Since I posted on the other site...
That was a very interesting situation as was with a few other exquisite cards. and Id just like to make a few points.
As it was obvious to me, from the price history of the cards that he was just purely trying to profit from volume weighted average price. By that I mean he was exploiting how most people seem to value copies of the same card using 'last paid price' or a few most recent prices, thereby treating demand as being perfectly elastic (and homogenous) for all consumers based on 'last paid' price. That I think is completely flawed....
Just for example on how he was trying to profit.... lets assume he wanted to 'corner' the market....so he quietly start picking up these kobes at say $100 each...assume he manage to pick up 20 at $100 first...then prices gets pushed up so he picks up 15 more at average $200, then he picks up 10 more at average of $500.
total outlay for these 45 cards then is 2000+3000+5000 = $10000. giving an average price paid for these cards of $222.22 each
lets say he then 'intentionally' overpays for cards from then on (with others help in bidding) and get 5 more cards over time, at prices $1000, $1500, $2000, $2000, $2500 in that order.... so he ends up picking up 50 cards, at total cost of $17,000.
average price per card however has only gone up to $340. But the general market consensus value of his holding would be approximately 50 x $2000 = $100,000, GIVING THE ASSUMPTION THAT HE WILL CONTINUE TO CHASE THESE CARDS AT THOSE PRICES.
You mention that there is a variety of other bidders other than you two...but it is also very likely majority of them were also trying to profit from the fact that they know there is a guy who 'seems' to want to pick up every copy.....when these people see that he is willing to pay $2000 for copies of the cards, they will be willing to pay $1500 naturally, as they can then flip to the coinguy for profit. So in reality the jump in demand from other sources, and the change in perception of 'value' is purely because of the fact that this one guy is attempting to pick up every single copy of the card. And by giving out that perception at a time when he has picked up alot of the cards for cheap already, it is in fact helping him in driving the prices up.
So now this guy has spent $17000 and picked up 50 of these cards. and successfully drove the perception of value of these cards from $100 to $2000 each. Now it is time to cash out, as he hasnt made a profit unless he can sell it.
What can he do....a few things. He can tryo to NOT to give the impression he is selling these. I would fathom a guess that he would try to sell these in smaller shows or going to other dealers, and not go thru ebay, and sell to people who doesnt know his ebay ID. do this secretly for awhile, given he has pushed the prices up (even in beckett) at say a 'discounted'/BS price of $1200-$1500, he can easily recoup cost. Eventually people will catch on, words will travel and those same people who were furiously bidding these up with the main culprit, will no longer bid on these as it become obvious the coinguy is not interested anymore and is selling.
At that time, it become a game of 'find the fool'. he is no longer likely to find alot of people willing to pay the high manipulated price, so he will try to find just one fool instead of the many. he puts up rest of the lot, at a heavily discounted price compared to his last paid....say he has 30 left, and he starts an auction selling all 30 at a total of $3000!! that is ONLY $1000 each!! CHEAP! (sarcasm). Puts in auction what the card has sold, and also what teh book value is etc etc, and say how great an investment it is to purchase and resell each one individually....when in fact whoever buys it has little to no chance to sell and recoup. but like I said...it will only take one fool now for him to be out, and since he has already made a profit, in fact anything above is jsut a bonus.
This strategy works very well with cards with medium print runs like 50-500 imo. stuff that are really limted....5-10 are tough to do because they just dont appear as often, and marginal price will affect average price ALOT MORE. whereas stuff that have higher print run are harder to get a good %.
As you can see, this is just one way people manipulate price and perception of value....there is also no guarantee it works...in addition the same strategy could be applied to any card really.....which is why I just dont pay attention to all the 90s euphoria atm, or really any sudden spike in a certain set.
