Next CLINK auction is starting to stack up some interesting pieces

[zhamlau]

I'm always amazed that people don't see the OA market in the right perspective.

 

Think about this, the stability of the market isn't defined by how the 50-100k+ piece are doing...that would be like saying "The housing market is doing great because Bill Gates and Larry Ellison both spent 100,000,000.00 on homes that cost a mere 90 million last year".

 

Good for them, and good for the guys who can drop 100k on a piece of art to hang on the wall...But those guys aren't "The Market" and what they do or don't spend their 53 pounds of gold on doesn't define the prices or the collector interest for most artworks or art collectors.

 

You want to see how healthy a market is, take a look at the values of items in the average collectors price range, the 5k and under crowd (if even that high). That's where you will see and continue to see how things are going. Those tens of thousands of sales a year are where our story is told, and by all accounts that story is summarized as such: "Full Speed Ahead"

 

Pieces that were selling for 1-300 a few years ago are going 500-2000 and have no shortage of suitors waiting to purchase them if someone decides to sell. We are seeing more and more CGC comic collectors (and collectors in general) waking up to the fact that comic art is infinitely more displayable and more personal. Its not just a mass produced comic anyone could have, its the artists love and craft for the art made real on 11x17 sheets of paper. Its owning the very soul of the comics we all love and collect (on some level anyway). As more and more people realize just how damn cool that is, they are coming up and taking 2-10 pieces each out of rotation from major collectors and dealers...those dealers are then attempting to re-acquire to keep their repeat buyers happy and well stocked. As such the long time collectors and part time dealers are getting their pieces acquired in this material continuum, which puts more money into willing collector/addicts hands which generally goes back into the market (and usually towards higher end pieces).

 

It's a sustainable model with a wide,diverse, and growing base that has a very well defined tiered system of product delivery. It's a healthy working capitalist market that isn't slowing down because the interest is growing a steady pace.

 

The real brain buster is this, prices likely will go up if the global economy tanks and scared money is looking for assets that hold value and aren't defined by things like the price of the dollar or futures.

 

Anyway, just my two cents. Been collecting this since 1985, and its gotten more and more fun every year.

[lhcomics]

 

We are seeing more and more CGC comic collectors (and collectors in general) waking up to the fact that comic art is infinitely more displayable and more personal.

 

[drewincanada]

A little late to the game...

 

Interesting that Colan's original pencils for the Howard the Duck Treasury Edition sold for $4667, while the Palmer lightboxed inks sold 2 years ago on Clink for $8209.

 

Palmer trumps Colan?

 

Lightboxed inks (which, now that the Colan pencils have shown up, it's now 100% certain those were) trump original pencils?

 

And there is still the question about whether the Palmer inks were the original lightboxed inks or a later recreation. Palmer is adamant that he did them as a recreation, but he may have had his motives for claiming that.

[Bronty]

I'm always amazed that people don't see the OA market in the right perspective.

 

Think about this, the stability of the market isn't defined by how the 50-100k+ piece are doing...that would be like saying "The housing market is doing great because Bill Gates and Larry Ellison both spent 100,000,000.00 on homes that cost a mere 90 million last year".

 

Good for them, and good for the guys who can drop 100k on a piece of art to hang on the wall...But those guys aren't "The Market" and what they do or don't spend their 53 pounds of gold on doesn't define the prices or the collector interest for most artworks or art collectors.

 

You want to see how healthy a market is, take a look at the values of items in the average collectors price range, the 5k and under crowd (if even that high). That's where you will see and continue to see how things are going. Those tens of thousands of sales a year are where our story is told, and by all accounts that story is summarized as such: "Full Speed Ahead"

.

 

Well.... I hear the logic in that, but at the same time I think that rightly or wrongly the guy that spends 100k on a page is part of what gives the little guy the confidence to spend 5k on that lesser page.

 

When a McSpidey cover sells for nearly 700k boy it makes 50k for an average one look cheap right? But when an average one sells for 30k, suddenly 50k looks expensive

 

At the end of the day IMO there are so many pieces trading for so much dough that I agree the market is healthy, but if there's no new records and a pause at the top well there is nothing wrong with that.

