June 2023 Heritage Signature Auction #7340 4 4

[Michael Browning]

On 6/24/2023 at 4:19 PM, KirbyCollector said:

You live in that world... the world where the rich think they are gods and leverage themselves to the hilt at every chance in the unending competition to have more than the next guy. Do you feel sorry for them when they fail to display any common sense and blow their accounts up? Why is this any different?

No matter how rich people are -- and how much richer they are than me -- I don't ever revel in someone else's loss/pain. 

[KirbyCollector]

On 6/24/2023 at 4:34 PM, Michael Browning said:

No matter how rich people are -- and how much richer they are than me -- I don't ever revel in someone else's loss/pain. 

I don't revel in it but I don't like the inference we should sympathize with the reckless wealthy. A working guy who sells a piece for a 60% loss because he has to replace the transmission on his only car, that person I feel for. Someone who loses $90,000 on a page -- with the consequence being he won't be able to get one of the first five new Aventadors shipped to the US, God forbid, he will have to settle for #6 -- I can't feel sorry for that guy.

Edited June 24, 2023 by KirbyCollector

[RICKYBOBBY]

On 6/24/2023 at 11:22 AM, Kryptic1 said:

Wait, someone actually paid that price?  For a panel page with no action?  And thought it was such a good price they could immediately flip it for a profit after fees?

No one paid the 150k. That was the consignors original listing on CAF asking that price. Didn’t sell of course and then auctioned it.

Don’t know what he paid to obtain it however looking in the HA archives, this page did very well when comparing previous sales.

[Nexus]

On 6/24/2023 at 9:59 AM, delekkerste said:

You can say it's their fault for re-selling so soon or paying so much in the first place...

Yes. You can.

[delekkerste]

On 6/24/2023 at 3:55 PM, alxjhnsn said:

Or perhaps ran into financial problems. Still, that's a huge drop.

On 6/24/2023 at 4:19 PM, KirbyCollector said:

You live in that world... the world where the rich think they are gods and leverage themselves to the hilt at every chance in the unending competition to have more than the next guy. Do you feel sorry for them when they fail to display any common sense and blow their accounts up? Why is this any different?

I don't want to speak out of turn, but, since this is a semi-public situation (the consignor had tried to sell some art on CAF recently and explained his reasons at that time), I'll try to put some pieces together and speak in very broad strokes. 

I know both the former owner of the DD #169 page and the guy who bought it from him. I don't remember when the deal went down, but, I think it was 2020 or 2021. The buyer really, really wanted a Miller Daredevil Elektra page and made super-strong offers to myself and others who have these pages. It's a testament to how much people love this artwork, because if you heard the offers that were made, many/most would think that we were crazy for not selling - I mean, we're talking like 4x the prices that were prevailing just a couple years earlier (I know this, because I actually sold a couple of DD #168 Elektra pages at that time ).

Anyway, from what I gather, the DD #169 page - which is a perfectly good page at a price - was the only one that the buyer could extract from the collecting community even making these mega-offers. I'm sure that he had no illusions about flipping this for a profit; from the above listing someone posted, I suspect he was just trying to get his money out when he listed it on CAF earlier this year. Which, he stated at the time, was because he (and his girlfriend/fiancee IIRC?) needed to raise money quickly for a home purchase. 

I could be wrong, but, my impression is that this was a young guy who tied up too much money in art and got wrong-footed when life circumstances changed. I don't think he planned to have to sell when he did and it came back to bite him when he had to. There was surely a lack of foresight, but, I don't think that makes him a bad guy or comparable to people who blow themselves up chasing a quick buck in, say, finance or real estate. I sincerely hope that the losses haven't derailed his home buying plans or soured him on the hobby.  

Edited June 24, 2023 by delekkerste

[Bronty]

On 6/24/2023 at 3:48 PM, comix4fun said:

Not all Lee is created equal. The peak Lee is Lee/Williams on X-men. 
The 248 page that sold yesterday was Lee/Green. The 248 cover is Lee/Green and is lacking what people are looking for in a Lee X-men premiere go to the mattresses at auction piece (Hint: "Snikt"). Also the $360,000 page is from an arc everyone who collects or read this stuff remembers: Xtinction Agenda.  I like Colossus a lot, and Havok is ok, but it's not this : 

This page is several times more desirable to Lee X-men collectors than that Lee/Green cover, for all the reasons people collect comic art, the characters, composition, and credits matter.

