Is there a relation between Gold and Collectables (Comics)???

[mintcollector]

I should not answer this question directly because I think they are different forms of commodities; with little to no correlation. What I can say is as an antique collector and dealer I have seen it all. Currently I know of at least two dealers that have been taking a major loss because they were 'dumb' enough to take gold and silver as payment while offering extended payment plans on their items. In this situation all one has to do is wait for gold and silver to drop when buying; then wait for it to rise based on the spot price to make payments on their said items. I sure hope these dealers are learning very valuable lessons that exchanging hard volatile assets for other hard volatile assets is not working too well. Cash is still king in situations like these.

 

Just a view from the 'other side.'

 

Ironically, I got to see a 'newbie' offend a major dealer and seller of antique Tiffany Lamps and glass. This was worth the price of admission alone to the last antique show I attended. It is very interesting as to what kinds of people the current reality television shows are bringing out of of the 'woodwork.' Everyone is suddenly a dealer of something. Perhaps this is causing prices to rise? As I have said before the collectibles markert is very speculative right now. Be careful what you buy and what you pay. Long term not all these items are going to hold up well and comic books are very 'hot' right now as are toys, anything Star Wars related, and a lot of pop culture based collectibles.

 

 

[comicwiz]

Currently I know of at least two dealers that have been taking a major loss because they were 'dumb' enough to take gold and silver as payment while offering extended payment plans on their items

 

I was in this boat late last year, and the deal fell apart because the person felt I was undervaluing their trade offer. The reality is that I was pricing their offer at $1600 per oz, not factoring in the numismatic value (which was the buffer I was using in the event the market went below the valuation).

 

On paper, that trade would have meant taking a hit of about $2K in the current spot price dip if evaluating on spot price alone, but the numismatic value would still have me in the green.

 

However, were the trade to happen in the current market, I still would have won out over the long-term, and believe that by the end of the year, I would have made $8K on that deal.

 

For the sake of clarity, on the notion of taking gold/silver over cash being foolish, there is a big difference between taking trade from scrap, bullion, and/or coin bullion with numismatic value.

 

Buyers are still paying full spot + prices on the latter, with low-ballers offering in the range of $200-$400 below spot (pawn shops would surely go lower than $1K an oz based more on the fact that smelters would be paying $200 less per oz than what they were paying a few months ago).

 

If trade involved scrap on spot price, then I'd see it being more of a bath, especially if short-term gain was the goal and if offered on a payment plan.

[passion4comics]

Gold and Comics are two totally different entities. Gold is worldwide and considered a primary commodity. A person in a shed in Cambodia has a use for gold and no use for a Batman comic. 6-billion people will buy gold compared to a small group of comic collectors.

 

If gold goes up, the USD is weak. This is when I've tried to buy art overseas and their prices went from (example) 10k to 14k because of the exchange rates. Comics are really a USA collectable; not to exclude our welcome foreign comic collectors.

 

The interesting thing about gold since we went off the standard is it is a safe investment to maintain your savings. 100$ of gold maintains its buying power. While keeping that same 100$ in USD will buy you less and less as years go by. I've had in dept discussions with analyst at my old job for a Brokerage and they have said that Gold should be at $5000-$6000 and it's being artificially deflated so we can maintain our purchasing power with other countries; specifically China. China has bought tons and tons of USD to maintain its strength. Also, oil in the mercantile requires USD which creates more of a demand. If China dumped its USD the entire country would be in turmoil. People will be trying to buy gold at record rates. I doubt anyone would be looking at comics as an investment. In the late 90's Iran was planning to open its own mercantile to trade oil in Euros. That would have also decimated the USD.

 

Gold or comics. GOLD. Then you have to think about what makes you happy? If you have ten gold eagles so what. Do you look at them. Do you think about the first time you picked it up. Apples and oranges. Comics as an investment? Bronze era comics have dumped like a brick over the last 4 years. Gold has went up. On GPA I see just more comics in a free fall than are going up. One is an investment, the other is a volatile hobby.

[ComicConnoisseur]

I should not answer this question directly because I think they are different forms of commodities; with little to no correlation. What I can say is as an antique collector and dealer I have seen it all. Currently I know of at least two dealers that have been taking a major loss because they were 'dumb' enough to take gold and silver as payment while offering extended payment plans on their items. In this situation all one has to do is wait for gold and silver to drop when buying; then wait for it to rise based on the spot price to make payments on their said items. I sure hope these dealers are learning very valuable lessons that exchanging hard volatile assets for other hard volatile assets is not working too well. Cash is still king in situations like these.

