'98 Overstreet may be the key...

[valiantman]

Lou, do you think a 114% increase over 7 years is really indicative of a coming huge crash? That is well less than 15% annual compounded growth, which doesn`t exactly translate into "speculative bubble".

 

If anyone's wondering, it's about +11.5% annually.

[tth2]

overstreet did adjust a bunch of prices downward in 1998 for low/mid-grade books, so it's not like they always ignore the market

They also adjusted a lot of NM prices for a lot of SA books in the 1998/1999 time frame.

[the blob]

weren't those mostly adjusted up a bit? although i think some of the late 60s stuff like TTA may have dipped a little? i really can't remember.

[tth2]

weren't those mostly adjusted up a bit? although i think some of the late 60s stuff like TTA may have dipped a little? i really can't remember.

No, a lot went down, and not just the late-60s stuff, even early 60s SA. It was quite the seismic event. I don't think a lot of people appreciate just how depressed and bearish the market was just before CGC came on the scene.

[adamstrange]

weren't those mostly adjusted up a bit? although i think some of the late 60s stuff like TTA may have dipped a little? i really can't remember.

No, a lot went down, and not just the late-60s stuff, even early 60s SA. It was quite the seismic event. I don't think a lot of people appreciate just how depressed and bearish the market was just before CGC came on the scene.

 

I do. It was

[the blob]

"I don't think a lot of people appreciate just how depressed and bearish the market was just before CGC came on the scene."

 

many comic shop owners' unwillingness to part with more than 10% of guide for even high end silver age (because they didn't have much money due to new comic sales being down the toilet) perhaps made people realize these were lousy investments given lack of liquidity. seriously, if you were joe blow collector with a bunch of nice SA books, but not necessarily stuff that could go into a sothebys auction or put up on PCE, $75-$200 books let's say, what the heck could you do with them if you didn't want to rent a table at a show? ebay came along and gave us some liquidity while at the same time flooding the market. i like the liquidity given that doing shows was a lot of work and pain.

[Aces]

"I don't think a lot of people appreciate just how depressed and bearish the market was just before CGC came on the scene."

 

many comic shop owners' unwillingness to part with more than 10% of guide for even high end silver age (because they didn't have much money due to new comic sales being down the toilet) perhaps made people realize these were lousy investments given lack of liquidity. seriously, if you were joe blow collector with a bunch of nice SA books, but not necessarily stuff that could go into a sothebys auction or put up on PCE, $75-$200 books let's say, what the heck could you do with them if you didn't want to rent a table at a show? ebay came along and gave us some liquidity while at the same time flooding the market. i like the liquidity given that doing shows was a lot of work and pain.

 

Absolutely correct!

eBay was heaven sent for all those $50-$200 books that you couldn't get peanuts for if you weren't a mail order dealer.

[tth2]

"I don't think a lot of people appreciate just how depressed and bearish the market was just before CGC came on the scene."

 

many comic shop owners' unwillingness to part with more than 10% of guide for even high end silver age (because they didn't have much money due to new comic sales being down the toilet) perhaps made people realize these were lousy investments given lack of liquidity. seriously, if you were joe blow collector with a bunch of nice SA books, but not necessarily stuff that could go into a sothebys auction or put up on PCE, $75-$200 books let's say, what the heck could you do with them if you didn't want to rent a table at a show? ebay came along and gave us some liquidity while at the same time flooding the market. i like the liquidity given that doing shows was a lot of work and pain.

 

Absolutely correct!

eBay was heaven sent for all those $50-$200 books that you couldn't get peanuts for if you weren't a mail order dealer.

Yes, but in fact prices were plunging even after the advent of eBay. Not always, but a lot of times. But I agree that in real world terms, people were better off with eBay, because even if they couldn't sell at Guide or anything close to it, they could sell their books for a lot more than they could've to dealers or LCS's.

[the blob]

"Yes, but in fact prices were plunging even after the advent of eBay."

 

Ebay started taking off in 1999/2000 or so.

 

Not so sure about plunging, at least with older material. In the guide or in reality? I noticed at around that time I started to not be able to get the good haggled out deals at shows on good stuff because ebay was becoming a venue these guys could sell on.

 

How could the older material be plunging when people could sell it here in 1999 and 2000 and get good prices, even for lower and mid-grade material?

 

Sure, stuff like Valiants and some of the "hot" BA books (punisher app., deathlok, ghost rider, etc.) that were hot in the early 90s had cooled off because those series had been cancelled by 1999/2000, but that was a temporary blip until those characters became interesting again.

[tth2]

Ebay started taking off in 1999/2000 or so.

 

Not so sure about plunging, at least with older material. In the guide or in reality? I noticed at around that time I started to not be able to get the good haggled out deals at shows on good stuff because ebay was becoming a venue these guys could sell on.

 

How could the older material be plunging when people could sell it here in 1999 and 2000 and get good prices, even for lower and mid-grade material?

eBay was already being commonly used by late 1998, and was in full swing by 1999. I don't know how to answer your questions, except to say that SA prices in the Guide had declined and I was picking up lots of raw HG books, including keys, on and off ebay at very decent prices in the 1997-2000 time period.

[greggy]

Ebay started taking off in 1999/2000 or so.

 

Not so sure about plunging, at least with older material. In the guide or in reality? I noticed at around that time I started to not be able to get the good haggled out deals at shows on good stuff because ebay was becoming a venue these guys could sell on.

 

How could the older material be plunging when people could sell it here in 1999 and 2000 and get good prices, even for lower and mid-grade material?

eBay was already being commonly used by late 1998, and was in full swing by 1999. I don't know how to answer your questions, except to say that SA prices in the Guide had declined and I was picking up lots of raw HG books, including keys, on and off ebay at very decent prices in the 1997-2000 time period.

Not the Western Penn DD issues. I remember watching those auctions with the digital camera pics and thinking

[tth2]

Ebay started taking off in 1999/2000 or so.

 

Not so sure about plunging, at least with older material. In the guide or in reality? I noticed at around that time I started to not be able to get the good haggled out deals at shows on good stuff because ebay was becoming a venue these guys could sell on.

 

How could the older material be plunging when people could sell it here in 1999 and 2000 and get good prices, even for lower and mid-grade material?

eBay was already being commonly used by late 1998, and was in full swing by 1999. I don't know how to answer your questions, except to say that SA prices in the Guide had declined and I was picking up lots of raw HG books, including keys, on and off ebay at very decent prices in the 1997-2000 time period.

Not the Western Penn DD issues. I remember watching those auctions with the digital camera pics and thinking

I blame Mike Grissmer and AdamWarlock for the insane prices paid for those books! I'm pretty confident that the winner of those books did just fine in the end.

[the blob]

all i know is that every piece of junk comic i put up on ebay in 1999 -- none of which had scans -- sold at decent prices. sure, ebay was up in 1998, but i suspect comic sales were a tiny fraction of what they are today. i worked at a large law firm in NYC and we did not even get internet access on our desktop computers until early 1999 and I don't think we were too far before the technology curve in the country. i know that my friend who had a shop only started feeling lost sales to ebay in 1999.

 

anyway, we're splitting hairs on exactly when things started picking up. plus, i'm comparing prices on ebay to what I could cut at conventions in NYC where silver age has generally been cheaper than elsewhere (read chuck's blurb on mile high about this), what are you comparing them to?

 

anyway, i guess i'll have to go and dig up my OPGs from 1998, 1999 and 2000 to see where these prices were going in the guide.