Exposing FRAUD And DECEPTION - A Must Watch! 18 18

[wombat]

On 8/25/2021 at 12:15 PM, valiantman said:

The moment the value of the pop memorabilia drops to zero, you can either lose 100% now or you could lose 0.01%, if the fractional market existed.

 

This argument seems a bit odd to me. If you don't have the money to buy the book so you instead buy a fractional share, you had zero chance of losing the entire value of the book. In both examples you are losing 100% of what you put in if the value drops to zero. 

[Bronty]

On 8/25/2021 at 12:37 PM, wombat said:

This argument seems a bit odd to me. If you don't have the money to buy the book so you instead buy a fractional share, you had zero chance of losing the entire value of the book. In both examples you are losing 100% of what you put in if the value drops to zero. 

Fair point I think.   Only difference is scale.

[valiantman]

On 8/25/2021 at 11:37 AM, wombat said:

On 8/25/2021 at 11:15 AM, valiantman said:

The moment the value of the pop memorabilia drops to zero, you can either lose 100% now or you could lose 0.01%, if the fractional market existed.

 

This argument seems a bit odd to me. If you don't have the money to buy the book so you instead buy a fractional share, you had zero chance of losing the entire value of the book. In both examples you are losing 100% of what you put in if the value drops to zero. 

No, I'm saying that if you had $10,000 in "play money" and you put a little into pop memorabilia this, a little into oil painting that, a little into Babe Ruth something else, and a few dozen other things you think are interesting, and you don't tie up all the money in a single item, then the single item can go to zero and you either lose a fraction of your $10,000 (because it's also in fractions of dozens of other things), or you lose the whole $10,000.

I have a friend who "bragged" that she had some money in bitcoin, when it went from $40,000 to $60,000.  I asked her how much, and she said $50.  There's an emotional response to "choosing correctly" regardless of the dollar amount.  If you get to "play" 100 different times for the same price as buying one item outright and possibly losing it all in one fell swoop, people will enjoy the playing 100 times and winning a few.  The dollar amount is the same, but the risk is lower (per item) and the odds of being right at least a few times (and getting that endorphin/adrenaline rush) are very high, at least a few times.  

When it's "play money", you have to consider the emotional value associated with the time within the game, not just the final score.  People call a team "their team" when they have been to one game in the stadium.

They get excitement from that single "investment" a decade ago, when they sat in the stadium and cheered on their team.  They get $0 back from that.  They don't consider it money lost.  Buying a fraction of a big item is like paying to go to a museum, look at an item that isn't yours, and then turn to the person next to you and say, "That's mine!  Just $50 worth, but it's mine!  That one right there!" and your emotions don't make you smile 0.01%.  You get a whole smile out of it.  It can go to zero.  It was play money anyway.  Or, it could double and you cash out.  Whatever.

Edited August 25, 2021 by valiantman

[wombat]

On 8/25/2021 at 1:04 PM, valiantman said:

No, I'm saying that if you had $10,000 in "play money" and you put a little into pop memorabilia this, a little into oil painting that, a little into Babe Ruth something else, and a few dozen other things you think are interesting, and you don't tie up all the money in a single item, then the single item can go to zero and you either lose a fraction of your $10,000 (because it's also in fractions of dozens of other things), or you lose the whole $10,000.

Those other things could also lose money. And instead of spending $100 in a fractional share you could spend $100 on a comic worth $100. I just don't see how buying a fractional share of a comic somehow reducing your risk of losing money,. 

[valiantman]

On 8/25/2021 at 12:10 PM, wombat said:

On 8/25/2021 at 12:04 PM, valiantman said:

No, I'm saying that if you had $10,000 in "play money" and you put a little into pop memorabilia this, a little into oil painting that, a little into Babe Ruth something else, and a few dozen other things you think are interesting, and you don't tie up all the money in a single item, then the single item can go to zero and you either lose a fraction of your $10,000 (because it's also in fractions of dozens of other things), or you lose the whole $10,000.

Those other things could also lose money. And instead of spending $100 in a fractional share you could spend $100 on a comic worth $100. I just don't see how buying a fractional share of a comic somehow reducing your risk of losing money,. 