 

This is a page people fight to the death over, and they did looking at that auction result. If you want a cover that's a comp to this page I'd look at 268 and not 248. 
The 268 cover sold 2 years before the 271 page above for $300,000 and would likely be dramatically more today. That cover and this page are leagues ahead of another Lee cover that didn't have Williams inks or Wolverine, Psylocke or Jubilee, etc on it. 

I'm sure you know the area better than I do so I will take most of what you say at face value.

Its still three hundred and fukking sixty thousand for a half splash interior.   That's bonkers.    
 

And more to the point, regardless of what it is or isn’t comparable to, 360k feels pretty squishy today, no?    To my eyes it does, along with the six figure deathblow (who?) data point and some of the other Covid era Lee results,  but as I’ve said more than once, not my sandbox.

Edited June 24, 2023 by Bronty

[Bronty]

On 6/24/2023 at 5:41 PM, delekkerste said:

I don't want to speak out of turn, but, since this is a semi-public situation (the consignor had tried to sell some art on CAF recently and explained his reasons at that time), I'll try to put some pieces together and speak in very broad strokes. 

I know both the former owner of the DD #169 page and the guy who bought it from him. I don't remember when the deal went down, but, I think it was 2020 or 2021. The buyer really, really wanted a Miller Daredevil Elektra page and made super-strong offers to myself and others who have these pages. It's a testament to how much people love this artwork, because if you heard the offers that were made, many/most would think that we were crazy for not selling - I mean, we're talking like 4x the prices that were prevailing just a couple years earlier (I know this, because I actually sold a couple of DD #168 Elektra pages at that time ).

Anyway, from what I gather, the DD #169 page - which is a perfectly good page at a price - was the only one that the buyer could extract from the collecting community even making these mega-offers. I'm sure that he had no illusions about flipping this for a profit; from the above listing someone posted, I suspect he was just trying to get his money out when he listed it on CAF earlier this year. Which, he stated at the time, was because he (and his girlfriend/fiancee IIRC?) needed to raise money quickly for a home purchase. 

I could be wrong, but, my impression is that this was a young guy who tied up too much money in art and got wrong-footed when life circumstances changed. I don't think he planned to have to sell when he did and it came back to bite him when he had to. There was surely a lack of foresight, but, I don't think that makes him a bad guy or comparable to people who blow themselves up chasing a quick buck in, say, finance or real estate. I sincerely hope that the losses haven't derailed his home buying plans or soured him on the hobby.  

That really sucks.   I know of a collector in a similar situation in games - over spent a ton, got engaged, suddenly needed cash out at the worst possible time.   Unfortunate and has to leave a sour taste for these guys but they also did it to themselves in a way, unfortunately. 

[Michael Browning]

On 6/24/2023 at 6:09 PM, Bronty said:

That really sucks.   I know of a collector in a similar situation in games - over spent a ton, got engaged, suddenly needed cash out at the worst possible time.   Unfortunate and has to leave a sour taste for these guys but they also did it to themselves in a way, unfortunately. 

I think that happens a lot more often than we see in such a public way as the DD #169 page.

[Bronty]

On 6/24/2023 at 6:14 PM, Michael Browning said:

I think that happens a lot more often than we see in such a public way as the DD #169 page.

Agreed.    The six figure examples are the ones that we can’t help but see but I’m sure it happens at many different price points. 

[comix4fun]

On 6/24/2023 at 4:52 PM, Bronty said:

I'm sure you know the area better than I do so I will take most of what you say at face value.

Its still three hundred and fukking sixty thousand for a half splash interior.   That's bonkers.    
 

And more to the point, regardless of what it is or isn’t comparable to, 360k feels pretty squishy today, no?    To my eyes it does, along with the six figure deathblow (who?) data point and some of the other Covid era Lee results,  but as I’ve said more than once, not my sandbox.

Anything that went down in blood-sport live bidding would likely resell for less a couple years later just from the removal of the auction winner from the bidder pool. Anyone paying "museum exhibit" prices at a recent auction would likely meet with diminished results in under 5 years. 

I would feel more comfortable pointing to the Deathblow result as squishy than one of the best pages from the Lee/Williams Uncanny run though. 

"Bonkers" got redefined after the Secret Wars 8 page result.....that made the X-men half splash only 10% Bonkers.  

[Brian Peck]

On 6/24/2023 at 12:48 PM, comix4fun said:

Not all Lee is created equal. The peak Lee is Lee/Williams on X-men. 
The 248 page that sold yesterday was Lee/Green. The 248 cover is Lee/Green and is lacking what people are looking for in a Lee X-men premiere go to the mattresses at auction piece (Hint: "Snikt"). Also the $360,000 page is from an arc everyone who collects or read this stuff remembers: Xtinction Agenda.  I like Colossus a lot, and Havok is ok, but it's not this : 

This page is several times more desirable to Lee X-men collectors than that Lee/Green cover, for all the reasons people collect comic art, the characters, composition, and credits matter.

