I want to preface by saying that I am not sure that everything has to come down but I definitely do think that the market is very strange at the moment. So to answer your question “what is the actual variable that will cause demand to drop off?” (which I think is a good question) -
I think it’s fair to say that for the cards to be 10xing, a lot of new buyers have to be making very quick and rash decisions (that’s not to say a rash decision can’t be a financially successful one, sometimes you need that risky conviction to be successful). But if a significant portion of new buyers are rash up on the way up, it’s logical to guess that they would also be rash on the flatline/way down.
Pokémon can stop being cool again. Pokémon has had many times in it’s 30 year history of being uncool. When Pokémon wasn’t cool, it was cheap. Now it’s cool to flex your low pop Pokémon cards on social media alongside cars and jewellery, it’s expensive. I remember when Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT display pictures where the biggest cool online social media flex, with Eminem, Shaq etc etc having them. Now they’re not cool and they’re down 97%. Drake got destroyed by Kendrick in a rap beef and now OVO clothing is seriously uncool and the stores are dead. I’m sure there are many more examples, but being uncool can kill interest quickly.
When I go to card shows, funnily enough the majority of customers aren’t the 30 somethings who grew up in the first Pokémon boom of 1999, they’re early 20s kids. They’re at a stage in life where that online flex validation and hustler mindset is a priority. When they get older and more settled and need to buy property, start a family, etc then their priorities will probably shift (which is why I believe there are less of the 30 something original crowd at the shows, their priorities have already shifted to those things). If they aren’t replaced by another wave of early 20s with the same conviction in Pokémon cards, then that would also lead to a big retrace.
They’re the first things that come to mind for me. Like I say, I really like the question and think it’s important for people on both sides of the market up/market down debate to think about why they think that way and if they’re actually true beliefs, or just what they want to think because they prefer that outcome.
A good case study on this subject would be PSA 10 CD promos. Now it’s been awhile since I’ve dove into pop reports, but they are among the most graded vintage cards. I’ve always thought of them as something that would always be there, too saturated to really suffer a price spike. Fast forward to now and the prices on Charizard, Blastoise, Venusaur have been shooting up like crazy the past 6 months. Whatever buyer pool that is moving into the market has began to kirby up the supply.
If they aren’t replaced by another wave of early 20s with the same conviction in Pokémon cards, then that would also lead to a big retrace.
The multi generational appeal where parents introduce their kids to the games and media creates a self sustaining cycle. Pokemon is arguably the biggest IP by revenue and cultural reach. It’s the highest grossing media franchise ever created. It has already demonstrated staying power across three decades. Few maintain relevance for that long. It’s the definition of lindy effect unlike the examples you mentioned which were a fad.
It’s truly remarkable how little supply there comes up even during a price action frenzy like this. Alot of people genuinely like these cards more than they like hard dollars and that sort of 30 year long attachment you cannot replicate. NFT projects tried and failed miserably because a low capped population of something is not enough. You need genuine interest to maintain the price floor’s over multiple market cycles.
So far pokemon has always managed to create higher price floors after every market cycle and I don’t think this will change anytime soon.
With that being said I wouldn’t be surprised if we tank -50% soon enough but I also wouldn’t be surprised if we 200% again either
The lack of resupply is a major difference from 2020. Its hugely dependent on bringing prices down on the Older, Rarer, Minter; Better cards. Obviously some record prices will retrace, but record prices are like a clickbait thumbnail, they aren’t the actual content. The lack of resupply is more important and influential and it not happening like it was in the previous boom.
Also the second point about NFT’s is very valuable. Even if these new boogeyman buyers are a bunch of crypto speculators, its speculation on top of something that has immense organic demand, and difficult to acquire. I’m not a science guy, but a ton of energy + friction probably creates heat. Why there is so much frustration around price spikes is the demand talking. You never once saw someone say, man I really wish pixelated lamas were cheaper so I could complete my collection. With that said, there will be drops, but cards with strong fundamentals, and little to no resupply summon the old smpratte adage, where is the cheaper option?
I mean I agree with this, it just depends on how long the hype can be sustained. I also agree with your position on the overall popularity of the Pokémon franchise, but I disagree that popularity longevity is guaranteed to translate to an ever-increasing spending on graded trading cards. Pokémon as a franchise might be 30 years strong, but spending $5k on JP base Pikachu PSA10 is not.
How did you come up with that conclusion? Based on what metrics?