You've lost me now.  Spending $100 on anything can go to zero, what difference does it make if it's one item, one fraction, or ten thousand items for a penny each?  You need ten thousand losses to lose $100 or you need one loss to lose $100.  Odds are some of those ten thousand won't go to nothing.  You can't buy ten thousand items that matter for a penny each, but you could theoretically buy $10 fractions in ten different $100,000 items.  Or you can buy whatever the variant-of-the-week is for $100.  Yuck.  Sadly, that variant is the only "valid" option out of all these listed, according to what I'm seeing in these replies.

I'm not sure I can explain "don't put all your eggs in one basket" if that's what you're suggesting is the better idea.  Putting $100 into gold, silver, and platinum metal futures won't let you hold anything, but it probably beats $100 worth of chicken gizzards in the back of the car.  DESPITE the fact that chicken gizzards could meet a basic human need, while gold-that-you-can't-touch doesn't.  People choose the impractical all the time.  Why settle for what you can afford 100% of when 50% or 0.5% grows or shrinks at the same rate?

Edited August 25, 2021 by valiantman

[wombat]

I don't think anyone would argue against diversifying your investments. You just have no need for fractional shares of a comic to do that.

In the examples you have been giving you are basically saying if you put all of your money into one expensive comic vs. a much smaller amount in a fractional share that the expensive comic is much worse since you can lose a lot more. You appear to want to way oversimply what you are presenting to make it appear one option is clearly better. 

[Bronty]

On 8/25/2021 at 1:40 PM, wombat said:

I don't think anyone would argue against diversifying your investments. You just have no need for fractional shares of a comic to do that.

In the examples you have been giving you are basically saying if you put all of your money into one expensive comic vs. a much smaller amount in a fractional share that the expensive comic is much worse since you can lose a lot more. You appear to want to way oversimply what you are presenting to make it appear one option is clearly better. 

They aren't quite the same though either.   Having a slice of a key isn't the same proposition as having the entirety of a non-key or lesser key.

[Sweet Lou 14]

On 8/25/2021 at 12:29 PM, Bronty said:

Yeah, TMNT 1 is a good example.   9.8s were 20k just a very short time ago.   And now they are 250k?  SCAM!   SCAM!    FRAUD!  DECEPTION!!     

The obvious take away for anyone looking at rising prices in today's collectible markets should be that 80s and 90s material is very hot in general, and that this time frame is when interest starts to splinter off from comics into other things like games and MTG and pokemon and whatever else, because 90s kids, post the decline of the comics industry, were into other things.   Those other things are now hot.

It really doesn't take a genius.   We've been talking about this effect on the boards for a very long time.

Is there speculation in the game market?  Sure.  Also in comics, real estate, the stock market and almost any other market you care to name.

The video grasps at straws, and its incorrect literally 5-10 seconds in.    30k was not a record of any kind for a game sale in 2017.    And when your video starts off with a glaring mistake that any modest amount of research would have uncovered, you know its not going to get any better from there.

This half baked video is, I would guess, simply an attempt to get attention.   Twitter content, more followers, clicks, whatever.   Either that or he's just salty.    "Gamers" like Karl have been mad about "collector" prices since the very early days.    Guys like that would cry foul in 2002 (when things were incredibly cheap) that collectors took copies out of the marketplace for "real gamers."    That self serving BS, the idea that you're only entitled to appreciate a game if you can beat it in 20 minutes like Karl can, is definitely still alive.   

Look around guys.    I love comics, but comics haven't been read by the masses since about 1994, and nothing lasts forever.   We are 27 years out from 1994.      Is it really shocking that people are hobbying elsewhere?    20 years from now, when all of today's 55 year old comic collectors are 75, what's the health of the market look like then?    Who will be left to care about anything other than the most desirable comics?      Comics, as a hobby, have eroding demographics and in 20 years those demographics will be similar to stamp and coin demographics.    Games, pokemon, etc have better demographics.      You shouldn't be surprised to see pokemon cards and desirable games gaining strongly against most comics/coins/stamps.     

 

You make a lot of good and interesting points.  Full disclosure, I am one of those 50+ Silver/Bronze Age comic collectors.  I have very fond memories of video games (though I am of the Atari 2600 generation, not the Super Mario generation) and I am simply too old to have cared about Pokemon or Magic the Gathering, etc.  I don't have any interest in collecting video games, but I completely understand why others would go crazy for video games.  I don't think anyone was specifically comparing video games to comics, or lamenting that the interest in games is somehow depriving comics of oxygen, but I suppose it could go that way in the years to come.

