Are prices still climbing or have they eased up a bit??? 43 43

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 2/3/2023 at 2:07 PM, Rob said:

I think these are the two thoughts behind the craziness we've seen since 2021.  Has the market changed forever, or is this a speculative bubble that will pass and things get back to normal?  I'm betting on the latter, but respect your opinion as well.  Time will tell.  I'm basing my assumption on what we've seen from other speculative bubbles (housing, silver in 1980, crypto).  My prediction is that in 5 years, all GPA historical charts will see this 2 year blip from '21-'23, then things went back to predictable after that.  We'll see.

There seem to be a bunch of different factors in the comics/collectibles market that make it different from other markets.  Some of those factors, I think, create a kind of built-in resistance for full market corrections (in other words, "getting back to normal" as you've described it above).  Not enough to stop a correction completely, but it seems to me enough to slow down the pace or severity of a correction.  Just off the top of my head:

• Trading volume on any particular asset is a tiny fraction of the volume in the stock market.  That means that data points are scant enough that it's harder to feel fully confident -- and therefore, harder to fully convince someone -- what FMV is for a particular asset.  If someone is holding a book they bought for $1,000, and you can show one or two recent sales at $750, they can (with at least some justification) say the jury is still out and more data would be needed before they will accept your $750 offer.
• No two assets are strictly identical.  (Well, maybe in the modern space you could say that all perfectly-centered 9.8 WPs are created equal, but generally every book is unique.)  So if you make an offer based on what you believe is a comp, the holder of the book can always say "well my copy is better" because of this or that defect in the comp you've chosen.  True or not, they can always rationalize that their copy is worth more than what the market seems to indicate.
• Directly related to the above:  Unlike, say, the stock market, people trading in comics are much (much much) more likely to have sentimental or or even "irrational" reasons for buying and holding a particular book.  Someone is much more likely to say "If I can't get $X for my book, I'll just hang onto it" than "If I can't get $X for my Coca-Cola shares, I'll just hang onto them."
• As many in this thread have pointed out, a lot of collectors buy their comics with money they consider to be discretionary.  When you're talking about the major investments in your life, the things that you consider directly tied to your retirement strategy and overall financial well-being, the stakes are higher and you're more likely to make the rational decision to cut your losses.  When talking about the "fun money" you used to buy comics, maybe you view that as something different altogether, and you don't feel any particular need to sell.  In other words, the stakes are lower and you may feel partial or full "immunity" to the market forces at play.
• There's an awful lot of pride that comes into play when it comes to selling a book at a loss.  Unless the owner of a book has an urgent need to sell -- see previous point for why this is generally not often the case -- they may feel that they just cannot bring themselves to sell a book for less than they paid for it.  I cannot tell you how many times I've made a fair offer for a book and I've been told "I can't sell for that, because I have [number greater than current FMV] invested in this book."
• The above is exacerbated further by the major conundrum sellers face:  the best way to get the highest price for your book is usually to sell through someone else's platform -- eBay, one of the big comics auction houses, or consignment through a reputable dealer.  Now you've got a seller who wants to make a profit even after the fees they will have to pay on their sale.  I've even had sellers (or the dealers representing them) tell me the taxes and shipping fees the book's owner paid when they bought the book, and try to use that as part of their argument that I need to pay more so they could at least "break even."  That is a complete disconnect from how markets work ... the market doesn't care what you paid to acquire and maintain your asset, only what the asset is worth now.
• And finally, whenever a transaction is the result of direct interpersonal negotiation (as opposed to a blind auction), that greatly amplifies all of the emotional factors above.  If you've ever negotiated the purchase or sale of a house through a broker, just imagine how much more difficult and emotionally charged it would be if the broker(s) weren't there to make the deal happen.  And yes, sometimes a dealer is there to broker a negotiation on a consigned book, and that can help, but emotions can still sometimes get in the way and a deal will fall apart.

Compound all of the above with the fact that many people are used to the last few years where the trend has gone up, up, up, and my feeling is that something needs to fully, dramatically "break" in the market for people to be disabused of some of these heavy biases.

And to be fair, let's recognize that some of these biases work on the buyer side to make these effects even greater:

• The lower the trading volume (highly correlated to census count), the more likely a buyer will be more aggressive.  This is more than just the usual supply / demand effect -- it is actually a "time is money" effect, because the buyer knows if they don't get this copy, it will cost them time and effort to find another.
• Buyers can assign sentimental / irrational value to a book they really "need," something they are unlikely to do for a stock.
• If they are using "fun money" to make their purchase and they have deep enough pockets, they may not be concerned about overpaying.  Essentially, they are treating $1 as something worth less than $1 because it's their "fun money."

