How does a 19 year old have $1,500 in 1972?

[sportscardpete]

I was able to gather some data from a local Bloomberg machine.. Here is what I come up with:


Returns from day of Wagner purchase to 5/31/2011

We shouldn't have to debate compounding vs. simple interest, unless we calculate dividends as well (which I will not do)! Way too much time. Anyway:


Honus Wagner Return: 2580%

Disney: 4493%

Microsoft: 29015% (in much less time)

Apple: 8629%

S&P 500: 1194%

Coca Cola: 2577%


So to sum it up, the Honus Wagner beat the S&P. Pretty impressive. I can go into detail if anyone wants me to.

[baseballart]

Originally Posted by sportscardpete

I was able to gather some data from a local Bloomberg machine.. Here is what I come up with:


Returns from day of Wagner purchase to 5/31/2011

We shouldn't have to debate compounding vs. simple interest, unless we calculate dividends as well (which I will not do)! Way too much time. Anyway:


Honus Wagner Return: 2580%

Disney: 4493%

Microsoft: 29015% (in much less time)

Apple: 8629%

S&P 500: 1194%

Coca Cola: 2577%


So to sum it up, the Honus Wagner beat the S&P. Pretty impressive. I can go into detail if anyone wants me to.

My stock picks look more like this:

Bre-X (-100%)
Nortel (-100%)
JDS Uniphase (-100%)

As pointed out above, the owner also gets to look at the Wagner. (Me, I get to look at a box of 89 Donruss)

[Big Ben]

Originally Posted by sportscardpete

I was able to gather some data from a local Bloomberg machine.. Here is what I come up with:


Returns from day of Wagner purchase to 5/31/2011

We shouldn't have to debate compounding vs. simple interest, unless we calculate dividends as well (which I will not do)! Way too much time. Anyway:


Honus Wagner Return: 2580%

Disney: 4493%

Microsoft: 29015% (in much less time)

Apple: 8629%

S&P 500: 1194%

Coca Cola: 2577%


So to sum it up, the Honus Wagner beat the S&P. Pretty impressive. I can go into detail if anyone wants me to.

Love the number crunching! But as an investment, the Wagner card would be tough to keep once the market for the card and the hobby took off the way it did in the 1980's-early 1990's.

[barrysloate]

If you bought a decent Wagner for $1500 in 1972, I don't even have to pull out my calculator to tell you you've done really really well. Not everybody can pick exactly the right stock or commodity, and seems like the rate of return on that Wagner is as much as any of us could hope for. Why quibble?

[sports-rings]

The wagner in the photo seemed very nice and lacking any cracks seen in many Wagner psa 1's. It also had 4 decent corners.

An undiscovered Wagner was auctioned off by Phillip Weiss for $800,000 about 2 years ago.

Perhaps Bill Mastro paid a "record price" for the card back than because it was a very high quality Wagner and my $400,000 was way too conservative?