You're dismissing the video as inaccurate and self-serving.  I will admit that when I watched it, I thought it was pretty compelling.  I'd rather not debate whether the video is actually breaking any news about the individuals it names, or if "everyone" does the things he's accusing those people of.  But since you seem to be very knowledgeable, I wanted to ask you about two very specific things that would make me very wary of entering the video game market.

First:  The video makes (what seems to me like) a strong argument that the video game market is sorely lacking in information (e.g. census data) that would help investors make informed decisions, and further that there are powerful individuals manipulating the market by maintaining an unequal access to that information.  If I thought certain people knew more than I did about the supply of a particular collectible, I would be very, very reluctant to buy in.  (To bring this back to TMNT #1 -- it's a legitimately rare item, especially as compared to other comics of its time, so I'm really not shocked by its growth in value.  But if a "rare" item isn't really rare, then look out.)

Second:  The video, and some of the comments on this thread, would seem to indicate that manipulation of the physical collectible itself is rampant and trivially easy to pull off.  If anyone can put new shrink wrap on an old box and it's indistinguishable from a genuine shrink-wrapped game, or if there's no way to confirm that the box really contains everything it's supposed to once it's in the slab, that's pretty scary.  Again, I'd have a hard time trusting in the claims made about the provenance of the collectible itself.

I would appreciate a thoughtful response on these questions.

[wombat]

On 8/25/2021 at 3:18 PM, Bronty said:

They aren't quite the same though either.   Having a slice of a key isn't the same proposition as having the entirety of a non-key or lesser key.

Sure. Not all assets are equal. Depends what kind of price point you are talking about. One 8K book vs. 8 1K books. Maybe they appreciate the same. Maybe not. $100 slice of a key vs. something else. who knows. 

But you also have the downside of the partial share in that you don't have direct control. 

[Bronty]

On 8/25/2021 at 3:44 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

You make a lot of good and interesting points.  Full disclosure, I am one of those 50+ Silver/Bronze Age comic collectors.  I have very fond memories of video games (though I am of the Atari 2600 generation, not the Super Mario generation) and I am simply too old to have cared about Pokemon or Magic the Gathering, etc.  I don't have any interest in collecting video games, but I completely understand why others would go crazy for video games.  I don't think anyone was specifically comparing video games to comics, or lamenting that the interest in games is somehow depriving comics of oxygen, but I suppose it could go that way in the years to come.

You're dismissing the video as inaccurate and self-serving.  I will admit that when I watched it, I thought it was pretty compelling.  I'd rather not debate whether the video is actually breaking any news about the individuals it names, or if "everyone" does the things he's accusing those people of.  But since you seem to be very knowledgeable, I wanted to ask you about two very specific things that would make me very wary of entering the video game market.

First:  The video makes (what seems to me like) a strong argument that the video game market is sorely lacking in information (e.g. census data) that would help investors make informed decisions, and further that there are powerful individuals manipulating the market by maintaining an unequal access to that information.  If I thought certain people knew more than I did about the supply of a particular collectible, I would be very, very reluctant to buy in.  (To bring this back to TMNT #1 -- it's a legitimately rare item, especially as compared to other comics of its time, so I'm really not shocked by its growth in value.  But if a "rare" item isn't really rare, then look out.)

Second:  The video, and some of the comments on this thread, would seem to indicate that manipulation of the physical collectible itself is rampant and trivially easy to pull off.  If anyone can put new shrink wrap on an old box and it's indistinguishable from a genuine shrink-wrapped game, or if there's no way to confirm that the box really contains everything it's supposed to once it's in the slab, that's pretty scary.  Again, I'd have a hard time trusting in the claims made about the provenance of the collectible itself.

I would appreciate a thoughtful response on these questions.

Good questions.

1) Census data would be great, but I'm not sure that people appreciate what that entails.   To this day, new variants are constantly being found.   Action Comics 78 for example, there's one print run and that's it.    Super Mario Bros, for example, they made a tiny change to the packaging every few months and so there are at least a dozen different kinds of Super Mario Bros that exist, because the title was commercially available for many years.    If I was putting out census data, I would want to have my understanding of variants locked down completely before releasing that.    But look, more to the point, all anyone has to do is ask a long term collector.    Many of these games, as census data will show, are incredibly difficult to find sealed and exist in incredibly small populations.    You had to pay $50 for something in 1987 and then not even open it at a time these were not collectibles?   Its an absurdly tall ask.     However, VGA (the grader that existed before wata, today put out a release suggesting they will be making census data available soon.   Wata's census may not be very robust yet, but VGA has been around 12 years, and if in 12 years they graded four copies of a game or of a specific variant of a game, particularly if its an in demand or valuable game, that's compelling evidence as to population.      I certainly don't think, however, that Wata is holding the information back in order to give anyone (whom?) an unfair advantage.   That's baloney IMO.    This is all supposed to be tied into their app, which was supposed to be released years ago... which they still haven't dealt with, I believe, because of a tsunami of submission volume that they just can't keep up with.

