ASM #252 CGC 9.8 Record Sale - something fishy going on? - Holder Tampering Incident confirmed by CGC 50 50

[comeaux]

On 1/26/2024 at 7:50 AM, comicwiz said:

Don't worry about the "nothing to see here brigade" - their role is to foment and create division and distraction. Some have no business even posting here based on their history, and with others, you can see right through their intent because money is inevitably the corrupting influence. They might even see the information I've posted here as a threat to their grabby pursuits. .

This is 100% accurate and if you counter any of the CGC natives with response to their trolls then you’re sent on a nice little vacation. 

[comeaux]

[shadroch]

On 1/27/2024 at 6:59 AM, Stefan_W said:

People always react from their own vantage points. 

You are spending a great deal of time looking at a large number of books that have absolutely been tampered with, many of which are not on CGC's list, and are seeing that the scope of this is much larger than CGC claims. That is great and the work is important, but it also shapes your viewpoint.

I am looking across my own collection of several hundred slabs and none of those have been tampered with, and I am 100% sure that the books I am bidding on right now at the CL auction have not been tampered with due to my price point and the books I am selecting. That shapes my viewpoint. 

The key here is perspective and understanding where everyone is coming from.

The following is a series of true statements about the scam:

- The scam is important and has impacted on many people.

- The vast majority of comic collectors do not own books that have been tampered with.

- The hobby has been impacted in ways we cannot begin to measure.

- The hobby will continue.

- People's trust in CGC has been shaken.

- A lot of people will continue to send books in to CGC for grading and it will continue to be the gold standard in comic grading.

If your meme shows the flip sides to all of these proverbial coins then please go ahead and share. 

Unless you think the scammers started by submitting 9.8 books and didn't do any trial runs, you have no idea what slabs have been infected.  In my mind, the scammers most likely practiced this scheme on lower-value books to see if they'd get away with it.  If that is true, and it doesn't take a giant leap of faith to believe it, then you or I have no reason to accept any slab you didn't submit yourself as legit, and potential buyers have no reason to believe your slabs aren't tampered with. 

Or you can rest easy, knowing CGC is on the case and this scandal is only limited to the 300-plus books they put on the list.  I read Comicwiz's outstanding research on the matter and CGCs lack of response after its initial posting of the list and came to my conclusions.   It's not a permanent decision, but for now it will take substantial discounts for me to entertain buying almost any slab. Call me a Doubting Thomas if you want, but I would want to examine any potential buy for possible evidence of tampering.

[Junkdrawer]

On 1/26/2024 at 8:54 PM, Ccccccccccccc said:

I've been following since mid-December and every day since.  My take is CGC slabs are comically (pun intended) easy to open and swap books.  At this point they are just plastic, and it is entirely up to the consumer if you believe the book inside is accurately represented by the label.  It's a complete disaster and in my opinion CGC is trying to keep the details as obfuscated as possible to protect their market share.  I'm not selling all my CGC slabs, but I will never use this company to grade books based on everything I know about their equipment and processes.  

So it’s safe to paint all the graded collectibles markets and grading companies under suspicion? I hope prices drop like hell. 

[sledgehammer]

On 1/27/2024 at 10:11 AM, shadroch said:

Unless you think the scammers started by submitting 9.8 books and didn't do any trial runs, you have no idea what slabs have been infected. 

Well, we do have an idea, and it includes a whole bunch of Incredible Hulk 181 comic books that weren't graded 9.8

A fact that makes the cavalier and nonchalant attitude from several people, about who this affects and how much, extremely hard to take as more than cheerleading.

[comicjel]

Using the "verify" feature, I have determined the 34 books that were included in the last 6 submissions that we believe were done by the scammer - of those 34 books, 11 books are on the "list", presumably because they were reholdered.

Of the 23 books not on the list, 17 were the usual suspects (ASM 238, 252, 300; X-men 266; New Mut 98; Hulk 340; MSH 8) - all graded 9.8.

For the scam, as we know it, these 17 books provided the 9.8 labels to be used to swap in inferior books, but for some reason, "none" were reholdered, in fact 6 (by my count) were just sold after being graded (probably more, because I just looked at GPA).

So the pattern does not fit!?!

To truly understand the scam, I think we need to understand why some 9.8s are reholdered with inferior books and some are just sold.

I keep coming back to the thought that the originally submitted books that are getting graded 9.8 (at an extremely high success rate no less) and then sold are also inferior books somehow?  Why else would the scammer sell them, when they could have just swapped in inferior books in their place like they were doing with the other 9.8s??