I bet I could come up with some more, but I'll stop there!

Edited February 4, 2023 by Sweet Lou 14

[lou_fine]

On 2/3/2023 at 5:03 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

• As many in this thread have pointed out, a lot of collectors buy their comics with money they consider to be discretionary.  When you're talking about the major investments in your life, the things that you consider directly tied to your retirement strategy and overall financial well-being, the stakes are higher and you're more likely to make the rational decision to cut your losses.  When talking about the "fun money" you used to buy comics, maybe you view that as something different altogether, and you don't feel any particular need to sell.  In other words, the stakes are lower and you may feel partial or full "immunity" to the market forces at play.

Well, with the wild and rather crazy fluctuations that we have seen in the equity markets, all I can say is that I certainly would want to be caught in the situation where I had to directly and personally depend upon the stock market for my retirement.  It is much better to be retired and debt-free and in a situation whereby both your government pension and fully indexed company pension when combined gives you almost the same amount of money as you would have if you had continue to work.  

That way, you can use your "fun money" not only to buy your comics, but also to take a spin on the stock market roulette wheel.   

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 2/3/2023 at 8:43 PM, lou_fine said:

Well, with the wild and rather crazy fluctuations that we have seen in the equity markets, all I can say is that I certainly would want to be caught in the situation where I had to directly and personally depend upon the stock market for my retirement.  It is much better to be retired and debt-free and in a situation whereby both your government pension and fully indexed company pension when combined gives you almost the same amount of money as you would have if you had continue to work.  

That way, you can use your "fun money" not only to buy your comics, but also to take a spin on the stock market roulette wheel.   

That's a great place to be, of course.

Most people who are younger than retirement age these days don't have a "pension" -- if they are lucky, they have a 401(k) and/or 403(b) and/or some other flavor(s) of IRAs.  And if they are getting any kind of good advice, or simply picking certain mutual funds designed to adjust over time, there is no way their portfolio will be as aggressive (i.e., as vulnerable to market fluctuations) as they approach and pass retirement age.

But this is a digression ...

[lou_fine]

On 2/3/2023 at 5:57 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

That's a great place to be, of course.

Most people who are younger than retirement age these days don't have a "pension" -- if they are lucky, they have a 401(k) and/or 403(b) and/or some other flavor(s) of IRAs. 

Are you one of those "older people" who 's already thinking of retirement because I remember when I first started working?  All of us were complaining that the worse thing about our pay cheques was the large amount they was taking off every two weeks to fund our pension.    

Now, we finally understand that it is indeed an actual employee benefit and not the cost of working for the corporation that we used to think it was.  Yep, much better to be a retiree in this current high inflationary environment when your pension automatically increases by some 6% or 7% for this coming year because it's linked to the CPI.  Not so much if you are still working and locked into a 2% pay increase, or even worse yet, still frozen back at 2021 wages or earlier  because your union or company hasn't settled on a collective agreement contract yet.  

But like you said, we digress.............

[paperheart]

On 2/2/2023 at 11:51 AM, GrasshopperFF said:

Don’t wait too long to pick up an X-Men #1. I totally agree with your reasoning, mainly because I am also targeting X-Men #1. Like most boardies are saying: It is hard to predict the bottom. I don’t think I’m the only other looking to score an X-Men #1. We may regret not getting it at $10k now … Amazon’s stock was at $82 share 2 months ago. Now it’s over $110. Get what you can when you can and don’t look back!!

and it was $170 10 months ago

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 2/3/2023 at 9:44 PM, lou_fine said:

Are you one of those "older people" who 's already thinking of retirement because I remember when I first started working?  All of us were complaining that the worse thing about our pay cheques was the large amount they was taking off every two weeks to fund our pension.    

Now, we finally understand that it is indeed an actual employee benefit and not the cost of working for the corporation that we used to think it was.  Yep, much better to be a retiree in this current high inflationary environment when your pension automatically increases by some 6% or 7% for this coming year because it's linked to the CPI.  Not so much if you are still working and locked into a 2% pay increase, or even worse yet, still frozen back at 2021 wages or earlier  because your union or company hasn't settled on a collective agreement contract yet.  

But like you said, we digress.............

I'm not old enough to be an American who still spells it "cheques" ... 

Put another way, I'm a long way from retirement but of course I have a plan.  I don't think very many people still in the workplace today, at least not in the private sector, have anything like this CPI-linked pension you're describing, so I'm happy for you.

[GrasshopperFF]

On 2/3/2023 at 10:00 PM, paperheart said:

and it was $170 10 months ago

It sure was. And I bought it low and held it. Still very happy. I don’t like to compare stocks to comic books for the reasons stated in this thread. I tried because there are similarities. But the analogy is not really strong. 
 

