Final Order Cutoff (FOC)
Final Order Cutoff (FOC) is the deadline -- typically the Monday (or Sunday for several major publishers) before a comic's release, at a fixed cutoff time -- by which comic shop retailers must lock in their final order quantities with their distributor. After FOC passes, the publisher/distributor commits to the print run based on the orders accumulated by that point, which directly determines the issue's final print quantity and, for ratio/incentive variants, the number of variant covers that will actually be produced.
A fixed deadline by which participants must commit to an allocation in a limited offering, after which the issuer locks in final quantities and no further orders can be accepted, is a standard mechanism for matching supply to confirmed demand before production or issuance.
Real-World Comic Market Application
If retailers collectively order 8,000 copies of an issue by its FOC deadline, the publisher generally commits to printing at or near that 8,000-copy figure; orders placed after FOC typically cannot be filled from that print run.
Domain Guardrails & Anti-Patterns
Do not assume a comic's print run is fixed at solicitation -- it is fixed at Final Order Cutoff, based on accumulated retailer orders up to that deadline, not the originally announced or estimated print run.
Trade or Inspect Related Assets
Explore comic equity issues governed by this valuation standard.