Do you have a GoldenEye for a bargain?

With the latest James Bond film arriving in UK cinemas next week, could the nation’s favourite spy be a licence to profit, or do rising prices mean it is no time to buy? Adam Williams reports

He is an international spy and one of the most famous fictional characters in British history, but James Bond could also be a smart investment.

The latest instalment of the 007 film series – No Time To Die – is released on Thursday and is his most anticipated appearance yet.

Covid had succeeded where Blofeld, Goldfinger and co failed and halted Bond in his tracks. Now, after three pandemic delays, the arrival of the new film has prompted a flurry of interest in 007 memorabilia, with books, posters and other merchandise selling for thousands of pounds.

LIVE AND LET BUY Bond may be better known today as a film icon, but the original Ian Fleming books are the most desired items among collectors. The rarest is Casino Royale, the first book to be published, which was printed in 1953 with a run of 4,728 copies. A copy in good condition sold for £32,760 at auction at Sotheby’s last year.

Charles Ashton, of Cheffins, an auction house, said: “The holy grail when it comes to Bond books are the earliest releases, ideally signed by Ian Fleming himself and in great condition.”

For some collectors, Bond has been a lifelong obsession. Michael Day, 68, was born two weeks before Casino Royale was published and has been a devotee since childhood. “Growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, James Bond was a hugely exciting figure,” he said.

A first edition collection of the 13 novels in good condition is valued at about £70,000. Mr Day owns two complete sets and has travelled as far as Australia and South Africa to track down books that were missing from his collection. “I sell copies to fund the purchase of better copies,” he said. “As collectors we always want the best copy we can have.”

As well as his love of 007, Mr Day said that there were good financial reasons to invest in books. “It’s a hedge against inflation and will also be something to leave to my children,” he said.

Mr Day’s favourite item is a first edition copy of The Man with the Golden Gun. He said Jonathan Cape, the publisher, would emboss a symbol on the side of each Bond book and for this first edition it chose a pistol in gold leaf. “However they hugely underestimated how much gold leaf would be needed,” he said. “So only 700 or so copies out of a print run of around 70,000 ended up with the gold leaf before they ran out. They are worth between £6,000 to £12,000, depending on the condition, and rising.”

Mr Ashton said that other soughtafter books were the first editions of Live and Let Die, Moonraker and From Russia, with Love. “Especially when accompanied by their original dust jackets, which also need to be in good condition,” he explained. A first edition copy of Live and Let Die was recently sold by Cheffins for £4,900.

A VIEW TO A BILL Posters have always been a mainstay of any Bond obsessive’s collection. At a 007-themed sale this summer, the auction house Ewbank’s sold an original

film poster for Thunderball for £4,800, while a smaller version sold for £4,000, more than twice the presale estimate.

Other sales included an original script of For Your Eyes Only, which sold for £800, and a car number plate prop from Skyfall, which sold for £550.

Even mass- produced items can be worth a small fortune. The producers of the Bond films were among the first to recognise the sales potential of movie merchandise. Even in the 1960s, film releases were accompanied by toy cars, badges and trading cards, often sold inside packs of bubblegum.

In the 1970s and 1980s this had moved on to plastic toy guns and T-shirts, and by the 1990s new films were accompanied by thousands of pieces of merchandise and tie- in items, including cocktail preparation kits, deodorant and video games.

Even the most obscure tie-in products are now collected. The James Bond Collection, an independent archive of memorabilia, holds 007-branded CocaCola cans and empty bags of Golden Wonder crisps in its catalogue.

DR. NO SALE Memorabilia prices typically increase when a new film is released, before falling back once the hype has died down. But, unlike Bond’s vodka martini, collectors need not be shaken should

prices fluctuate. Mr Ashton said: “The massive promotional machine behind Bond always has a positive effect on second-hand sales at auction.”

So what could become the valuable items of the future? The Royal Doulton porcelain bulldog, first seen in Skyfall, is already a collectors’ item. A new No Time To Die version has been released priced at £65, while older models sell for three times that amount.

The Folio Society, the publisher, has also re-released some of Fleming’s classic novels with new cover illustrations by the artist Fay Dalton.