 

This is a page people fight to the death over, and they did looking at that auction result. If you want a cover that's a comp to this page I'd look at 268 and not 248. 
The 268 cover sold 2 years before the 271 page above for $300,000 and would likely be dramatically more today. That cover and this page are leagues ahead of another Lee cover that didn't have Williams inks or Wolverine, Psylocke or Jubilee, etc on it. 

I always preferred Green over Lee, old school inks compared to Williams and the Image style. 

[tth2]

On 6/25/2023 at 12:59 AM, delekkerste said:

Tens of millions of dollars of original art traded hands at the peak of the market's fervor in 2021 and 2022 and yet you consistently make it seem like everybody bought a long time ago and is unaffected by the softening witnessed in certain swaths of the market since then. And this is even when we've already seen numerous examples this year of 2021 and 2022-purchased art being resold at steep losses. You can say it's their fault for re-selling so soon or paying so much in the first place, but, it certainly suggests that there's a lot more art out there that is effectively underwater and that those owners would sell at similar losses if they had to liquidate now.  

And people have every right to be disappointed when their mark-to-market gains have fallen substantially from theoretical peak highs. Most people mentally mark to market their gains and losses to at least a certain extent and get joy from unrealized gains and feel pain when those gains evaporate. The fact that they may still be up, even substantially, from their cost basis, or that the market is merely correcting an unsustainable 60-degree advance, does not alter the fact that some segments of the market are down and that real disappointment or even pain is being felt by some sellers.

I'm sure the guy who consigned the DD #169 and Ronin #1 pages (it was the same person) does not share your cavalier view of what does and doesn't constitute justifiable disappointment in this market.  

It's interesting that in the $500 Gold thread you're always lecturing us about the importance of the entry price of one's investment (i.e., not overpaying), and yet when it comes to art you're so willing to give a total free pass to--nay, actually sympathize with--those who overpaid and are now suffering the totally predictable consequences. 

If someone had bought a S&P 500 index fund at the peak in 2022, you would be unmerciful in your criticism, but for some reason it's not the same for someone who bought OA at the peak in 2022. 

[tth2]

On 6/25/2023 at 1:24 AM, alxjhnsn said:

Frank is fading?

No, just the Pandemic-fueled liquidity/irrationality.

[tth2]

On 6/25/2023 at 1:26 AM, gumbydarnit said:

For example, I think the results for the two Miller pages (Ronin and Daredevil) still seem to be way above where they should be.

Yeah, the Ronin page is a nothing page with no samurai.  It's basically Frank's homage to Moebius.  I guess the price was driven in part by its association with a legendary mini-series and in part by the artificial scarcity of pages from issue #1.

[comix4fun]

On 6/24/2023 at 9:36 PM, Brian Peck said:

I always preferred Green over Lee, old school inks compared to Williams and the Image style. 

The good news is…you get Lee at a steep discount. 

[Silver Surfer]

Can't begrudge anyone for "over paying" when some of these key pieces might not see the light of day for decades. 

[delekkerste]

On 6/24/2023 at 11:06 PM, tth2 said:

It's interesting that in the $500 Gold thread you're always lecturing us about the importance of the entry price of one's investment (i.e., not overpaying), and yet when it comes to art you're so willing to give a total free pass to--nay, actually sympathize with--those who overpaid and are now suffering the totally predictable consequences. 

If someone had bought a S&P 500 index fund at the peak in 2022, you would be unmerciful in your criticism, but for some reason it's not the same for someone who bought OA at the peak in 2022. 

While I enjoy talking about the OA market as much as the next guy, I would never equate someone buying comic art with someone buying a stock index fund (which someone would only buy in the expectation of earning a rate of return) unless that person was buying art explicitly for speculation/resale/investment.  

[ES6]

On 6/24/2023 at 1:44 PM, KirbyCollector said:

I don't revel in it but I don't like the inference we should sympathize with the reckless wealthy. A working guy who sells a piece for a 60% loss because he has to replace the transmission on his only car, that person I feel for. Someone who loses $90,000 on a page -- with the consequence being he won't be able to get one of the first five new Aventadors shipped to the US, God forbid, he will have to settle for #6 -- I can't feel sorry for that guy.

