Auction Update Review
Week 6, Spring 2010, One Auction Archived through February 13, 2010
For the week just ending 8 auctions were completed and one archived. This coming week we'll add the other sales to the AED.
The one sale archived was a good one. PBA successfully sold $268,224 of material on the 8th. It was one of 4 auctions in California over the past week. Heritage staged two at its new Beverly Hills showroom and Bonhams and Butterfield is completing one today [Sunday] as we release this weekly update.
The California sales were held in conjunction with the ABAA's LA Book Fair. The fair, by some reports, was below expectations both for attendance and sales. The audience was a little grayer and the mood more cautious. Star gazers, looking for something closer to home than the Milky Way would have seen Jesse Jackson in the lobby and Ricky Jay touring the show on Friday. On Saturday morning Bill O'Reilly was in the building.
No one visiting the fair would have been disappointed. The material was first rate and the dealers, in most cases, open to negotiation. The ABAA's next fair is in New York in April. Collectors and institutions will get a second chance.
We have updated the monthly charts to reflect improving results in the auction rooms. They show that the market is recovering. These numbers however obscure the widening separation between the exceptional and the mundane. Great material is rebounding while common material continues to fall. It's a new world.
Bruce McKinney
February 14, 2010