Edited January 27 by comicjel
make clearer

[comicwiz]

On 1/27/2024 at 11:11 AM, shadroch said:

Unless you think the scammers started by submitting 9.8 books and didn't do any trial runs, you have no idea what slabs have been infected.  In my mind, the scammers most likely practiced this scheme on lower-value books to see if they'd get away with it.

I appreciate that you mentioned this point. Very early on, when I was looking at the unusual trends/patterns from the sales history of these impacted books, I used the word that it looks almost like someone was trolling CGC. The words I should have used instead was the parading of an embarrasment of riches.

When comparing it to scandals like the Toy Toni scandal, he had run that scheme with unused Palitoy factory cardbacks and blisters using a post-factory seal, and yes he got them through right under AFA's nose, but there were patterns I identifed (some were reassuring very early on in the scandal) that he didn't have the confidence and certainty of success. The reason is the staggered manner of submissions, sale patterns, and doing his best to cover his tracks.

This is an extremely important point as we compare the trends/patterns in this incident. Even if we apply a "true detective" statistic to help explore this point, not even the most well-planned bank heists have a greater than 60% rate of success.

When you look at the pattern of acquisitions (dates, amounts of books, in the same grade), the frequency of reappearance of the same books, and speculate on the turnarounds achieved between acquisition and changes we tracked, the amount of money and risk/reward had to be almost near certain.

Not 60%. Not 70%, Not 80% or even 90%. I'm talking very nearly 100% certain this scheme was going to achieve the success and expected result.

It's one thing to pull off a heist, because the percentages show it's a crime that doesn't pay.

But there's also a percentage of unsolved and it's fairly higher than it should be, but the reason for this is because when it's pulled off right, the perpetrators don't go around showing off what they did, or talking about it with YouTubers, and certainly not flaunting it.

The pattern that is unmistakable in this specific instance (and the graphic I showed of the amount of books broken down by year certainly reinforce the progression and graduating aspects) but these books appeared too quickly, too soon after, and often very visibly with high value attaintment, with the unmistakable signature of seeming to parade these record prices with reappearances.

That is the red flag that drew me in instantly in, because even when I first looked at the data, I thought could these perps be that dumb?

But I was partly wrong. 

It's because of how certain they were of pulling this off. REPEATEDLY. 

The only part about smarts, or lack theroef, is the parading is what led us to notice that something was very wrong.

Edited January 28 by comicwiz

[comicjel]

On 1/27/2024 at 12:47 PM, comicwiz said:

I appreciate that you mentioned this point. Very early on, when I was looking at the unusual trends/patterns from the sales history of these impacted books, I used the word that it looks almost like someone was trolling CGC. The words I should have used instead was a parading of an embarrasment of riches.

When comparing it to scandals like the Toy Toni scandal, he had run the unused Palitoy factory cardbacks and blisters using a post-factory seal, and yes he got them through right under AFA's nose, but there were patterns I identifed (some were reassuring very early on in the scandal) that he didn't have the confidence and certainty of success. The reason is the staggered manner of submissions, sale patterns, and doing his best to cover his tracks.

This is an extremely important point as we compare the trends/patterns in this incident. Even if we apply a "true detective" statistic to help explore this point, not even the most well-planned bank heists have a greater than 60% rate of success.

When you look at the pattern of acquisitions (dates, amounts of books, in the same grade), the frequency of reappearance of the same books, and speculate on the turnarounds achieved between acquisition and changes we tracked, the amount of money and risk/reward had to be almost near certain.

Not 60%. Not 70%, Not 80% or even 90%. I'm talking very nearly 100% certain this scheme was going to achieve the success and expected result.

It's one thing to pull off a heist, because the percentages show it's a crime that doesn't pay.

But there's also a percentage of unsolved and it's fairly higher than it should be, but the reason for this is because when it's pulled off right, the perpetrators don't go around showing off what they did, or talking about with YouTubers, and certainly not flaunting it.

The pattern that is unmistakable in this specific instance (and the graphic I showed of the amount of books broken down by year certainly reinforce the progression and graduating aspects) but these books appeared too quickly, too soon after, and often very visibly with high value attaintment, with the unmistakable signature of seeming to parade these record prices with reappearances.

That is the red flag that drew me in instantly in, because even when I first looked at the data, I thought could these perps be that dumb?

But I was partly wrong. 

It's because of how certain they were of pulling this off. REPEATEDLY. 

The only part about smarts, or lack theroef, is the parading is what led us to notice that something was very wrong.

I agree! - there is a carelessness to this scam that is out of proportion to the risk / reward - an overconfidence that does not make sense!

Imagine the evidence that could have been gathered against the scammer if CGC had figured this out internally first? - CGC could have pulled in authorities while the scam was ongoing (figured out if there were accomplices) - it's like the scammer was not worried about that at all!