I love this hobby. And I’m learning a lot from this thread. Thank you all for being genuine in your comments. I have learned to be patient about the blue chip books I want. And I have learned that rarity and age still matter. 
 

 

[Rob]

On 1/20/2023 at 11:09 PM, Rob said:

Some of us even predicted this drop.  The conversation below was about X-Men #1 in 2.0.  People called me crazy for thinking the price would drop.  It peaked over $10k, and this month the low was $6200.  I'm thinking we haven't seen the bottom yet.  (Same applies to all grades of this book.)

Just noticed that X-Men #1 in 2.0 continues to drop: $5520 on 1/30.  I've got my $3000 ready to go.  

[WolverineX]

On 2/3/2023 at 11:20 PM, Rob said:

Just noticed that X-Men #1 in 2.0 continues to drop: $5520 on 1/30.  I've got my $3000 ready to go.  

I hope so too.  The DC  stuff has been going crazy this past week.  Hopefully there isn't a hint of X-men or news of the new Wolverine being cast soon.  I know a Wolverine ps5 game is coming out soon.

[Rob]

On 2/3/2023 at 6:43 PM, lou_fine said:

Well, with the wild and rather crazy fluctuations that we have seen in the equity markets, all I can say is that I certainly would want to be caught in the situation where I had to directly and personally depend upon the stock market for my retirement.  It is much better to be retired and debt-free and in a situation whereby both your government pension and fully indexed company pension when combined gives you almost the same amount of money as you would have if you had continue to work.  

That way, you can use your "fun money" not only to buy your comics, but also to take a spin on the stock market roulette wheel.   

Thank you for the thorough response.  Loving the discussion about this.  Whereas I agree that you can't really compare the comics market to other markets, I do think there are similarities between this bubble and other bubbles.  That being, prices are driven up by speculators who join the market, driven by greed.  They're buyers who have no sentimental value to the purchases their making, but rather see them as investment commodities.  And when they see prices dropping, they get out and get into the next thing.  Granted, not 100% of the speculative buying were non-collectors, so I'm sure this correction has more of a sentiment factor than say a housing or stock market bubble, so the trip back to normal may take a little longer.  I just don't see any reason to think this isn't like any other bubble we've seen in history.

[Westy Steve]

On 2/3/2023 at 3:16 AM, lou_fine said:

Just a question for you with respect to your comment here...........are you talking about stocks or comic books here or are you talking about both?  

We’ll, I was talking about comics using stocks as an analogy, but I do think stocks are in the same situation. 

Edited February 4, 2023 by Westy Steve

[lou_fine]

On 2/3/2023 at 7:07 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

I'm not old enough to be an American who still spells it "cheques" ... 

Put another way, I'm a long way from retirement but of course I have a plan.  I don't think very many people still in the workplace today, at least not in the private sector, have anything like this CPI-linked pension you're describing, so I'm happy for you.

Still better to be young and alive and have a lot more time to enjoy life the way it was meant to be enjoyed.  

Yes, all good for now until the pension plan goes bankrupt and I have to sell off my Spawn 1, 80's B&W's, Valiant books, and some of my personal stock holdings like Enron and Nortel to fund my retirement.  

Glad to hear that you are still a long way from retirement, but yet already have your head screwed on properly to plan far ahead.  

[lou_fine]

On 2/3/2023 at 8:20 PM, Rob said:

Just noticed that X-Men #1 in 2.0 continues to drop: $5520 on 1/30.  I've got my $3000 ready to go.  

Yikes, this sounds bad as it's getting a whole lot closer to my purchase price point and I certainly wouldn't want to lose money on my old  beater copy here.   

Edited February 4, 2023 by lou_fine

[Microchip]

On 2/4/2023 at 12:03 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

 

• There's an awful lot of pride that comes into play when it comes to selling a book at a loss.  Unless the owner of a book has an urgent need to sell -- see previous point for why this is generally not often the case -- they may feel that they just cannot bring themselves to sell a book for less than they paid for it.  I cannot tell you how many times I've made a fair offer for a book and I've been told "I can't sell for that, because I have [number greater than current FMV] invested in this book."

I bet I could come up with some more, but I'll stop there!

You covered it, in several of your other points, but guys looking at selling at a 'perceived' loss will take a few years to unwind if the market continues too soften.  

I'm in the delicate process of talking down a guy selling his 9.8 copy of Thor God of Thunder #2 original asking price of $3,000 to $500 (newsstand copy).   The hype madness has subsided, and the rubbish film have gutted the value of the book.   The hyper market has cooled.   But expectation, and what could have been, are still warm loving thoughts in his mind.      