 

The McSpidey cover selling for a big loss has got nothing to do with the overall market at either the top or the bottom IMO. Its more about having been bought too recently for too much money, and selling at the end rather than the beginning of the wave of McSpideys to hit the auction block. Unfortunately IMO it was bought when the market was hungry for McSpidey and sold when the market was totally fatigued on eating $100k McSpidey sandwiches.

 

 

[drdroom]

Howard the Duck splash. This should go for at least $5k.

 

I would say that is extremely safe. If it does sell in that neighborhood, look for it on my CAF gallery!

[Kevn]

I'm always amazed that people don't see the OA market in the right perspective.

 

Think about this, the stability of the market isn't defined by how the 50-100k+ piece are doing...that would be like saying "The housing market is doing great because Bill Gates and Larry Ellison both spent 100,000,000.00 on homes that cost a mere 90 million last year".

 

Good for them, and good for the guys who can drop 100k on a piece of art to hang on the wall...But those guys aren't "The Market" and what they do or don't spend their 53 pounds of gold on doesn't define the prices or the collector interest for most artworks or art collectors.

 

You want to see how healthy a market is, take a look at the values of items in the average collectors price range, the 5k and under crowd (if even that high). That's where you will see and continue to see how things are going. Those tens of thousands of sales a year are where our story is told, and by all accounts that story is summarized as such: "Full Speed Ahead"

.

 

Well.... I hear the logic in that, but at the same time I think that rightly or wrongly the guy that spends 100k on a page is part of what gives the little guy the confidence to spend 5k on that lesser page.

 

When a McSpidey cover sells for nearly 700k boy it makes 50k for an average one look cheap right? But when an average one sells for 30k, suddenly 50k looks expensive

 

At the end of the day IMO there are so many pieces trading for so much dough that I agree the market is healthy, but if there's no new records and a pause at the top well there is nothing wrong with that.

 

The McSpidey cover selling for a big loss has got nothing to do with the overall market at either the top or the bottom IMO. Its more about having been bought too recently for too much money, and selling at the end rather than the beginning of the wave of McSpideys to hit the auction block. Unfortunately IMO it was bought when the market was hungry for McSpidey and sold when the market was totally fatigued on eating $100k McSpidey sandwiches.

 

 

I think you're both right. Savvy stock market investors have mostly figured out that trying to buy the next hot stock is a mug's game, and that index funds held for long periods are the best way to capture market gains. And savvy stock market investors accept that there WILL be corrections, and actually look at those corrections as times to buy, not sell (Warren Buffett has great advice in this area).

 

I look at the OA I bought back starting around 1980, and a few pieces have significantly outstripped the stock market, a lot of pieces have matched it, and a few have lagged (mostly pages that were 'hot' when I bought them). I think looking at the price of a single great page is like trading in a single stock -- it's potentially VERY volatile, and you can easily lose money over the short run. But if you amass a decent and diversified collection, and don't do rapid turnover (buy and hold, in stock market terms), then OA is probably a damned good investment. Certainly better than any other collectibles market I've dabbled in.

 

Speaking of which, I need to find a place to offload a bunch of the animation ephemera I'll collected...

[glendgold]

Howard the Duck splash. This should go for at least $5k.

 

I would say that is extremely safe. If it does sell in that neighborhood, look for it on my CAF gallery!

 

But it might sell for so much more if it were Palmer's lightboxed version.

[batman_fan]

Howard the Duck splash. This should go for at least $5k.

 

I would say that is extremely safe. If it does sell in that neighborhood, look for it on my CAF gallery!

 

5k will likely be my max bid so I fit goes higher than that I don't care. I will just take my ball and go home.

[delekkerste]

At the end of the day IMO there are so many pieces trading for so much dough that I agree the market is healthy, but if there's no new records and a pause at the top well there is nothing wrong with that.

 

I agree that the OA market is generally healthy - if by healthy you mean that the market has managed to consolidate at/near record price levels and absorb a ton of supply over the past 3 years without seeing a broad-based pullback. On the other hand, if by healthy people think the overall market is still rocketing ahead well into the double-digits annually and breaking records left and right like we were from, say, 2010-2013, I wouldn't agree with that assessment at all.

