The Mora interest seems pretty organic to me. I haven’t seen any hype on IG, YouTube or the key collector app, and certainly not here. It’s actually the opposite - complete silence. The sales have been noted on here the same way any comic heating up would be.
As for them holding value? 
But isn’t that the case for every artist? You have Hughes and McFarlane selling for cover and some selling for $$$$.
Same with Spears and Putri.
Here’s a screenshot of feedback someone left for a Mora variant. They even uploaded a photo of the book in one of those self slab kits so likely going on their wall.
You are not going to convince me. But I deleted my post so the game can continue.
I think the point is that it doesn’t seem to be speculator buying them and driving up the price.
Just my observation from my sales, it would appear these are popular amongst the Asian population and in some cases those with an attraction to the Nightwing character.
And The best books seem to be a combination of both.
No one here is recommending paying FMV of the “hot books” above cover price…what we are doing is speculation which covers that can be found for cover have the best chances of a future payoff…including which ones are with holding onto before dumping (i.e., Nightwing 114).
Some of those have been hits (Nightwing 109/110/114, Catwoman 80, and now Batman & Robin 10).
Anything I’m holding onto at the moment is for my PC. It’s not many…vast majority I have listed.
Buy low, sell high.
I didn’t see a need to do that. I think it’s a healthy discussion, no?
I restored them, there’s no reason to go delete comments that are harmless and part of the discussion.
In fairness to Mora, he’s been popular for a long time now and has a following. He didn’t just come out of nowhere. He first came into my radar many years ago from hearing online chatter how great the series Once and Future was. That series has a rabid fanbase.
I kept hearing about how rabid the fans were for this series that several years ago I came across a dealer that was selling all the various issues for $1 (Canadian) each. I bought the entire thing and now have a shortbox of the issues, multiples of each. My thought process at the time was since I got it for so cheap I could hold on to them and see if the series would be a good spec down the road. If it doesn’t pop I could easily unload them and get my money back or keep it in my collection. This was way before all his covers heated up.
I like Mora’s style. It’s a cross between Sean Murphy and Jim Lee. Hopefully this Mora train keeps rolling and it trickles down to his earlier works. My body is ready and papa need new shoes.
Just for the record…I think all comics aside from a few select true keys are heading to zero town in the future…but you may all pass on before it’s realized.
(Except me, because I’m going to live forever).
I just don’t see today’s youth carrying this hobby forward. So it’s pretty much all manipulation…some more direct than others. But that in depth discussion is for a different thread.
The way I approach it is to have a budget (as a monthly hobby “expense”) and anything above that gets funded through sales. So if it all goes to zero then i really didn’t lose anything net wise…not any more than someone who’s hobby is golf or playing video games…
I certainly don’t see my comics as some future payoff…that would be a bonus…but not an expectation.
We operate in a pretty closed environment here, so who would be doing the manipulation. We are pretty good at seeing trends and jumping in early, but no one on here is shouting “Buy More Mora” anywhere, so where do you think the manipulation is coming from?
Also, it has been noted that a high volume of these books are from Chinese buyers, at least for the beefcake Nightwing covers.
I think his increased profile is simply from being on bigger titles than he used to be, and he’s fast enough to be putting out tons of covers. Who knows why some “pop” over others. He’s too prolific at this point to predict what will be sought after later on, other than keeping an on variants for more niche titles.
I would argue that about comics in general! I don’t have any massive keys I ever hold onto for long because I never know if they’ll suddenly lose their luster.
That right there… comics are really piss poor investments, at least for the long term investing. I hope people aren’t counting on comics they buy for their retirement cause that’s just not a great way to invest in your future if you ask me.
I disagree to an extent. Rich people have long used commodities such as art, baseball cards, comics, and others as a place to park cash. So with that said, most every day modern books aren’t going to make you rich. I do like flipping but changed up my strategy to include dropping some of the profits into investment accounts. I also buy silver and gold coins, but with how expensive precious metals are right now, I am buying very few. Platinum had the bottom drop out of it. Used to be worth more than gold and then it fell to less than half of gold prices. Anyway, take some of your profits from selling comics and invest it in something, hell even a savings bond, and let the money grow.
I think the concept of FOMO is sort of nonsense. It’s supply and demand. We see artists get hot (and then usually cool) all the time. Books go up in price because they get harder to find, and we sellers know the demand has now surpassed supply. This is just how this, and virtually every collectible market goes. Will the trendline continue this way? Almost assuredly not. Probably quite the opposite.
I’ve sold a bunch (maybe majority) of Mora/RedHood/Putri/Nightwing books to what I can non-traditional comic buyers. Far more women than ever before. Far more overseas, but not just China. LGBTQ buyers. One guy was buying one of these books for his partner, and he was so excited to get it for him. I got the impression neither were comic collectors.
I think most use it not for investment but for tax write offs, well, particularly for artwork. Buy modern art, get buddy appraiser to say it’s worth millions, tax break by donating to local museum to display…
But nowadays, I don’t think most collectibles, at least the ones that take years to grow value are good investments since most of the time you’ll be already dead before it’s worth enough to sell. How many grown men who held onto to their Action Comics #1 or Detective Comics #27 made it long enough to get the full blown value we see now?
And now when all these modern collectibles are going straight to encapsulation, we’re gonna have hundreds and thousands in pristine condition compared to the golden and silver age books that got treated mostly as periodicals to read and the amount that got thrown out. Most of this modern crap is not rare nor special compared to the collectibles that actually survived the decades of poor or mistreatment from the owners.
Some of the recent auctions we have seen are people who purchased recently reselling at a higher price on these whale key books.
There are currently 81 Action Comics and 77 Detective 27’s on the cgc census. Thats not a lot. One of the better grades comes up and those that want one really need to shell out now.
The most recent Superman #1 sale was a grown woman…I’m not sure how she acquired it, but she held on to it…and died before selling it…but her kids benefited…once they found it in some boxes in her house. She knew what she had and didn’t part with it.
I thought I read they found it in the attic after the original owner died?