[lou_fine]

On 2/4/2023 at 2:50 PM, Microchip said:

You covered it, in several of your other points, but guys looking at selling at a 'perceived' loss will take a few years to unwind if the market continues too soften.  

I'm in the delicate process of talking down a guy selling his 9.8 copy of Thor God of Thunder #2 original asking price of $3,000 to $500 (newsstand copy).   The hype madness has subsided, and the rubbish film have gutted the value of the book.   The hyper market has cooled.   But expectation, and what could have been, are still warm loving thoughts in his mind.      

Well, never say never as there are some, pride notwithstanding, are still willing to give it a shot as evident by these 90 books and counting from the much heralded "Over Promise and Undelivered Collection" that's coming back out to market for their second go round in the upcoming Heritage March Signature Auction:  

https://comics.ha.com/c/search-results.zx?No=25&Nty=1&Ntk=SI_Titles-Desc&N=52+794+793+792+4294939359&Ntt=promise&limitTo=4294939359

No worry about possible loss of pride here, but let's hope they don't end up losing their shirt and pants as evident by my post from earlier this morning in another thread on the boards here:    

On 2/4/2023 at 11:25 AM, lou_fine said:

Well, let's hope it doesn't do a Terry-Toons 38 with the first Mighty Mouse which did not have such a mighty 1-year return at -72% as it dropped from $60K all the way down to only $16,800 or even a Saddle Justice 6 which dropped by some 69% as it fell off its $21K saddle and landed on the ground at only $6,600 on their second go round.    

 

What I find absolutely surprising is that in this day and age of rampant CPR being the supposed name of the game when it comes to certification today, that virtually nobody save a small handful from Ritter at Worldwide even dare to resubmit these books for regrading prior to sending them back to market a second time.  Or maybe not considering who the original submittor of all of these books for grading was.  

Edited February 5, 2023 by lou_fine

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 2/4/2023 at 5:50 PM, Microchip said:

You covered it, in several of your other points, but guys looking at selling at a 'perceived' loss will take a few years to unwind if the market continues too soften.  

I'm in the delicate process of talking down a guy selling his 9.8 copy of Thor God of Thunder #2 original asking price of $3,000 to $500 (newsstand copy).   The hype madness has subsided, and the rubbish film have gutted the value of the book.   The hyper market has cooled.   But expectation, and what could have been, are still warm loving thoughts in his mind.      

For a book like that I wonder if you should just wait a little longer ... look for a copy that was obviously (based on the CGC certification number) graded recently, so you know the seller's cost wasn't much more than the grading fees.  If you're dealing with someone who bought the book slabbed for way more than it's worth now, it will be like beating your head against a wall.

[THE_BEYONDER]

On 2/4/2023 at 8:26 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

look for a copy that was obviously (based on the CGC certification number) graded recently, so you know the seller's cost wasn't much more than the grading fees. 

[DC#]

Hulk #181 in 9.8 is seeing softer sales after a Fall/end of year surge.   There was a $125k sale on Pedigree in Oct, $146k (suscha news) on Clink in Oct, and a $100K in Dec on ComicLink - along with 2 Heritage sales of $96k and $90k in Nov.  

Past two sales came in at $69k (Heritage 1/12 - OW/W copy) and $66k (ComicConnect 2/1 White pages but bad wrap)

Edited February 6, 2023 by DC#

[FormerReader]

On 2/6/2023 at 3:45 PM, DC# said:

Hulk #181 in 9.8 is seeing softer sales after a Fall/end of year surge.   There was a $125k sale on Pedigree in Oct, $146k (suscha news) on Clink in Oct, and a $100K in Dec on ComicLink - along with 2 Heritage sales of $96k and $90k in Nov.  

Past two sales came in at $69k (Heritage 1/12 - OW/W copy) and $66k (ComicConnect 2/1 White pages but bad wrap)

Ouch or awesome, depending on if you’re the seller or buyer.

[lou_fine]

On 2/6/2023 at 12:45 PM, DC# said:

Hulk #181 in 9.8 is seeing softer sales after a Fall/end of year surge.   There was a $125k sale on Pedigree in Oct, $146k (suscha news) on Clink in Oct, and a $100K in Dec on ComicLink - along with 2 Heritage sales of $96k and $90k in Nov.  

Past two sales came in at $69k (Heritage 1/12 - OW/W copy) and $66k (ComicConnect 2/1 White pages but bad wrap)

 

On 2/6/2023 at 12:50 PM, FormerReader said:

Ouch or awesome, depending on if you’re the seller or buyer.

Ouch    or awesome    , depending on if you are a speculator who brought during the pandemic times or a longer term collector who brought back in the pre-pandemic times.