Friday, June 26, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - June 26

As of yesterday, June 26th the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 206
Sell-Through: 57.28%
Average starting price: $7.28
Average final price: $13.77

Highest Single Card Sale: 2008 Allen & Ginter Barack Obama, $125
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2008 Allen & Ginter Yankee Tribute Set, $101.62
Highest Graded Sale: 2003 LeBron James BGS 10, $355
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2006 Brett Favre, $177.50
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2001 Albert Pujols
* 1961 Mickey Mantle
* 2009 Barack Obama
* Baseball Classic Mark Fidrych

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 1961 Mickey Mantle - 13 bids

The Next Autograph

For the last several Mondays I, like others, have refreshed the homepage of the etopps website around noon, expecting to see the next autograph offering pop up. But each time, the IPOs show up at 1PM instead.

The last one (Masterson) took a bit of time to sell out. Doing a biweekly offering makes sense to keep everyone interested without hurting their wallets but after so many weeks, you would expect them to resume the biweekly schedule since it's now looking more like a monthly schedule.

I think the next autograph will tell us what's going on. Either we're going to be offered something big (as if they wanted to prepare our wallets for this) or the same low priced offering will continue.

I don't think a higher-priced offering will be a problem considering the money being made from this year's baseball offerings so far.

The only other possibility I can think of for the hiatus is the focus on getting signatures for this fall's football season. We don't know whether etopps is so scaled down that Mark is getting the autos himself or someone else is doing this for etopps. It's just a hunch considering the fact that a lot of the autographs come with COAs that show the date of the signature occurred months before the offering.

Friday, June 19, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - June 19

As of yesterday, June 19th the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 140
Sell-Through: 59.29%
Average starting price: $7.20
Average final price: $11.64

Highest Single Card Sale: 2009 Barack Obama, $49.99
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2007 Allen & Ginter Presidents Set, $120
Highest Graded Sale: 2008 Mickey Mantle A&G Yankee Tribute Set, BGS 9.5, $30.99
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2008 Evan Longoria, $117.50
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2001 Albert Pujols
* 2003 LeBron James
* Allen & Ginter SB Champs Brett Favre
* Allen & Ginter Yankee Tribute Mickey Mantle

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2001 Cal Ripken - 7 bids

Friday, June 12, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - June 12

As of yesterday, June 12th the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 196
Sell-Through: 68.88%
Average starting price: $6.80
Average final price: $11.84

Highest Single Card Sale: 2001 Albert Pujols, $45.30
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2006 Mickey Mantle Set, $350
Highest Graded Sale: 2001 Albert Pujols, BCCG 10, $80
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2008 Evan Longoria, $150
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: None

Other best sellers:

* 2003 LeBron James
* 2007 Hunter Pence
* 2007 LeBron James
* 2006 Derek Jeter

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2001 Albert Pujols - 12 bids

Saturday, June 6, 2009

Friday Marketwatch - June 5

As of yesterday, June 5th the following are stats covering the last 7 days on ebay for etopps in-hands:

Quantity of etopps in-hands listings: 160
Sell-Through: 68.13%
Average starting price: $6.56
Average final price: $14.13

Highest Single Card Sale: 2009 Barack Obama Basketball Event, $69.99
Highest Mult-Card Sale: 2007 Adrian Peterson Lot of 2, $32.51
Highest Graded Sale: 2001 LeBron James BGS 9.5, $104.95
Highest Non-Graded Autograph Sale: 2008 Evan Longoria, $150
Highest Graded Autograph Sale: 2006 Chien Ming Wang, BGS 9.5/10, $132.60

Other best sellers:

* 2003 LeBron James
* 2008 Kevin Durant
* 2006 Ian Kinsler
* 2008 A & G Yankee Tribute Set Patch Card

In-hand listing (not including graded or autographed) that received most bids that sold well: 2003 LeBron James - 11 bids

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Autograph Offering: Justin Masterson

Kudos goes to etopps for offering autographs every other week to make it easier for etopps members' wallets. I presented the dilemma of offering high-end autographs vs. low-end autographs at the beginning of the baseball season in light of our economy and the road etopps has chosen seems to be working. IPOs are selling out and so are the autographs so far. As stated in a previous post, the other shoe may drop later in the season, after the all-star break, when wallets are exhausted.

This Thursday, 200 2008 Masterson autos are being offered at $29.99 each and you can buy a maximum of 3 per account.

So is this reasonable? As of this writing, there are only 14 active listings and a bunch of ebay store offerings. Most of the 14 listings are auctions, and so are the completed auctions. $29.99 is about what they're selling for at the close of auctions on average with sticker autos going for $10-$15 on average. For a relief pitching prospect, not bad.

Add another $10 to its value for the etopps "halo effect" (COA, on-the-card auto) and at least another $5 the fact that it's a Red Sox and a rookie card.

I would stop here but there's something else to consider. Trade rumors are flying around already. Big Pappi is falling apart. What if Masterson is on another team by the time you get this autograph in the mail?

Something to think about.