BBOOTS

listings on eBay
 #172  by Audrius
 
This partial sheet of 40 sk of Second Vilnius Issue, Grodno postmark, CTO originally from the Hermann Logsch collection was first sold on eBay in December 2008 for $527. Then in October 2010 it was sold again on eBay for $416. Few days ago this sheet was sold for $198.

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We know that this item wasn't offered for sale on eBay by a distressed collector. If eBay auctions of more valuable items are any indication of valuation trends, this latest sale may be an indication of a new long-term downtrend.

This may be an early indication that the long-term uptrend that had been seen since 90s is coming to an end and that prices of rare collectibles are headed lower from here. However, it may just be a blip rather than a legit reversal. Of course, only time will tell.

What do you think?
 #175  by vitg
 
The eventual price platau and even a slight downtrend is clearly expected and is indeed currently seen to a small degree in both Baltic and Russian philately. What's interesting - is that truely unique items still fetch rather high premiums, but simply nice and relatively rare items (like the one pictured), which were drasticly overpriced in 2005-2010 are being sold recently closer to their true value.
Also, I have to warn everyone that it is silly to judge the market based on a single eBay auction. eBay is frequently highly unpreditable. eBay prices can often be unexpected and unexplainable.
 #176  by qatarstamps
 
This is my comment on the Lithuania partial sheet that was sold on ebay for $198. There was really only two bidders on it. You were correct, the stamp market is going down in value. From 20-50%, sometimes more on stamps valued $1,000 or less and you're seeing a trend in the regular auctions, not only ebay, that stamps over $1,000 to say $10,000 are not even selling. Then there's one other factor you have to figure in. Years ago just about everyone, wanted to own a sheet or blocks, with the trend I have seen that the buyers of the sheets and blocks are dealers to break them up. It looks like the collectors now are just content to own just a single stamp.

I can comment with accuracy on the U.S. stamp market. Blocks, pairs, they are all being broken down for singles. As for the major rarities, they too have shown weakness. You have seen the prices that were achieved in the German auction for the German WWII issue. They were very high but they would have been higher if the economy was better. If you take a look at auction companies, their unsold lots, which most of it you can tell go to the book, are up about 15% from last year. If you take another look the modern stamps, I would say from the 1960s to now are selling much better than the classic stamps.

The collectors are now looking more to complete the modern part of the collection and we're finding less collectors that are specializing in issues. In the U.S. collecting field the post masters of the 1840s has basically stayed the same price for 10 years almost. Yes when a few of the extreme rarities come up, they do achieve high prices but not the prices they should be selling for. The stamp market is going down in my opinion. And it will stay that way for some time, I hope I am wrong.

And as for ebay, it's a good indicator of pricing. As you know major dealers put their stuff on ebay all of the time and their sales have not been good.