 

Just a view from the 'other side.'

 

Ironically, I got to see a 'newbie' offend a major dealer and seller of antique Tiffany Lamps and glass. This was worth the price of admission alone to the last antique show I attended. It is very interesting as to what kinds of people the current reality television shows are bringing out of of the 'woodwork.' Everyone is suddenly a dealer of something. Perhaps this is causing prices to rise? As I have said before the collectibles markert is very speculative right now. Be careful what you buy and what you pay. Long term not all these items are going to hold up well and comic books are very 'hot' right now as are toys, anything Star Wars related, and a lot of pop culture based collectibles.

 

I have noticed that Star Wars 12 backs are picking up steam. (thumbs u

[comicwiz]

I should not answer this question directly because I think they are different forms of commodities; with little to no correlation. What I can say is as an antique collector and dealer I have seen it all. Currently I know of at least two dealers that have been taking a major loss because they were 'dumb' enough to take gold and silver as payment while offering extended payment plans on their items. In this situation all one has to do is wait for gold and silver to drop when buying; then wait for it to rise based on the spot price to make payments on their said items. I sure hope these dealers are learning very valuable lessons that exchanging hard volatile assets for other hard volatile assets is not working too well. Cash is still king in situations like these.

 

Just a view from the 'other side.'

 

Ironically, I got to see a 'newbie' offend a major dealer and seller of antique Tiffany Lamps and glass. This was worth the price of admission alone to the last antique show I attended. It is very interesting as to what kinds of people the current reality television shows are bringing out of of the 'woodwork.' Everyone is suddenly a dealer of something. Perhaps this is causing prices to rise? As I have said before the collectibles markert is very speculative right now. Be careful what you buy and what you pay. Long term not all these items are going to hold up well and comic books are very 'hot' right now as are toys, anything Star Wars related, and a lot of pop culture based collectibles.

 

I have noticed that Star Wars 12 backs are picking up steam. (thumbs u

 

12 Backs have been going strong since late last year, with "A" letter variations performing strongest. However, this isn't exclusive to 12 Backs as there are a number of areas of the Star Wars production toys hobby that are performing with historically unprecedented growth, and others which are trending down.

[delekkerste]

Comics as an investment? Bronze era comics have dumped like a brick over the last 4 years. Gold has went up. On GPA I see just more comics in a free fall than are going up. One is an investment, the other is a volatile hobby.

 

It's not just Bronze era comics that have dumped like a brick, and Silver Age Marvel keys certainly haven't all held their value (50-70% declines in Avengers #4 9.6, anyone?) I would wager that most comics are on the wrong side of peak pricing at this point - it's 2013, I'm surprised so many people haven't figured that out yet. You know who has figured it out? The big money auction houses, who are now devoting more and more energy towards original comic art instead, because they know that most comics have seen their best days.

 

Anyway, there's a lot of myths that comics and collectibles are counter-cyclical investments, probably from the fact (?) that circulation volumes picked up during recessionary periods as people looked for cheap entertainment. That says nothing about the resale value of "investment grade" comics, however. The fact is, stocks, gold, art and collectibles have all, for the most part, reflated together since early 2009 (recent stumbles notwithstanding). That is because it is not an "either/or" decision as some of you are framing it - "the economy's getting better so I'll buy stocks instead of comics".

 

I know I'm painting things with a broad brush, but everything is basically the same market. Every asset class is priced off of currently abundant liquidity and low interest rates. Stocks have gone up the past 4 years. Gold has gone up the past 4 years (though it's down the past 18 months). Bonds have gone up the past 4 years. Real estate has turned up the past year or two because it had its own issues to work out before that. Comic art has gone up the past 4 years. Comics have had a mixed performance, but, again, it was due to some hobby-level specifics. Basically, everything has been riding the same wave of reflation and recovery. So, if I see things start to fall off the wave, no matter how allegedly different, say, comics and gold are, that makes me concerned.

[comicwiz]

So, if I see things start to fall off the wave, no matter how allegedly different, say, comics and gold are, that makes me concerned.

 

What's interesting to me is the appearance of things starting to unravel. This actually may be an oversimplification of the fact that person-to-person trading has choked-up people's abilities to liquidate in a seamless and straightforward manner. Taxation on PayPal is one of the many facets that may have tripped-up people's plans to cash out on even keel or better, but that would also be understating the more complex issues with PayPal being used as an instrument for the inherently evil to perpetrate fraud and scams.

