Fantastic Four as your 401(k)

October 3, 2008 | 2:20 pm

Every month when the warehouse storage bill comes, I tell my wife that all those boxes of old comic books I'm keeping should be thought of as a great investment. And right on cue, she rolls her eyes and reminds me that all those boxes aren't worth anything unless I sell them.

Harrumph.

Well, now the Wall Street Journal, that bastion of investment culture, says I was actually ahead of the market curve all those years ago when I sealed my gorgeous copy of "Fantasic Four" No. 48 up inside a Mylar bag:

Mark Craddock, manager of Comic Book World, in Florence, Ky., says stock-market investors also are turning to superheroes. "There's kind of a buying frenzy" in vintage comic books, he says.

The "Silver Age Comic Book Pricing Index" of 32 frequently traded '60s comics, was up 14.2% in the 18 months ending in July, while the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index was down 11% in the same period. Mark Haspel, president of Certified Guaranty Co. in Sarasota, Fla., which grades comic books, often for investors, says it's on track to handle 200,000 books this year, up from 150,000 in 2007.

"Spiderman is going to be here in 20 years -- he's not going away," Mr. Haspel says.

That's an excerpt from an article by Jennifer Levitz on all the quirky investments that are gaining traction amid these bruising seasons on Wall Street. All of you deep-pocket corporations looking for a place to put your money, I have a full run of "West Coast Avengers" taking up waaaay too much space, it's yours if the money is right.

-- Geoff Boucher

Photo by Spencer Weiner/Los Angeles Times shows collectors buying up vintage books at Comic-Con International in San Diego in 2007.