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ASM #252 CGC 9.8 Record Sale - something fishy going on? - Holder Tampering Incident confirmed by CGC
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Started by spidermanbeyond,

9,029 posts in this topic

wombat

wombat

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 4:04 PM, Silver Surfer said:

After all this is a printing money venture. He probably was too busy scamming ever since CGC started using their new holders that he didn’t have time to work the convention circuit. 

I don't even know why he would want to do anything other than sell on ebay. Much easier to hide your identity and much easier to pull this off when people don't have the books in hand. 

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Silver Surfer

Silver Surfer

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 12/25/2023 at 1:17 PM, paqart said:

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) investigates criminal counterfeiting, piracy, and other federal crimes. You can report suspicions concerning the manufacture or sale of counterfeit or pirated goods to the FBI by contacting your local FBI Office, or or calling (202) 324-3000 and asking to speak with the Duty Complaint Agent. If you suspect products for sale on the Internet are counterfeit or pirated, you can report your suspicions to the FBI Internet Fraud Complaint Center.

I’m sure this is some form of mail fraud too. This guy must be krapping his pants right now. If he did indeed have an inside guy and that guy starts singing he is done. 

Edited by Silver Surfer
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OJ Pimpson

OJ Pimpson

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 12:08 PM, Genuine Article Comics said:

CGC has to come up with a way to keep the inner well and label attached to one another.  If CGC heat seal/sonic weld the label and inner well together then this scam never happens. CBCS used to sonic weld their label to their inner well. With CBCS's cases being the best on the market for protection, clarity and security they don't need to do that anymore but CGC should absolutely adopt that solution. 

Careful, I received a warning for talk like this yesterday.  Additionally CGC made it mandatory for me to “acknowledge” the infraction to conintue to post. Ironically the whole point of my initial posting was that pressure from competitors might hasten an Acknowledgment of this ordeal from CGC. 
 

Merry Christmas everyone. I hope to come back here tomorrow to find that CGC has announced sweeping changes to their policies, offered a FMV buy back to anyone stuck with any of these fraudulent books and filed federal charges against the scammer. 

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Stefan_W

Stefan_W

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 12/25/2023 at 4:23 PM, agamoto said:

 he uses his own photos of the book. he would have had to list his 9.8 CPV book book 7-10 days before it was graded

Does CGC allow pickups in person? That is the only way I can think of for this to happen.

*edit: I thought of one more possibility. For my orders CGC sometimes lists the shipping date as the next day while it is picked up same day. Not common but it has happened. If he is within a next day delivery area it is also possible in these specific circumstances. 

Edited by Stefan_W
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Gaard

Gaard

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Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 3:10 PM, agamoto said:

he sold a canadian price variant asm 238 9.8 on ebay the same day it was noted as graded by cgc.

It was an auction, though. Doesn't that mean the auction started beforehand?

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mephistopheles

mephistopheles

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 4:31 PM, VintageComics said:

I have what 'may' be a small piece of potential good news. 

I spoke to a very prominent, international convention dealer and shared the name of the alleged person involved (the real name, not the name speculated on in this thread) and they replied that they'd never heard the name before. 

This seems to makes it sound like the person allegedly involved may not have done much business on the convention circuit. If they had been on the con circuit, this dealer definitely would have heard of them.

Take that for what you will at this point. I take it as good news that this debacle may not have spread beyond online sales and into convention sales. 

Assuming he is the only one pulling this scam. We also can't rule out that some of his books made their way into other dealers' inventory.

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agamoto

agamoto

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 1:31 PM, Gaard said:

It was an auction, though. Doesn't that mean the auction started beforehand?

Correct, for example, on a 7-day auction, he would have had to have known a week before the sale date of 8/2/2023 that his book was a 9.8... 7 days before CGC says it was graded. 

 

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Nschenks

Nschenks

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 12:06 PM, Buzzetta said:

Could also be a market adjustment.  I know a guy that is not even into comics that has 50 copies of ASM 252 an 50 copies of Secret Wars 8 that have been in box since they were released.  They look to be easy 9.4-9.8's.  There are MANY copies out there of this book and ASM 300 btw... yet still people have treated them like some unicorn in the wild.  I own a 9.8 and I do not even think it should be commanding this much money. 

