The Certified Collectibles Group (CCG) and Certified Guaranty Company (CGC) acknowledged a number of scams involving their graded comics on Dec. 28, 2023. The company is best known for giving an objective grade for comics, putting them in an unopenable hard plastic shell without destroying the certification, and creating value for collectors who have these comics at certain levels.
First reported on Instagram by the9.9newsstand, an account dedicated to graded comic products, first noticed the scam happening when an Amazing Spider-Man #252 issue featuring the first of Peter Parker in the black costume, graded at 9.8, sold for $15,700. This particular version has a “Mark Jewelers” insert, which is rare for the Amazing Spider-Man issue. What he ended up finding was a deep scam involving CGC graded comics.
YouTuber Swagglehouse went over the copy, zooming in on the picture and showing some damage to the corners of the book immediately, which would have disqualified it from being a 9.8 grading under CGC standards. This makes it crazier that the sale went for such an extreme amount when it appeared this is not a legit CGC 9.8 copy.
The Instagram account noticed a picture of the Amazing Spider-Man issue from an earlier sale in August, where the book sold for $2,247. This sale was the same book because both comics featured the CGC certification number 4277700004.
In the picture of the August sale, the sold version did not have a custom label with a picture of Spider-Man to note the key issue, and it also did not note it was a Mark Jewelers variant on the CGC label. That version, as pointed out by Swagglehouse, was a true 9.8 graded comic with a nearly perfect book inside. So how did it have the same certification number with what was a different book?
The9.9newstand noted this graded comic book was “recognized to be a Mark Jewelers that CGC previously missed, and resubmitted to CGC to be re-encapsulated as a Mark Jewelers with Mark Jewelers noted on the label. The cert number has since been updated as Mark Jewelers. The book now encapsulated, however, is not the same book. Just look at the condition of the book.”
Someone opened the original book, put in a different copy of a lesser graded version, and sent the book into CGC to get a new shell that labeled it Mark Jewelers to get it back as a labeled 9.8 and resell a lesser-graded book at a higher graded comic price.
“The scammers out there, man, are getting next level with their ability to abuse the system,” Swagglehouse said of this controversy, talking about how there are people out there presenting facsimile versions as the real ones, making reproduction covers to make a book look higher grade, and now abusing the resubmission system.
CGC recognized this problem with graded comics, commenting on their website:
“The Certified Collectibles Group is aware of an incident involving an individual tampering with CGC Comics holders.
The Certified Collectibles Group® (CCG®), which includes Certified Guaranty Company® (CGC®), is aware of an incident involving an individual tampering with CGC Comics holders. Based on our initial review, we believe that the incident affects a few hundred comic books.
CCG exists to protect the collecting community, and in the last 36 years we have certified more than 85 million collectibles, each one backed by a comprehensive guarantee. The trust that we have built with our community sometimes makes us a target of bad actors and, despite our vigilance, this individual tampered with some of our holders.
If you purchased one of the books that this individual tampered with, we will ensure that you are appropriately compensated for losses arising from any failures in our services. We expect to share a list of books that we believe are impacted as soon as possible.
We have also retained a leading private investigative service and outside counsel to conduct a comprehensive review of this incident and our processes, and to help ensure that this individual is held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. We have already made significant improvements to our processes as a result of this incident, and we will continue to take appropriate steps to help ensure that this type of incident does not happen again.
We expect to share more information when we have it. In the meantime, if you have any questions or would like to share any information with CCG, please reach out to us at ReportFraud@CollectiblesGroup.com.”
With graded comics now suspect as to their validity even with a CGC shell and CGC admitting there are hundreds of copies out there that could be fraudulent, one can’t help but wonder if this will cause great upheaval to the collector’s comic market.
What do you think about the CGC graded comic scandal involving Amazing Spider-Man #252 Mark Jewelers edition? Let us know in the comments.
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