Discussion: The Valiant secondary market is...

[greg]

The Valiant secondary market is an oligopsony.

Discuss.

[Daniel Jackson]

I think that is a very accurate description.

[greg]

I think that is a very accurate description.

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

[svair]

perhaps both

[Unblessed]

Not entirely true.

To sell a "RARE" Valiant comic for $200, all one has to do is use this website and BAIT the only people in the World who give $$$ for Valiants. That's what I would do.

~Unblessed

[Daniel Jackson]

I think that is a very accurate description.

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

For someone trying to get the issues they don't have=bad.
For someone trying only to sell the issues=good.

[greg]

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

For someone trying to get the issues they don't have=bad.
For someone trying only to sell the issues=good.

Wouldn't a larger number of buyers make the bad=worse, and the good=better?

[Technique]

The Valiant secondary market is an oligopsony.

Discuss.

Yes it is.

With ebay it makes the situation bad for buyers and great for sellers.

If two buyers are always willing to pay a fixed minimum for an item then the lesser of the two has set the minimum price that the item can be obtained. If they are always willing to pay that amount no matter how many they have then the demand never goes away while the supply will eventually dwindle.

Unfortunate.

[Unblessed]

You guys must be discussing Pre Unity, Variants and end run issues. Not 1993/1994 fire starters.

The term does not apply to ALL Valiant comics.

~Unblessed

[Daniel Jackson]

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

For someone trying to get the issues they don't have=bad.
For someone trying only to sell the issues=good.

Wouldn't a larger number of buyers make the bad=worse, and the good=better?

If a sufficient number of people would become interested, then I suppose that would be accurate as well.

[Sect]

I would think that a small group of people would be beneficial to buyers. the reason being that once a person obtains the item they are no longer in search for it and therefore results in less competition. So as time passes, the demand of it should decrease. If there is a large pool of interested people, I'd imagine there would be more competition. Of course, this is on the assumption that people don't hoard issues and just get one of each.

[Unblessed]

Of course, this is on the assumption that people don't hoard issues and just get one of each.

~Unblessed

[Daniel Jackson]

I would think that a small group of people would be beneficial to buyers. the reason being that once a person obtains the item they are no longer in search for it and therefore results in less competition. So as time passes, the demand of it should decrease. If there is a large pool of interested people, I'd imagine there would be more competition. Of course, this is on the assumption that people don't hoard issues and just get one of each.

I think you hit the nail on the head right there. I think the prices could probably level out to more reasonable levels if we all would just restrain ourselves and not purchase multiple copies of every key issue. But we all know that's not likely to happen anytime soon.

[magnusr]

The Valiant secondary market is an oligopsony.

Discuss.

The example given in the article relates to a market where there is constant production and consumption. We clearly match the definition of an oligopsony, but the we don't match the conclusions of the article.

/Magnus

[Vault-Keeper]

In all honesty, there isn't a single regular Valiant or Acclaim comic that should be considered hard enough to find that a small group of collectors could actually dictate the prices.

According to the laws of statistics, there should be a ton of these books still out there. Even some of the Golds and VVSS's have high enough print runs to make anyone who wanted one be able to get one cheaply enough. Or so you would think...

There are many Valiant-horders out there. I am among them. From what we are collectively willing to pay, the prices will never go below a certain point. This occurs across many fields of collecting, including many within the comic collecting community itself.

There are many Valiant and Acclaim special issues and lower print run issues that will always be hard to find. But that in itself doesn't guarantee that the value will rise.
The demand needs to be there.

As an example, the SHADOWMAN V3 #2 variant was cheaply priced in 2004, considering its print run was only 750-1000. For some reason, demand for this issue grew in 2005, with no steady supply to counter it, thus the price someone was willing to pay for one grew by leaps and bounds! The same thing is happening with the price variant issues of DESTROYER #0 and THE VISITOR VS THE VALIANT UNIVERSE #1 & #2.

Once a good supply of these issues surfaces, the price will once again go down. I don't think it's a matter of 'if', I think it's a matter of 'when'. Deflation of price, like I'm talking about, has already happened with VALIANT VOICE #17-19, and X-O #1/2 GOLD.

I personally see an implosion coming to the comic back issue market in the next 10-20 years, like it has in the current stamp market. I think it will specifically affect the Gold and Silver Age markets. As many older collectors die or leave the hobby, I think there will come a time where the collector's market will shrink to the point of making many Key books available (to those who want them) for affordable prices. There will be more collections available, with less collectors to absorb them out of the market, leading to a decline in prices, IMO.---Steve

[DawgPhan]

I would think that a small group of people would be beneficial to buyers. the reason being that once a person obtains the item they are no longer in search for it and therefore results in less competition. So as time passes, the demand of it should decrease. If there is a large pool of interested people, I'd imagine there would be more competition. Of course, this is on the assumption that people don't hoard issues and just get one of each.

I dont think that it works like this because most of us would continue buying these books at the same or nearly the same prices they are currently willing to spend.