2) Actually (limiting my comments here to the sealed cardboard box games as the opened games and/or hard case games require a different explanation), physically manipulating the collectible is much, much, much harder than comics or cards.    Darn near impossible.   When you open up a cardboard box, there is a stress line created at the back hinge.    A tell tale mark.     Simply swinging the box open creates a color breaking crease at that spot, and under magnification, a sort of a tiny valley in the cardboard.    Its not hard to tell if a box is unopened or not.    And, if unopened, you can't manipulate the contents at all.   You can't press it, you can't color touch it, you can't trim it.    Its more or less completely unalterable, apart from cleaning the shrinkwrap, which is accepted as not a big deal since its not really part of the item itself.     In that sense, its nice in that there's a lot of built-in protection from the shenanigans comic collectors have had to deal with.    

Hard case games don't make those same sorts of tell tale marks when opened, so I've always been a little less comfortable there.   All you really have to go on is the shrinkwrap, the specific weight, perhaps an x-ray test which I believe they do in some cases.   Now each game uses a specific type of shrinkwrap sealed in a specific way so you still have a lot more to go on than you would think, but my collecting area has always been the cardboard box stuff, so I am not as sure about the hard case material.

Edited August 25, 2021 by Bronty

[southern cross]

I enjoyed listening to the video while having a beer at a pub next door to my local tulip shop, sorry meant comic book store 😂

[D2]

On 8/25/2021 at 12:29 PM, Bronty said:

20 years from now, when all of today's 55 year old comic collectors are 75, what's the health of the market look like then?    Who will be left to care about anything other than the most desirable comics?  

 

I make this comment frequently. I am glad I am not the only one that thinks of this.

Who will care about comics in 20 years from now?

Certainly not the generation of kids that I'm raising. They don't care nearly as much about comics as I did at their age.

Only the most desired books now, will be (potentially) desired in the future.

 

Kids now care about video games.

[valiantman]

On 8/25/2021 at 12:40 PM, wombat said:

I don't think anyone would argue against diversifying your investments. You just have no need for fractional shares of a comic to do that.

In the examples you have been giving you are basically saying if you put all of your money into one expensive comic vs. a much smaller amount in a fractional share that the expensive comic is much worse since you can lose a lot more. You appear to want to way oversimply what you are presenting to make it appear one option is clearly better. 

I posted something similar to this in a different topic, but it seems like it might work well here also...

Given that Issue #1 of a favorite title is completely unobtainable...

 

Consider two possible comic book collections:

Collection A) Issues #2 through #300 of a favorite title

-OR-

Collection B) Issues #2 through #300 of a favorite title, plus 1% ownership in a real #1 issue.

 

Can anyone honestly say they wouldn't choose Collection B, since ownership in #1 through #300 outright isn't an option?

[WolverineX]

On 8/25/2021 at 4:20 PM, D2 said:

 

I make this comment frequently. I am glad I am not the only one that thinks of this.

Who will care about comics in 20 years from now?

Certainly not the generation of kids that I'm raising. They don't care nearly as much about comics as I did at their age.

Only the most desired books now, will be (potentially) desired in the future.

 

Kids now care about video games.

True.. video games with no cartridges . Time to convert into yugioh cards

[MatterEaterLad]

[comicwiz]

On 8/25/2021 at 3:44 PM, Sweet Lou 14 said:

You make a lot of good and interesting points.  Full disclosure, I am one of those 50+ Silver/Bronze Age comic collectors.  I have very fond memories of video games (though I am of the Atari 2600 generation, not the Super Mario generation) and I am simply too old to have cared about Pokemon or Magic the Gathering, etc.  I don't have any interest in collecting video games, but I completely understand why others would go crazy for video games.  I don't think anyone was specifically comparing video games to comics, or lamenting that the interest in games is somehow depriving comics of oxygen, but I suppose it could go that way in the years to come.

