The median graded comic sale in the last reporting fortnight was $105. That is the number worth holding onto while you read the rest of this, because it describes the hobby most of us actually live in: a $105 book, bought and sold a few thousand times a day, nothing dramatic about it.
Now the other number. Between September 22 and October 5, GPAnalysis tracked 20,904 graded comic sales totaling $13,443,894. Broken out by decade of publication, the 2020s produced about $262,000 in top-five sales. Roughly 85 percent of that came from a single title that launched in October 2024 at a cover price of $4.99.
Absolute Batman is not just the best-performing modern comic. On the graded market, it is close to the only modern comic with real money in it. And the way that money is distributed inside the title is the most instructive thing happening in comics right now.
One title, one decade
The decade-by-decade breakdown of that fortnight reads like a map of where comic money actually lives. The 1940s led everything with about $2.81 million in top-five sales, driven by a single Captain America Comics #1 in CGC 9.0 that brought $716,750 through Heritage. That one book was about 5.3 percent of every graded comic dollar spent in the two-week window.
The 1960s came second at roughly $1.59 million. Amazing Spider-Man moved the most units of any title in the period, about 1,260 books for close to $1 million, which is why the summary line on that report was that Spider-Man drove the transactions and the Golden Age drove the dollars.
Then look at the modern end. The 2010s managed about $100,800 in top-five sales, led by Ultimate Fallout #11 at $43,922. The 2000s came in near $134,000, led by a Walking Dead #1 at $69,121. The 2020s cleared $262,000, and Absolute Batman supplied around $224,000 of it. Second place in the decade was the Absolute Batman SDCC Ashcan at $9,959. Third was an Amazing Spider-Man from 2022 at $9,921.
That is not a healthy modern market with a standout. That is one book and a long drop.
The grade cliff
Here is where it gets strange, and where collectors need to pay attention.
Pull up the price history on Absolute Batman #1 and the curve looks almost flat through the grades most of us own. As of mid-October, raw copies were running around $307. A CGC 9.6 was selling in the $380 to $408 range across four sales between September 20 and October 11. A CGC 9.8 was averaging about $580, with recent closes at $579.95, $595.95, and $620. A CGC 8.0 brought $181.
So the entire spread from a Very Fine copy to a Near Mint/Mint copy is about $400. Fine, that is a normal modern book.
Then you reach 9.9. There are ten copies registered at that grade, three signed and seven unsigned. No copies exist at 10.0. On August 20 an unsigned 9.9 sold on eBay for $10,000. About a month later, a different unsigned 9.9 sold for $18,000.
That is a roughly 80 percent gain in thirty days, on a book whose next grade down trades for less than six hundred dollars. The ratio between a 9.8 and a 9.9 on the same comic is now better than thirty to one.
For context on how fast this developed: in early December 2025, the CGC population report showed 3,730 graded copies of Absolute Batman #1, and the record sale for a 9.8 was $401. The population has multiplied several times over since, 9.8s now close two or three times a day, and the ceiling has moved from four hundred dollars to eighteen thousand.
Why 400,000 copies did not kill it
The usual objection is obvious. Absolute Batman #1 is not scarce. The first printing was at least 250,000 copies, the issue went through eleven printings, and something in the range of 400,000 copies exist. The title now moves more than 300,000 copies a month, which would make it the fourth-largest publisher in the direct market if it stood alone.
Print run has stopped being the variable. Two things replaced it.
The first is the variant economy. Issue #1 carried 33 exclusive covers between later printings and convention editions. Issue #18 had 45 exclusives across 21 stores. Issue #19 had 53 across 23 stores, and a reasonable estimate puts the retailer-exclusive share of that issue's print run near 140,000 copies on its own. Scott Snyder has said DC is now capping retailer exclusives, which reads as a ceiling around fifty per month. When a book has fifty covers, the "book" is no longer the collectible. The specific cover is.
The second is grading severity. Foil stock, heavy spot gloss, and tight modern spines mean the 9.9 and 10.0 tiers simply are not being handed out. When a census shows ten copies at 9.9 and zero at 10.0 against tens of thousands submitted, the top of the grade scale becomes a genuinely finite object sitting inside an infinitely available comic. That is the cliff.
The money is paying for labor, not paper
The highest price ever realized on anything Absolute Batman is not a 9.9. On June 24, a one-of-one sketch cover painted by Dan Quintana sold for $18,550 during a Whatnot livestream on the Knight of Comics channel, with bidding past $5,000 before the auction formally opened. Quintana's original oil painting for the Heavy Mental Collectibles retailer exclusive on issue #16 sold through Heritage for $100,000.
Below that sits a tier of signed and remarked copies. A foil SDCC Ashcan #1 in 9.8 signed by Snyder and Nick Dragotta brought $12,000. The same ashcan in 9.9 brought $8,888.88. A Philip Tan black-and-white NYCC cover with a Dragotta sketch in 9.8 brought $6,500. By mid-July, more than fifty distinct Absolute Batman copies had crossed $1,500 on eBay alone, and at least fifteen of them were signed.
Read that list again and the pattern is clear. Almost nothing on it is valuable because of the comic. It is valuable because a specific person drew on, signed, or painted that specific copy. The market has quietly decided that in a 400,000-copy title, the scarce input is artist time.
What to do if you own one
A few practical conclusions follow from the numbers above.
Do not submit a raw copy chasing the 9.9. The expected value is not close. At roughly $580 for a 9.8 against grading, shipping, and insurance costs, a 9.8 is a thin but real margin on a clean raw copy bought near $307. A 9.9 is a ten-ticket lottery across a population in the thousands. Submit for the 9.8, price the 9.9 at zero, and you will not be disappointed.
If you own a signed, remarked, or store-exclusive copy, the live-selling channels are where the comparable sales are happening. The $18,550 record and a good share of the four-figure sales ran through Whatnot streams, not traditional auction houses. That is where the bidders for this specific kind of object are sitting.
Watch the first appearances rather than the reprints. Issue #20 brings the first Robins of the Absolute line, #21 puts Batman in front of the Absolute Joker, and #22 carries first appearances of Penguin and Two-Face. First-appearance issues at cover price are the only part of this market where a collector still gets in at retail.
And be honest about concentration risk. A decade whose graded value is 85 percent one title is a decade with a single point of failure. An animated series has been announced without a date, which is the sort of catalyst that pulls prices forward and then leaves them exposed. The books that hold are the ones a person actually wants on a shelf.
Key Takeaways
- Absolute Batman supplied roughly 85 percent of 2020s top-five graded sales in the September 22 to October 5 window, about $224,000 of $262,000.
- The grade curve is nearly flat to 9.8 and then vertical: raw near $307, 9.6 around $400, 9.8 around $580, and a 9.9 at $18,000 against a population of ten.
- Print run stopped mattering. Fifty-plus retailer exclusives per issue and severe foil-era grading moved scarcity from the issue to the individual copy.
- The genuine top of this market is artist labor: a one-of-one Quintana sketch cover at $18,550 and his issue #16 oil at $100,000.
- Submit for the 9.8, not the 9.9. Sell signed and remarked copies where the live-selling bidders are. Buy first appearances at cover.
Prices in collectibles move quickly, and every figure here is a snapshot from mid-October 2026 drawn from reported sales and census data. Treat them as estimates, verify against current comparable sales before buying or selling, and assume the top of this particular market is more volatile than most.