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When 2025’s Free Comic Book Day rolls around this May, it’s looking increasingly likely that the event will have new ownership, with a timeline for the auction of assets from bankrupt owner Diamond Comic Distributors now released by the court.

The Authorized and Approved Bidding Procedures document was released by the US Bankruptcy Court for the District of Maryland earlier this week. In it, the court orders that assets owned by Diamond and its associated companies — specifically, Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc., Comic Holdings, Inc. Comic Exporters, Inc., Diamond Select Toys & Collectibles LLC, Alliance Game Distributors, and Diamond UK — will be offered for sale on the following timeline:

• March 14, 2025: Sale Objection Deadline — basically, if any entity wishes to object to the sale of a particular asset for some reason, that case needs to be made in writing to associated parties including the attorneys representing the debtors, potentially interested parties, and the court itself. As the document states, “Any party or entity that fails to timely make an objection to the Sale on or before the Sale Objection Deadline may be forever barred from asserting any objection to the Sale, including with respect to the transfer of the assets free and clear of all liens, claims, encumbrances, and other interests.”
• March 19, 2025: Bid Deadline — All qualifying bids must be filed by this date. “Qualifying” in this sense could simply be summarized as “those considered by associated parties to be financially viable.”
• March 24, 2025: Asset Auction — In the event that multiple assets have multiple bids, or that parties have bid for multiple assets and the court is needed to rule which party is ultimately successful in the purchase. There is significant wiggle room here; the document notes that the auction may not be necessary, but also that Diamond can request multiple auctions for different elements of its assets.
• March 27, 2025: Sale Hearing — What is intended to be a final hearing to approve on the sales as finalized on March 24.
• April 10, 2025: Sale Closing — If the approved buyer fails to close the sale by April 10, their winning bid is invalidated and whoever bid the next-highest amount during auction becomes the assumed owner of the asset — assuming that they, too, manage to close in a court-mandated period.

All potential bidders will have to be approved as a “qualifying bidder” and pass due diligence in the eyes of the appropriate parties, which includes Diamond itself.

The timeline of a March 24 auction and April 10 closure of sale means that Free Comic Book Day — the intellectual property of which has been Diamond property since its inception — will almost certainly have a new owner by the time the 2025 event takes place May 3, 2025. Diamond has already stated that it is planning to maintain this year's event to the best of its ability, and the comic books themselves traditionally arrive at comic book retailers significantly ahead of the event itself… but it’s going to be worth keeping an eye on FCBD 2025 this year, to see how everything unfolds nonetheless.

Get ready for what's next with our guide to upcoming comics, how to buy comics at a comic shop, and our guide to Free Comic Book Day 2025.