 

I bet a lot of people here think that prices have risen more than 15% annually the past couple of years. Really? Mathematically, that compounds out to prices having risen by almost a third (32.3%) during this time. Think that's what's actually happened? When I apply those numbers to my own purchases from a couple of years ago, let me assure you that, if I were in a selling mood, I'd be ecstatic to get that kind of return...because it's simply fantasy. I'm sure many purchases from that vintage (including my own) are not even ripe enough to get peoples' money out yet.

 

Thankfully, I have no want or need to sell, but, the same cannot be said for all the people who have recycled pieces bought in 2012/13 back at auction in 2014/15, largely at a loss. I can already hear the excuses of "they sold too soon!", but, really, if you can't get your money out, then these pieces are not really worth what people think, are they? I never could understand how people don't realize that the last sale does not set the value for all comps, and that, far from "the more you bid, the more it's worth", the reality is that you're going to take a new car-like depreciation hit from the loss of freshness as soon as you buy a piece in a public sale. In the past, the market was appreciating so quickly that you'd make up that depreciation in no time. But, for the most part, that's not happening anymore.

 

Prices seem high, because they are high; in fact, they're at/near record highs. No one is saying otherwise. And, after taking down the thousands of pieces of art that have hit the market over the past 3 years, those prices probably seem even higher because most people have less spare cash on hand these days after the OA buying frenzy of the past few years. And, I wouldn't be surprised if some priced-out collectors are moving down-market and saying, "wow, I can't believe how expensive these ____ pages are! I remember when you could buy them for $100 each back in the day and no one cared!", which just adds to the perception. But, make no mistake - the market has unquestionably slowed down over the past year, and prices are not appreciating anywhere near as fast as many/most people think. Most people are fixated on the absolute price level when they should be looking closer at the rate of change and the deceleration in such.

[Bronty]

Can't go up like a rocket forever. I was more surprised by the run up a couple years ago than I am by a pause now.

[Kevn]

I never could understand how people don't realize that the last sale does not set the value for all comps, and that, far from "the more you bid, the more it's worth", the reality is that you're going to take a new car-like depreciation hit from the loss of freshness as soon as you buy a piece in a public sale.

 

I don't think that's an accurate way to look at it. Cars used to depreciate as soon as you drove them off the lot for a variety of reasons that have little to do with art (and little to do with modern car sales, which come with long warranties and better build quality that has pretty much eliminated that immediate new-car depreciation, but that's another subject). That fact that another collector owned the piece I'm interested in has nothing to do with potential depreciation for a piece of art, unless I know that owner was likely to mistreat the art.

 

I think the big-number sales are special cases. Think of it this way: when a major piece of a certain type comes up for auction, it's likely that most, if not all, of the deep-pocketed, serious collectors of that type of art are aware of that auction. In most cases, at the end of the day it's likely just 2 of those collectors who push that piece to a lofty height: bidder A and the eventual buyer, bidder B. My impression, from having attended live auctions and run one myself, is that when something goes big, the last 15-30% of the bidding is usually just two people going toe to toe.

 

Hypothetically, lets say a nice cover of XYZ goes for a record high for that title/artist. The old record was $50k. The new record is $65k. At this record auction, all the bidders except A and B dropped out once it hit around $50k. Then, a year later, bidder B decides they need to sell. It goes to auction again. The overall market is up a bit, but like all markets it is far from a uniform rise, and not necessarily clear. And the market for title XYZ is slightly better than a year before, but of course that's even harder to quantify, because only one lesser cover, one decent splash, and a dozen panel pages have sold on the open market in that time. So if that record cover goes on the block now, in a slightly stronger market, what happens?

 

I think there are 3 possibilities:

 

(1) The same collectors are interested, sans B (the seller). Bidder A is still eager, and beats out the same competition from before, and scores the cover for a little above $50k. B was again willing to go to $65k, but there was no dance partner. It appears the market for XYZ has taken a hit, but it hasn't.