What’s quite interesting is that I always thought that crypto and Pokémon cycles correlate with each other, but it seems to not be the case anymore. Crypto is in a deep bear market right now, and the majority of people over there aren’t playing a rotational game.
The crypto card gacha volumes have virtually nuked, and nobody on the timeline is talking about Pokémon but rather concerned about where and when BTC bottoms. The few “legitimate” vault tokenized TCG projects are also down 90% similar to the rest of the market.
Risk appetite is low, and people are preserving capital—typical bear market sentiment like in 2018 and 2022.
This is a healthy and positive indicator for our market. It seems to not depend on crypto being in boom cycles to expand, thats why I was wondering how you came up with your conclusion about diminishing organic demand.
The major speculative group has been the overlap from cryptobro liquidity, and right now for the first time, the two markets seem to have decoupled. I think the “sneaker reseller” group is still quite involved, however, rather with flipping modern and not high-end vintage IMO.
Because Pokemon has alot of emotional value intertwined in it. You would have to have a genuine love of the hobby to see it. No amount of money or metrics can show you this. As of the recent years hundreds of thousands of people are missing this love, and fans not being able to get product for their self/children, theft, etc is solely leading to pushing actual true fans away and replacing them with people who want to take advantage of it. In the end its going to end up like any other meme coin at the rate people treat it.
where were these ppl in 2024, when you would buy gold star eeveelutions for 2k apiece gold star mewtwo for 3k, aquapolis/skyridge umbreon for 3/4k among other things
also things would go “unpaid” at 1/10th the value that ppl are paying today, so much so that u typically had 2-3 “tries” at any given auction i specifically remember a no rarity pika that got unpaid like 4 times until i eventually snagged it for around 3k
Yeah that’s a fair point! When things begin to retrace it will likely line up with exactly where the organic interest is and from there we can start to see the impact of the artificial demand, same happened in the 2020 boom prices retraced but stabilized to where the organic demand was. It’s the reason why Pokémon didn’t just go to 0 and still held strong value and interest as people actually do care about Pokémon. I suppose this is the case for any market that gets hot you get all the speculators and investment flipper bros piling in bt at some point they need to take profits which will be interesting to see how well the market digests the sell offs
Can anyone here actually provide a solid example of another collectible or “asset” that quickly exploded in value like vintage has recently and retained that value in the short term without a significant retrace?
It’s insane how we see the same market dynamics (extreme booms followed by huge retraces in value) happen again and again in different collectibles and assets, yet you will always hear a contingent of “this time it’s different!!!” from a subset of people invested.
Fools and their money, or however the saying goes….
not a physical asset no, maybe something digital like stonks or bitcoins
just to put into perspective how cray cray the market is mtg alpha power nine 10s which have been the “holy grail” of tcg for 20+ years or most of everyones here entire lives and also to this day still have way lower pops are barely outselling common ass pokemans now (not even the “upper end” ones anymore)
I think there is some resupply waiting to be graded at PSA at the moment…
I know that isn’t true for some of the monster Pokemon grails some people on here have. But I think there is a good amount of resupply coming for the crypto bros and uneducated “diversification” investors.
Certain rolex & patek sports models & crypto if that counts.
Nothing goes up forever without retracing. Even the biggest bulls in here are not claiming otherwise. Even on places like reddit people do not believe it is a new paradigm from what I saw
Prices will come down but they will not come down to pre boom prices. Thats how cyclical markets usually behave and thats how Pokemon has behaved until now
Yes, the only two things I can compare it to in the collectible space are Michael Jordan rookies or autographed cards and probably the most comparable are Ohtani rookie cards have exploded in the last two years and continue to go up each day
So there are rolex’s that have gone up 15x-20x in the span of a few months and maintained that value long term without any retrace?
I think the thing I struggle with anytime we have a boom like this is with the thought “if we all acknowledge there is going to be significant retracing, why and who are still paying these insane prices?”. Time and time again, people buy at the top and watch the value of the card lose a significant % of its value. Its happened in pokemon at least 3x since 2016.
Like, how could an individual who is well versed in the pokemon market and its history justify paying these prices when we all know its not sustainable?
It’s like watching a super slow car crash in real time.
I just can’t reconcile these thoughts with the idea that the current market is normal or reasonable.
Does gold count? Starting from 2024, it has been going up parabolic and is now about 3x from then. There was a little retrace in late Jan of this year but has retraced the retrace and is nearly at the same peak again.