[Chip Cataldo]

On 1/27/2024 at 1:30 PM, comicjel said:

Imagine the evidence that could have been gathered against the scammer if CGC had figured this out internally first? - CGC could have pulled in authorities while the scam was ongoing (figured out if there were accomplices) - it's like the scammer was not worried about that at all!

Why would they be? They know that, in reality, CGC doesn't care about this at all. They just want it to go away, and based on all the other "scandals" that have caused an uproar in the past...it will.

[Stefan_W]

On 1/27/2024 at 12:47 PM, comicwiz said:

The only part about smarts, or lack theroef, is the parading is what led us to notice that something was very wrong.

It is hard to put the brakes on the money train once it starts rolling. 

My own personal unsubstantiated belief is the scam changed over time. The guy who did is an opportunist, and he took advantage of the existing system to run the scam that was uncovered. I can 100% see a scenario in the past where this guy preyed on older cases that were not sealed as well as even the current ones and so on. It would have been less efficient because a decade ago he could not take advantage of reholdering using the custom label process and things like that. But, of course, this is just speculation on my part. I doubt the perp will offer up a detailed confession of every crappy thing he did in the community, and so we are likely to never know the full extent of his shenanigans let alone the stuff that others who were not caught have done.  

[DC#]

I doubt this would ever happen but…..as we now live in a world where doubt and skepticism abounds and trust in people, companies, and institutions continue to erode for both legitimate and illegitimate reasons - it would be valuable for CGC to bring in someone like @comicwiz into the inner workings of this investigation.   At the appropriate time (possibly close to the end of their work), have him sign an NDA and open the kimono to him as a representative of the stakeholders in the community.  
 

some people will never believe what Matt or CGC say (or other professionals such as those at the auction houses) - so find an independent voice that can validate and report within the confines of a NDA.   CGC is in the business of trust - this situation may warrant doing something out of the norm to help.  

[Chip Cataldo]

On 1/27/2024 at 3:02 PM, DC# said:

I doubt this would ever happen but…..as we now live in a world where doubt and skepticism abounds and trust in people, companies, and institutions continue to erode for both legitimate and illegitimate reasons - it would be valuable for CGC to bring in someone like @comicwiz into the inner workings of this investigation.   At the appropriate time (possibly close to the end of their work), have him sign an NDA and open the kimono to him as a representative of the stakeholders in the community.  
 

some people will never believe what Matt or CGC say (or other professionals such as those at the auction houses) - so find an independent voice that can validate and report within the confines of a NDA.   CGC is in the business of trust - this situation may warrant doing something out of the norm to help.  

They won't ever do anything like this, because they just want the situation to disappear. They don't want any more "investigating."

[comicjel]

On 1/27/2024 at 4:11 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

They won't ever do anything like this, because they just want the situation to disappear. They don't want any more "investigating."

Both things can be true...

They want this issue to go away, but they want to find out how it was done, to prevent it from happening in the future - no reason to believe otherwise.

[comicwiz]

Keeping with the title of this 374 page thread being about an ASM 252 9.8 that first alerted us to this "holder tampering incident" - while not a record sale in this instance below, we do have yet another direct to newsstand swap.

Certification: 1257876006
Amazing Spider-Man, The (1963) #252 CGC 9.8

Beginning first with a cert look-up for posterity:

 

Cert: 1257876006 | 4/8/2015 | $250 (No WP record is available - greyed out for this reason)

↳
Cert: 1257876006 | 1/6/2023 | $1,895

↳
Cert: 1257876006  | 2/5/2023 | $1,425

↳

Cert: 1257876006 [4/23/2023] - $1,951 - Here is where we notice a change from Direct to Newsstand

[comicwiz]

With the following example, an Avengers 57 CGC 9.4 has a different book inside the holder, noticed from the photos of the listing on sale date 1/15/2023

Certification: 0966088004

Begnning first with the cert look-up:

Cert: 0966088004 | 5/2/2017 | $2,300

↳

Cert: 0966088004 [1/15/2023] - $3,050 (Changes noticed here - easiest to ascertain: front cover - staple placement on front cover, colour breaking creases along top edge; back cover - namely, brown spot stain on back across from Rockwell on outer edge, heavy dust shadowing along top edge, and traveling along the entire spine. 

Edited January 28 by comicwiz

[Microchip]

On 1/28/2024 at 11:40 AM, comicwiz said:

With the following example, an Avengers 57 CGC 9.4 has a different book inside the holder, noticed from the photos of the listing on sale date 1/15/2023

Certification: 0966088004

Begnning first with the cert look-up:

Cert: 0966088004 | 5/2/2017 | $2,300

↳

Cert: 0966088004 [1/15/2023] - $3,050 (Changes noticed here - easiest to ascertain: front cover - staple placement on front cover, colour breaking creases along top edge; back cover - namely, brown spot stain on back across from Rockwell on outer edge, heavy dust shadowing along top edge, and traveling along the entire spine. 

