at the GPA low of these books each year, but still... IMHO, it will be a lucky buyer who gets a GS X-Men 1 9.8 for less than $25,000 this year.  The buyer in 2019 who paid $13,800? The buyer paid $3700 more than the buyer who got the low GPA book, but I would give the buyer $15,000 on the spot.  And so would most people.  If you were a really good flipper and could buy at the GPA low each year and sell at the GPA high, you could do well, but I think it is easier to just be a long-term collector.  Buy it if you enjoy it and understand it.  

2011 $7500

2012 $5900

2013 $7500

2014 $7000

2015 $6718

2016 $8000

2017 $10,000

2018 $11,142

2019 $13,800

2020 $20,100

The other good thing about a free market is that high prices will chase out more books, IF they are available.  Just today, I see two Giant-Size Avengers 1 CGC 9.8s have been listed for $4400 and $4900 on Ebay.  Will they sell at this price?  I am certain that you won't see one listed for $1500 anywhere.  If it was, it has already been purchased.

I recommend reading "Inflation comes for the Profligate" by Alex J Pollack.  Here is one notable excerpt - 

"As has frequently been discussed, a notable inflation has already been running for some time—the inflation in asset prices. Monetary expansion, needing to go somewhere, has gone into the prices of equities, bonds, houses, gold, and Bitcoin. The “Everything Bubble” stoked by the Federal Reserve and the other principal central banks has taken asset prices to historically extreme, and in the case of Bitcoin, amazing, valuations. Financial history presents an essential recurring question: How much can the price of an asset change? It also provides the answer: More than you think."

I would add that there are several collectors actively collecting the Giant-Size run.  It is a really cool Bronze Age run headlined by a really important book.  9.8s don’t come along that often, the last sale of that book was in 2019, which was a different market.