(2) A is still interested, and another deep-pocketed collector steps up, and they push the cover to around $65, where either Mr. A stays cool or shoves it to a new record. The market for XYZ appears overheated, but again, it's pretty much the same market as a year before.

(3) Bidder B has scratched his itch for XYZ with that lesser cover (for which he overpaid at $45k, the dope), and now both bidders A and B are out this round. In this case, either two new collectors get the fever, or the cover goes for about $50k or even less. The market really appears to have dropped, but again, it really hasn't changed much, except at the very highest level.

 

What I'm saying is the record sales for a given artist/title/etc. are special cases, and not indicative of the market as a whole. The volatility in these kinds of sales will be vastly higher, because the demand at this level is much less elastic. There may be only 2 potential bidders in all the world for that record sale at that moment, and if only one of them bows out, the market at that level will totally change.

 

The overall market goes up because most buyers see what they're buying as undervalued. That is, by definition, never the case for a record sale. That's why someone can make a good buy on a nice panel page for $8k (on a title where the record for a panel page is $30k) and resell that page a year later for $9k and no one blinks. Its a vastly bigger, more elastic market below the record levels. At least that's how it appears to me.

[vodou]

That's why someone can make a good buy on a nice panel page for $8k (on a title where the record for a panel page is $30k) and resell that page a year later for $9k and no one blinks. Its a vastly bigger, more elastic market below the record levels. At least that's how it appears to me.

Vastly bigger...? That I have a hard time with. There is a big demographic hurdle to get to that conclusion. Or another way of saying, how many more stepped up CGC garbage books can be churned to greater fools before that "vast" pool of liquidity dries up? After all the consensus (seems?) is that the new money coming into OA is primarily from comics. And that wealth, either realized or unrealized is not limitless. And gee-whiz, any softening in CGC ez money would surely have those same fresh energetic art buyers run right back to comics or simply hunker down, wouldn't it? Never underestimate how quickly things can fall apart and all retreat to safety.

 

What we do not have, imo, is organic growth in the hobby of those making $100k or more a year in salary at a regular ol' job. And that's what's needed to be regularly taking down playthings at $5k+ per. Stock market and CGC heroes have fortunes built on sand, easily as low tomorrow as they are high today. Weren't any of you around Fall 2008?? Beijing Olympics was like the last good that happened that year.

 

Dealers that aren't overleveraged and private collectors can afford to hold prices nominally at break even or higher, not taking a paper loss..(only losing against inflation), but the stale auctions tell the story, with reserves not met and lower highs, not to mention lower lows. Who knows? But we'll all live to find out, this isn't something that need wait ten years to get the answer too.

 

As for the example given, that $8k art can easily resell a year later for $7k (less commission) and again no one else blinks. But trust me - the consignor, he's vastly blinking the tears away

[delekkerste]

That fact that another collector owned the piece I'm interested in has nothing to do with potential depreciation for a piece of art, unless I know that owner was likely to mistreat the art.

 

My impression, from having attended live auctions and run one myself, is that when something goes big, the last 15-30% of the bidding is usually just two people going toe to toe.

 

It's very established that there is a freshness premium (or, at least a penalty/discount for pieces that change hands within a short period of time). And, in fact, your post provides a brilliant explanation as to why this is the case: the last X% of the bidding is usually just two people going toe to toe. So, the next time the piece comes around for auction, unless there are one or more new serious bidders in the mix, and/or something has fundamentally changed to make people want to bid more, the price is going to slide.

 

 

It appears the market for XYZ has taken a hit, but it hasn't.

 

The market for XYZ appears overheated, but again, it's pretty much the same market as a year before.

 

The market really appears to have dropped, but again, it really hasn't changed much, except at the very highest level.

 

I think this line of thinking is problematic, as there can almost never be a true loss of value - using your guidelines, any drop in value is just because the price was too high to begin with due to overzealous bidding by A and B and was never the real value. Which may sometimes be the case for outliers, but doesn't explain what happens when prices fall from realistic competitive levels, potentially involving spirited bidding from multiple bidders. Also, the vast majority of people see these sale data points and take them to be the new market value, or close to it (obviously not in all cases, but, generally speaking).