You're dismissing the video as inaccurate and self-serving.  I will admit that when I watched it, I thought it was pretty compelling.  I'd rather not debate whether the video is actually breaking any news about the individuals it names, or if "everyone" does the things he's accusing those people of.  But since you seem to be very knowledgeable, I wanted to ask you about two very specific things that would make me very wary of entering the video game market.

First:  The video makes (what seems to me like) a strong argument that the video game market is sorely lacking in information (e.g. census data) that would help investors make informed decisions, and further that there are powerful individuals manipulating the market by maintaining an unequal access to that information.  If I thought certain people knew more than I did about the supply of a particular collectible, I would be very, very reluctant to buy in.  (To bring this back to TMNT #1 -- it's a legitimately rare item, especially as compared to other comics of its time, so I'm really not shocked by its growth in value.  But if a "rare" item isn't really rare, then look out.)

Second:  The video, and some of the comments on this thread, would seem to indicate that manipulation of the physical collectible itself is rampant and trivially easy to pull off.  If anyone can put new shrink wrap on an old box and it's indistinguishable from a genuine shrink-wrapped game, or if there's no way to confirm that the box really contains everything it's supposed to once it's in the slab, that's pretty scary.  Again, I'd have a hard time trusting in the claims made about the provenance of the collectible itself.

I would appreciate a thoughtful response on these questions.

I know you didn't ask me, but on your first question, I don't believe the lack of population data is as big a deal to me personally,  but I know it matters for others. A good example of this is what is happening in the sportscards market. Do you remember how the Impel Marvel cards suddenly went nuts? Well what had been happening at that point is a few PSA 9's and 10's sold for some crazy numbers, and suddenly everyone was out looking or sealed wax boxes to do box breaks in a hurried attempt to crack out a 9 or 10 - and if they managed to, they would pay their box off, with money left over. The problem sets in when the population reports began to come in, and at one point, they had 3000 1990 Marvel Universe cards submitted on their registry, 2000 of them were 10's. The Deadpool card went from selling for $4-$6K, to selling for $1-$2K as soon as word got out. When you cross-over into late 80's and early 90's video games, certain NES games were produced in very high numbers, so knowing what's been graded is understandable. However, there are contextual examples where all this information, plus more is available on the PSA site, and population data on certain cards should discourage people more, but for some reason it doesn't. It all comes down to what's happening in the market. When PSA suspended submissions, suddenly you had all these people part-way or even very near completing a set that didn't want to wait for PSA to resume grading, so they went out and bought what was out there, and probaby paid through the nose for it. That would probably be seen as a compulsive move, especially because when PSA gets caught up, the population data will be twice what it was before they suspended submissions on some cards, but that's one of the many reasons people may have been fine with overpaying, even if they knew there was a chance over the short-term, that card would drop slightly in value.

What the video exposes about the people involved in the company is thorough and compelling, to hear anyone say otherwise makes me question their motives. The investigative detail it goes into, showing people allegedly involved with WATA grading their own collection, providing evidence of their involvement/relationship, all while trying to overvalue and sell it, is exactly what it is alleges. Market manipulation.

Edited August 29, 2021 by comicwiz

[comicwiz]

On 8/25/2021 at 4:34 PM, MatterEaterLad said:

The "nothing to see here" comment was predictable. I noticed the traction it got a day ago, it's definitely made a rather compelling and convincing case for what's really been happening with WATA.

Edited August 25, 2021 by comicwiz

[Namtak]

So now that we know that collectibles are scam in prices,who wants to sell me an original 1938 action comics 1 for 10 $?

[Bronty]

On 8/25/2021 at 4:40 PM, comicwiz said:

 

What the video exposes about the people involved in the company is thorough and compelling, to hear anyone say otherwise makes me question their motives. The investigative detail it goes into, showing people involved with WATA grading their own collection, providing evidence of their involvement/relationship, all while and trying to overvalue and sell it, is exactly what it is. Market manipulation.

I for one question the motives of those ready to call fraud on markets they don't participate in and generally know nothing about.    Oftentimes its people salty they lost out.    Karl, who the published that video is a speedrunner.   Not sure what he collects but if he's speedrunning, its probably loose cartridges, maybe CIBs.    Guess what HASN'T gone up much?    loose cartridges, most CIBs...   

[valiantman]

On 8/25/2021 at 3:46 PM, Namtak said:

So now that we know that collectibles are scam in prices,who wants to sell me an original 1938 action comics 1 for 10 $?

Don't pay more than 10 cents.  Someone is artificially inflating the price if you pay more.