Damm!!!

Great work here.

Thats so distressing to see another key book dragged into this scam.   Is this book on the CGC list?

[tmac100]

On 1/27/2024 at 12:47 PM, comicwiz said:

I appreciate that you mentioned this point. Very early on, when I was looking at the unusual trends/patterns from the sales history of these impacted books, I used the word that it looks almost like someone was trolling CGC. The words I should have used instead was a parading an embarrasment of riches.

When comparing it to scandals like the Toy Toni scandal, he had run the unused Palitoy factory cardbacks and blisters using a post-factory seal, and yes he got them through right under AFA's nose, but there were patterns I identifed (some were reassuring very early on in the scandal) that he didn't have the confidence and certainty of success. The reason is the staggered manner of submissions, sale patterns, and doing his best to cover his tracks.

This is an extremely important point as we compare the trends/patterns in this incident. Even if we apply a "true detective" statistic to help explore this point, not even the most well-planned bank heists have a greater than 60% rate of success.

When you look at the pattern of acquisitions (dates, amounts of books, in the same grade), the frequency of reappearance of the same books, and speculate on the turnarounds achieved between acquisition and changes we tracked, the amount of money and risk/reward had to be almost near certain.

Not 60%. Not 70%, Not 80% or even 90%. I'm talking very nearly 100% certain this scheme was going to achieve the success and expected result.

It's one thing to pull off a heist, because the percentages show it's a crime that doesn't pay.

But there's also a percentage of unsolved and it's fairly higher than it should be, but the reason for this is because when it's pulled off right, the perpetrators don't go around showing off what they did, or talking about it with YouTubers, and certainly not flaunting it.

The pattern that is unmistakable in this specific instance (and the graphic I showed of the amount of books broken down by year certainly reinforce the progression and graduating aspects) but these books appeared too quickly, too soon after, and often very visibly with high value attaintment, with the unmistakable signature of seeming to parade these record prices with reappearances.

That is the red flag that drew me in instantly in, because even when I first looked at the data, I thought could these perps be that dumb?

But I was partly wrong. 

It's because of how certain they were of pulling this off. REPEATEDLY. 

The only part about smarts, or lack theroef, is the parading is what led us to notice that something was very wrong.

 

So, if I'm summarizing everything people have said so far correctly, then:

1) The scammer was able to get swapped books reholdered over and over again (hundreds of times apparently)

2) He was able to get a surprisingly high percentage of books graded 9.8 (some of which have been reviewed by posters and seem far from 9.8s)

3) He was able to get an astronomically high number of 9.8's that included grader's notes (and all saying the same thing), when 9.8's almost never have grader's notes

4) The turnaround times for getting many of his books graded was unrealistically fast

I'm sure I'm missing some other key points.

If this is all correct, then he sure was one lucky lone wolf to have all these things going for him for so long...

[grendel013]

Inside man

[comicwiz]

On 1/27/2024 at 8:16 PM, Microchip said:

Damm!!!

Great work here.

Thats so distressing to see another key book dragged into this scam.   Is this book on the CGC list?

Yes, I am only posting books on the list.

[Sweet Lou 14]

I'm really grateful for all those who are doing research and posting their findings here.  However, unfortunately a 375-page thread on a message board is far from the ideal place to collect all the information that has been gathered.  I wish there were an external page, blog, or the like that presents what is currently known, as well as the questions that remain outstanding, in a well-organized format that is easy for people to consume and understand.

Very broadly, the questions that interest me the most are:

• How many of the books on "the list" are confirmed to be fraudulent, how many are confirmed by CGC not to have been tampered with, and on how many is the jury still out?
• Is there any reason not to believe CGC if they say they've confirmed a particular book not to have been tampered with?
• What do we know about the specific details of how the perpetrator(s) physically switched the books in a case?
• Was the scam in question perpetrated by a single person (and accomplices), or is there any evidence that this practice was more widespread?
• Based on the set of confirmed fraudulent books, what patterns can we deduce about the titles / issues the scammer was targeting?  (At first I thought that the focus was limited to Bronze, Copper and Modern books that are traded in high volume, like Hulk #181 and ASM #300, and that the big-ticket Silver Age books on the list were "safe."  But the Avengers #57 certainly breaks that pattern.)
• Is there really evidence that the perpetrator may have had an unusual level of access (or even been a CGC employee), or is that just conspiracy theory material?

This is the kind of stuff that would be wonderful to see in one place, updated from time to time as we all learn more.  I might be able to think of more questions, but this list should be enough for now.