 

 

What I'm saying is the record sales for a given artist/title/etc. are special cases, and not indicative of the market as a whole.

 

I don't disagree with that, but I have been talking about the market as a whole - I bought more than 80 pieces last year, ranging from high two digits (yes, I bought a $100 page from a dealer with a 20% discount) to multiple 5 digits, as well as bidding on and tracking probably a couple thousand lots during the year (i.e., I'm looking at pages across the spectrum, not just looking at pieces like the ASM #317 cover; I also sold a good number of pages last year, mostly in the low-to- mid 4-figure range). And, the conclusion is inescapable: prices are generally consolidating at high levels, but are not bounding ahead like they were 2-3 years ago. And I'm far from the only one who has noticed this, though I may just be the most vocal about it.

 

 

The overall market goes up because most buyers see what they're buying as undervalued. That is, by definition, never the case for a record sale.

 

A record price does not necessarily connote overvaluation. Someone could easily pay $5K for an example when the previous high was $3K, because they strongly believe that it should be worth $10K.

 

Anyway, I think you make some excellent points, especially explaining the mechanism of how prices are set at auction (and, by logical inference, why price and value are often two very different things, something the vast majority of collectors don't take to heart). But, it's still not doing anything to disprove what open-minded people can see with their own eyes: the market hasn't done much over the past 12-18 months.

 

And, that's not necessarily a bad thing - as I said before, I think it's a good sign that the market has absorbed so much supply without a broad-based pullback. There's no need for people to invent phantom returns for the market to make it look better than it has been, when consolidating at these levels is a major victory in and of itself.

[Filter81]

At the end of the day IMO there are so many pieces trading for so much dough that I agree the market is healthy, but if there's no new records and a pause at the top well there is nothing wrong with that.

 

I agree that the OA market is generally healthy - if by healthy you mean that the market has managed to consolidate at/near record price levels and absorb a ton of supply over the past 3 years without seeing a broad-based pullback. On the other hand, if by healthy people think the overall market is still rocketing ahead well into the double-digits annually and breaking records left and right like we were from, say, 2010-2013, I wouldn't agree with that assessment at all.

 

I bet a lot of people here think that prices have risen more than 15% annually the past couple of years. Really? Mathematically, that compounds out to prices having risen by almost a third (32.3%) during this time. Think that's what's actually happened? When I apply those numbers to my own purchases from a couple of years ago, let me assure you that, if I were in a selling mood, I'd be ecstatic to get that kind of return...because it's simply fantasy. I'm sure many purchases from that vintage (including my own) are not even ripe enough to get peoples' money out yet.

 

 

I'm just curious, in your opinion does this apply to all genres/price ranges or is this assessment geared more towards the higher end of the market?

 

I'm a comic person who has just recently started buying some OA. (I've spent over $10k on a piece twice, my comfort zone is normally around $500-$2000 if it's something I really like. I don't really know what I'm doing with OA yet so I almost view it as "play" money, where I'm expecting its equally likely that I'll lose money, make money, or break even when I sell someday)

 

I generally have very little info to go off of when deciding how much to pay. (If I see something I really like I will ask someone more knowledgeable than me for advice, but usually I will just try to compare to the closest thing I can find in the HA archives) So far in the past 6 months or so I've gone after probably 6-7 pieces in an auction that had previously sold through HA between 2011-2013 and all of them sold for anywhere from 25%-100% higher than what they sold for originally.

 

I'm just wondering if there's a reason for this (i.e. my collecting focus is relatively narrow and the titles/artists I buy happen to be on an upswing right now, HA wasn't the place to realize top prices from 2011-2013, the price range I'm collecting in is not what's being discussed here etc) or if it's some sort of fluke that likely wouldn't be repeated with the next 6-7 pieces I look at.

 

I'm not questioning the correctness of anything being said so much as trying to learn from the experts with this question. In your opinion do you feel prices are flat only on the top end of the market or do you feel they are flattening out across all price levels?

*Nevermind. Most of this was just explained while I was typing this out!*

[NelsonAI]

I thought the auction house mantra was "the more we bid, the higher your price".