Comic art is not, and has not been, a good investment for about, I don't know exactly, but around 6 to 8 months now? I am a long-time collector, since the 1960's, and was always of the mind that OA and comics were undervalued. I was very active in the mid zeros to to mid-teens buying OA. Around 2020 my perception changed. I thought many comics and much OA was overvalued. 

I have not purchased any higher priced comics or OA since the late twenty teens because I do not like to lose appreciable money. Quite frankly, most of these current prices I consider daunting. I ask myself what is driving these prices. At this point in time, I consider only the top-rated A+/A++ material sound investments. 

If someone has the money, the love for the item, and eyes wide open, then by all means, let them go at it. As a previous poster said, if they got 80k worth of enjoyment, and the disappointment of the financial loss did not outweigh their joy of owning the piece for the time they did, then great for them.

I am not built that way. I don't mind breaking even, or even losing a little bit of money. However, my personality is such that I just won't buy anything, be it a car, a comic, or a shovel, if I think I am being ripped off or making a bad investment or am not getting value for my money. Because I have to feel emotionally satisfied with my purchases. It is not so much the price, because value is value, be it a ten-dollar item or a fifty-thousand-dollar item, but more the point to me of: is their value in it?

And no, I do not see the value in most OA and comics today. I think a big reason why is that on the economic side assets in general are overvalued. Maybe because of the relentless QE and stock market increases, and also probably because up until the last year or so, or less, a house, a collectible coin, a vintage car, or comic, was seen as a better investment than most stocks, or gold, or bonds. And they were. So, the cycle was perpetuated.

But it has peaked. Comics and OA are no longer and have not been for most of this century the relatively small cottage industry it was. The hobby has been elevated to the realm of big-time investment, much like fine art, coins, real estate, and other well-known investment portfolio types. That being the case, I think the hobby is more typically going to experience the financial swings most traditional investments have seen over the decades. 

Would I purchase a 10k, 50k, or even 100k comic or OA in the future. Yeah, I would. But unlike in the past, my main parameter would not be my love for the piece. Now these days, I would focus as much on the value and price stability of the piece as I would my passion for it. That was rarely the case in the past, because I knew if I held on to it for seven, eight years, usually at most, I would always at the least recoup my money, and more likely make a handsome profit. 

I think prices are going to generally continue to decline. How much and how long is the question. Not just in the comics and OA hobby, but numismatics, baseball cards, homes, really just about all assets. Not precious metals. 

The economy is in rough shape. Worse than most realize. Lots of window dressing out there. The rich, which is the very small minority in any collectibles field, will bolster the market for only so long. It is not that they can't. They can because they have the means to. For at least a while, they usually do, in many scenarios. But even they have a breaking point where they feel it is more profitable to wait out the storm then buck against it. At that point markets usually see steep declines. And sometimes it can take many years to gain back the losses. It becomes a snowball effect at some point. Seeing price declines, the average collector, which is most collectors, the guys who cannot afford more than around 20k to 40k a year on their collections, slow down or completely stop purchasing. 

Additionally, collecting is a pursuit of a society that is stable, enjoys abundant essential necessities, and has enough leisure time and has a sizable amount of the population who are blessed to have discretionary income. America these days is very different from just three years ago. Inflation has eaten into people's budgets. People are fidgety due to the political atmosphere. Household debt is at (probably) all time high levels, I know credit card debt is, which is at around one trillion dollars. The national debt is at around, I think it is 32 trillion. There is just way too much debt in this debt-based fiat system economy. Something has to give, and eventually the first things to go is collecting, along with vacations, or expensive vacations, and other activities that are non-essential to everyday living. 

Anyway, I know that was long. I know the people on here are well informed and intelligent and love the hobby. So, I did not want to just make a blanket statement that I think OA from a financial standpoint is currently not a good place to park one's money without stating my reasoning behind the statement.

 

Edited June 25, 2023 by ES6
Word

[Brian Peck]

On 6/24/2023 at 8:17 PM, comix4fun said:

The good news is…you get Lee at a steep discount. 

Very steep, I bought two X-Men pages from Jim at Wonder Con 1990. One for $100 with Rogue and Ms Marvel fighting. The other for $125 with Wolverine plus some of the women in his life. No don’t own them anyway sold/trade them years ago.

[tth2]

On 6/25/2023 at 11:27 AM, Silver Surfer said:

Can't begrudge anyone for "over paying" when some of these key pieces might not see the light of day for decades. 

Sure, except that's not what's happening with some of these pieces. 

And as we've seen, even if there was no intention to buy something to flip quickly, circumstances can change and you end up selling fairly quickly and taking a loss (i.e., you de facto overpaid).