Yeah both this and SW8 are due for major drops. Two of the most overrated and overpriced copper keys (and most abundant overall and in high grade). Definitely some market adjustment on this, but I think the seller's bad rating and the obvious defects (bad damage to top edge, plus TWO chipped corners BC lol) all combined to tank this particular copy. TBH with that top edge damage it shouldn't have gone for half that, but just goes to show how many people buy the slab and not the book.

That said, I believe this sale is a bit of a temporary outlier due to above reasons and not a fallout from the scam. I think in this forum sandbox (or Insta or FB, etc.) it's easy to forget how many people are out there buying slabs that don't care about a scam that only directly affected a relatively small subset of the slab-purchasing population. Perhaps it'll make people look a touch more closely at the slabs they are buying (not a bad thing), but I doubt long-run this is going to ruin CGC's reputation to the point that people will stop buying slabs altogether. Some people will get out, some people may stop buying/selling/subbing...but will it be a significant enough portion to ding high-grade slab sales? My personal opinion is it won't. That person who's been saving up for three years to buy an ASM 252 9.8 because it's a book they've most wanted to own...is still gonna buy that ASM 252 9.8. (But hopefully they'll look a little closer at the scans this time...)

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agamoto

agamoto

Posted
Posted (edited)

Just as an aside... 8/2/2023 was a super fortunate day for our friend, as he also sold a 9.8 CPV of ASM 252 same day. That one shows it was graded 7/10/2023

4235257001

image.thumb.png.3790dcfe42e84e31d3c39c3775e048b0.png

Fun facts! Here are submissions in that same series and when CGC says they were graded.

4235257002 9.8 ASM 194 - 4-12-2023

4235257003 9.8 IH 340 - 4-12-2023

4235257004 9.6 ASM 238 Direct 4-12-2023

4235257005 9.8 NS ASM 238 7-10-2023

4235257006 9.8 ASM 300 4-12-2023

I can only assume the later date ones are reholders and/or vanity labels. 

*edit... I don't have to assume, the pics on CGC census show they are.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by agamoto
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Ricomortis

Ricomortis

Posted
Posted

Hey guys… idk if this has been mentioned or discussed as I’m not about to read 123 pages. Anyways… this is what I think he did. It’s WAY easier to just swap out the 9.8 label with the 9.6 label as it’s just a thin piece of paper and you won’t have to beak the posts to remove the inner well. Then just send the 9.6 in with new 9.8 label and say hey I need this reholdered and you guys missed that it was a MJ variant. 
 

I will almost bet good money this is what he did. 
 

just saying 

Rico

 

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Lightning55

Lightning55

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 5:23 PM, Ricomortis said:

Hey guys… idk if this has been mentioned or discussed as I’m not about to read 123 pages. Anyways… this is what I think he did. It’s WAY easier to just swap out the 9.8 label with the 9.6 label as it’s just a thin piece of paper and you won’t have to beak the posts to remove the inner well. Then just send the 9.6 in with new 9.8 label and say hey I need this reholdered and you guys missed that it was a MJ variant. 
 

I will almost bet good money this is what he did. 
 

just saying 

Rico

 

Been mentioned a few times, lagging behind in the merit of possibilities, just ahead of inserting complete counterfeits.

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bc

bc

Posted
Posted (edited)
On 12/25/2023 at 5:23 PM, Ricomortis said:

Hey guys… idk if this has been mentioned or discussed as I’m not about to read 123 pages. Anyways… this is what I think he did. It’s WAY easier to just swap out the 9.8 label with the 9.6 label as it’s just a thin piece of paper and you won’t have to beak the posts to remove the inner well. Then just send the 9.6 in with new 9.8 label and say hey I need this reholdered and you guys missed that it was a MJ variant. 
 

I will almost bet good money this is what he did. 
 

just saying 

Rico

 

Why bother with the label since it's only good for one shot? What this perp is doing is allowing him to re-use the same 9.8 multiple times for reholders & custom labels.

I can see how the perp could re-use the label multiple times now. But why would he do it when he can exploit the system and have CGC do it for him?

-bc

Edited by bc
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Lightning55

Lightning55

Posted
Posted
On 12/25/2023 at 5:47 PM, bc said:

Why bother with the label since it's only good for one shot? What this perp is doing is allowing him to re-use the same 9.8 multiple times for reholders & custom labels.

-bc

Whether you swap the labels or the whole comic, you lose the 9.8 label in your Frankencomic when it sells. You keep the crappy label, or just destroy the evidence. 

Either way, you have to resubmit the pulled actual 9.8 comic and hope it regrades 9.8 to continue the loop.

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