 

From my perspective, the low to mid market activity is from traditional comics only collectors now starting to dabble in OA.

 

The question is are they into OA for speculation or because they actually like collecting OA? That will help determine the overall health of the market going forward.

 

Using Deadpool as an example, has the speculation on NM 98 comic spilled over to OA where there is now a frenzy on Deadpool OA (Art Adams homage cover)?

 

Cheers!

N.

 

 

 

[Nexus]

I thought the auction house mantra was "the more we bid, the higher your price".

 

[Nexus]

ASM #317 cover sells for $81,000, 43.5% less than where it sold at Heritage ($143,400) 2 1/2 years ago (not including transaction/commission costs - at the standard 10%, that would be a 49.2% net decline).

 

If McSpidey #317 hadn't sold for $143K a couple of years ago, and this was the only contemporary sale, wouldn't $81K be seen as a win? Even relative to what other McSpidey covers have sold for?

 

I don't know who won it (and it wouldn't surprise me if we don't see this show up on CAF anytime soon, either) but given the circumstances of the first sale, it would be cool if the original consignor from 2 1/2 years ago was able to buy it back.

[rotembk]

I'm curious if the $4,100 price for the Alan Davis JLA: the Nail cover reflects the fact that apparently it's only a recreation rather than the actual published cover, which the item description says nothing about, or the book was just not popular enough (in which case the winner may still have an unpleasant surprise).

 

(and this not being the actual published cover is based on Mr. Davis' statement on his forums:

 

I’ve had a few enquiries in regard of the Nail TPB cover.

The original inked artwork was mislaid/lost or stolen and never returned to me or Mark Farmer. Because of a problem with the quality of artboard, I had traced the original pencils onto a more suitable paper stock and had retained the original pencils.

Some years later I traced a second copy from the pencils and Mark inked them. Mark and I both signed the ‘redo’. The original was never signed by me or Mark.

The original pencils survive as an un-inked spread.

Alan

)

 

[vodou]

I don't know who won it (and it wouldn't surprise me if we don't see this show up on CAF anytime soon, either) but given the circumstances of the first sale, it would be cool if the original consignor from 2 1/2 years ago was able to buy it back.

Had the chance last year to buy back a piece I sold two or three years ago for half. When I sold it, had mixed feelings but the offer was too good. Couldn't muster the enthusiasm for the re-buy though, even at 50% off.

 

I think you make a good point though, if you lop off the 600k cover and 'forget' the 145k this went for previously, 80k or whatever is much more than this would have gotten ten years ago. And it's very much real money, contemporary with better Miller Daredevils, et al. I really don't like McFarlane Spider-Man, but I do like this cover.

 

However, for anybody that's been watching gold and silver for the last five years...or any AAPL boom/crash of the last twenty-five years, every year a new set of excuses to go long appear accompanied by prices that seem considerably more attractive compared to recent prices or also if the higher numbers are ignored (so only comparing to the pre-peak numbers). Past performance really is not indicative of future results. Food and water aside, future demand is still very much a guessing game.

[DJRome]

I'm curious if the $4,100 price for the Alan Davis JLA: the Nail cover reflects the fact that apparently it's only a recreation rather than the actual published cover, which the item description says nothing about, or the book was just not popular enough (in which case the winner may still have an unpleasant surprise).

 

(and this not being the actual published cover is based on Mr. Davis' statement on his forums:

 

I’ve had a few enquiries in regard of the Nail TPB cover.

The original inked artwork was mislaid/lost or stolen and never returned to me or Mark Farmer. Because of a problem with the quality of artboard, I had traced the original pencils onto a more suitable paper stock and had retained the original pencils.

Some years later I traced a second copy from the pencils and Mark inked them. Mark and I both signed the ‘redo’. The original was never signed by me or Mark.

The original pencils survive as an un-inked spread.

Alan

)

 

I don't think the price reflected this info, as it was not publicly disclosed before the auction. If the winner is reading this, you just pooped on his weekend.

 

I almost bid on this cover, but was saving my muscle for some later lots. Now I'm glad that I didn't.