So if buyer X will buy Unity red's for $25 forever then someone willing to only pay $20 will probably never get one unless they find one that buyer X didnt find.

I have a price in my head that I will pay for every issue I need and I probably wouldnt go much above that. I would however continue to buy those issues long after my set is complete...

which brings about another problem...I need more short boxes...I thought that I had 1 extra one, but I dont...oh well..

[Zero]

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

For someone trying to get the issues they don't have=bad.
For someone trying only to sell the issues=good.

Wouldn't a larger number of buyers make the bad=worse, and the good=better?

Intuitively this statement is correct, but in reality I believe it is false. More demand will lower prices.

Supply is fixed, but available supply is fluid. Meaning, there may be 3-4K Unity 0 reds, but there are only a handfull in the open market at any given time. A spike in demand would cause the available supply to increase. In the short run this will increase prices, but in the longer run (ala X-O 1/2 gold) prices will decrease substantially. ~Erskine

[ZephyrWasHOT!!]

Is this a good thing, or a bad thing?

For someone trying to get the issues they don't have=bad.
For someone trying only to sell the issues=good.

Wouldn't a larger number of buyers make the bad=worse, and the good=better?

In the short term, yes.

In the long term, increased demand would draw out the supply that is out there and drive down prices.

This was amply demonstrated in 2004-2005. In the summer of 2004, "Valiants were Hot!" and as a result, the limited supply that was "out there" on a regular basis dried up, and prices rose.

What came first, the demand or the higher prices? That's a chicken/egg argument. Logic says the higher prices followed the increased demand, but it could very well be that the effects of the oligopsony led to a price spike amongst the existing buyer base (like me), and those prices drove demand.

In 2005, this increased demand brought out those who wouldn't have necessarily sold Valiants, and the increased demand was more than met....which led to a drop in prices across the board.

Prices on Valiant are now lower than they were in the Fall of 2004.

So, in the long term, more buyers led to a net loss in value, mainly due to the supply that we all know is out there....for the right price.

The only way this would change is if there was new demand that exceeded the available supply of Valiants....a feat not achieved since 1993.

I wish I could do a nifty graph to demonstrate this.

[ZephyrWasHOT!!]

The Valiant secondary market is an oligopsony.

Discuss.

Yes it is.

With ebay it makes the situation bad for buyers and great for sellers.

If two buyers are always willing to pay a fixed minimum for an item then the lesser of the two has set the minimum price that the item can be obtained. If they are always willing to pay that amount no matter how many they have then the demand never goes away while the supply will eventually dwindle.

Unfortunate.

This would be true if every person with a minimum then bid on every such auction at all times.

That's not always the case.

I know for a fact that both Greg and I have been bidding on Valiants on eBay since 1998 (just the example, as you need both to make the argument.) I know that my minimum price I'd pay for a Unity Red is $10. I know his price is probably a bit more.

But I know that Greg has missed SOME of those Unity Red auctions, because I won 2 over that time at my price. And I certainly know I missed many because I just wasn't able to look at all auctions, all the time. In 2000, I won a Unity Red for $7.

And that's not even throwing into the mix those auctions with more than just the one item (i.e., Harbinger #1-41.)

[ZephyrWasHOT!!]

Heh. Nice to see everyone making the same points I made before me.

I should read everything before posting, but I hate to miss specific points in specific posts.

[Daniel Jackson]

Intuitively this statement is correct, but in reality I believe it is false. More demand will lower prices.

Supply is fixed, but available supply is fluid. Meaning, there may be 3-4K Unity 0 reds, but there are only a handfull in the open market at any given time. A spike in demand would cause the available supply to increase. In the short run this will increase prices, but in the longer run (ala X-O 1/2 gold) prices will decrease substantially. ~Erskine

But in the case of X-O 1/2 Gold, we saw a flood of issues coming to the market seemingly out of nowhere. One ebay seller who seemed to have an endless supply of them caused most of this. I'm just not sure if this would happen in the case of Unity Red or CEAR over the normal selling course unless a significant hidden stash of issues were to surface. Simply because a lot of people (like me) would not sell just because we see an increase in the demand.

[depluto]

Not entirely true.

To sell a "RARE" Valiant comic for $200, all one has to do is use this website and BAIT the only people in the World who give $$$ for Valiants. That's what I would do.

~Unblessed

Ayup. And like Dawg said, there are a number of buyers who buy every single issue if it goes for a certain price. So yeah, just a few hoarders are holding the price in place.

[greg]

So yeah, just a few hoarders are holding the price in place.

Doesn't this happen all the time?
Surely there's nothing special or unique about our particular market.

Take diamonds, for example...

[depluto]

And that's probably why some egghead economist came up with a word like "oligopsony."

[depluto]

To clarify, I certainly have no ill will towards the people who are hoarding Valiants. I've been taking a patient stance toward the few comics I have left to fill out my collection. I think the current prices are sometimes artificially high and will come down someday soon.

All just my opinion.