 

I've done two shows in the space of two months. If anything, I've seen 80's toys and comics performing extremely well. So well in fact, that dealers worrying over pop culture holdings (either because they are too old for 30 and 40 somethings to relate to, or too new for people to care) and have fallen out of favour with active buyers, are flocking to comics and vintage Star Wars in ways I've not seen in previous years when I did these same shows. So I believe real-time, in-person buying will always be difficult to model unless those people report their activities publicly, and really deserves its own discussion when speaking about things starting to fall off, especially when compared to the apprehension sellers are facing with the minefield selling their goods online has become.

[ComicConnoisseur]

I should not answer this question directly because I think they are different forms of commodities; with little to no correlation. What I can say is as an antique collector and dealer I have seen it all. Currently I know of at least two dealers that have been taking a major loss because they were 'dumb' enough to take gold and silver as payment while offering extended payment plans on their items. In this situation all one has to do is wait for gold and silver to drop when buying; then wait for it to rise based on the spot price to make payments on their said items. I sure hope these dealers are learning very valuable lessons that exchanging hard volatile assets for other hard volatile assets is not working too well. Cash is still king in situations like these.

 

Just a view from the 'other side.'

 

Ironically, I got to see a 'newbie' offend a major dealer and seller of antique Tiffany Lamps and glass. This was worth the price of admission alone to the last antique show I attended. It is very interesting as to what kinds of people the current reality television shows are bringing out of of the 'woodwork.' Everyone is suddenly a dealer of something. Perhaps this is causing prices to rise? As I have said before the collectibles markert is very speculative right now. Be careful what you buy and what you pay. Long term not all these items are going to hold up well and comic books are very 'hot' right now as are toys, anything Star Wars related, and a lot of pop culture based collectibles.

 

I have noticed that Star Wars 12 backs are picking up steam. (thumbs u

 

12 Backs have been going strong since late last year, with "A" letter variations performing strongest. However, this isn't exclusive to 12 Backs as there are a number of areas of the Star Wars production toys hobby that are performing with historically unprecedented growth, and others which are trending down.

Would you say this is just the 1977 to 1985 Star Wars stuff or are we seeing anything post 1999 heating up?

[comicwiz]

I should not answer this question directly because I think they are different forms of commodities; with little to no correlation. What I can say is as an antique collector and dealer I have seen it all. Currently I know of at least two dealers that have been taking a major loss because they were 'dumb' enough to take gold and silver as payment while offering extended payment plans on their items. In this situation all one has to do is wait for gold and silver to drop when buying; then wait for it to rise based on the spot price to make payments on their said items. I sure hope these dealers are learning very valuable lessons that exchanging hard volatile assets for other hard volatile assets is not working too well. Cash is still king in situations like these.

 

Just a view from the 'other side.'

 

Ironically, I got to see a 'newbie' offend a major dealer and seller of antique Tiffany Lamps and glass. This was worth the price of admission alone to the last antique show I attended. It is very interesting as to what kinds of people the current reality television shows are bringing out of of the 'woodwork.' Everyone is suddenly a dealer of something. Perhaps this is causing prices to rise? As I have said before the collectibles markert is very speculative right now. Be careful what you buy and what you pay. Long term not all these items are going to hold up well and comic books are very 'hot' right now as are toys, anything Star Wars related, and a lot of pop culture based collectibles.

 

I have noticed that Star Wars 12 backs are picking up steam. (thumbs u

 

12 Backs have been going strong since late last year, with "A" letter variations performing strongest. However, this isn't exclusive to 12 Backs as there are a number of areas of the Star Wars production toys hobby that are performing with historically unprecedented growth, and others which are trending down.

Would you say this is just the 1977 to 1985 Star Wars stuff or are we seeing anything post 1999 heating up?

 

I personally have not looked into anything post 85'. More specifically, I've steered clear of anything post ESB due to severe degradation issues and changes to material sourcing for packaging.

 

I'm glad I sold my Hulk 181 9.4 a few years back and laterally moved into a few pieces which have now doubled in value. Albeit hot at the moment, the value on a 9.4 Hulk 181 hasn't appreciated, and if anything, I've seen them sell for less in the space of several years, including in 9.6 and 9.8 grades.

 

Funny thing is that when I first got back into Star Wars (2010), I passed a number of people who were on their way out, and I guess the thinking then was the hobby had already had its last hurrah.