Right, but not every card graded gets immediately listed on ebay, we just have to see how supply plays out. Aside from all of that, there is no real argument right now for heavily declining box prices unless there is a sudden massive increase in supply of these boxes or we see some bigger economic problem that causes to sell off stock.
I agree, in the short term I don’t anticipate the box falling, perhaps increasing far further, but in the long term I am not sure what will happen with the graded supply coming back
The argument for heavily declining box prices is that the box price is currently propped up by speculative demand, which seems to be a natural conclusion given that it was worth $100 for 4 years and spiked to $1000 over the course of the past several months. Speculative demand is generally not sustainable.
Of course, not all of the demand for the box is speculative. Most of the demand might not even be speculative. But speculative demand is clearly a major factor in the box’s rise in price.
That´s exactly the thing, we just don´t know. In Pokémon (and other collectibles for that matter) there is a weird discrepancy between “speculators” - there is a group that is only in something because they want to make a monetary profit as quickly as possible, but there is also a group of people who speculate on a product not to necessarily sell it asap when it rises in price but to just add it to their portfolio/collection before major increases.
edit: a good example for this would be mtg dual lands for example - Someone buys a set of 40 of them, not because they want to flip them but because to just play and avoid paying even more in the future - that removes supply from the market (for a longer time) hence leading to price increases.
The one thing that all speculators have in common is the desire to generate profit. Speculative demand isn’t sustainable. The only sort of sustainable demand is collector demand. And to me, it’s pretty clear that Evolutions boxes have been a target of speculators.
Why is this clear to me? For a variety of reasons, among them the fact that box prices doubled while single prices stayed flat, the fact that the box price grew by 1000% over the course of several months, and the fact that pack prices lag bizarrely far behind box prices (more than they do for basically any other set).
Personally, I try not to buy things that are heavily targeted by speculators. Because speculators inflate the prices of assets beyond what supply and organic demand dictates they should be worth. I don’t buy into speculative bubbles. There’s money to be made, but also lots of money to be lost.
What I was trying to say is that a part of speculative demand is collector demand. Cards inside boxes don´t have to significantly increase in price for the box to increase in price (best example is sets like the Innistrad block in mtg, card prices go down, but boxes still go up)
A box is much more than the combination of all cards in the box. You can have people collecting the box or wanting to open one for the thrill of it without them being interested in specific single cards of the set.
I agree that there is of course speculative demand involved, but I have the feeling that it´s not the majority of the demand. We live in our little wotc (or ex ) bubble here on e4, but when I look on IG for example, people absolutely LOVE Evolutions. Anyways, it´s impossible to make a conclusive statement as we have no actual facts - but still tons of fun discussing!
Innistrad boxes are not a good example. The price is largely due to the fact that it’s one of the most popular limited formats ever, as well as the fact that it was released before sealed booster box ‘investing’ became a super widespread thing (unlike Evolutions). Anything RTR-forward has increased in price at a much smaller rate.
I’m sure that the majority of people buying Evolutions boxes are people who genuinely want them. But you have to remember that your average collector/Evolutions enthusiast is only buying 1, 2, or 3 boxes. There are speculators, however, that buy dozens of boxes at a time. So even if there are 10 genuine collectors for every 1 speculator, that 1 speculator might be pushing up the price more than the 10 collectors combined.
@zorloth Ok, maybe I did Innistrad wrong there (it´s honestly a blast to draft) but you could just switch that out to Steam Siege or another modern MTG set, cards get reprinted again and again and the boxes still hold/go up with massive speculative demand.
Evolutions already is a case study, but it will get even more interesting with time. I´m excited to see what happens. The influence of speculators on prices is undeniable but the question is how/when/what they can unload at a certain point in time - unless there is some economic event or a massive stash of cases quickly unloaded, I have a hard time seeing prices crashing.
Man, don´t crash this discussion with a hate comment, I´m no particular fan of this set either but it´s still respectable for what it is: a modern gateway to wotc.
Since people are panicking thinking that Pokemon will reprint Evolutions (which will never happen since this set is 5 years old, its completely irrelevant in the current meta and they have to take care of their current demand first) we might be able to see some price drops, so definitely not the best time to sell.
Most likely because one part is going full apeshit about how this set is going to the moon because he gambled on this set while the other is being more about full fundamentals. Both opinions are interested to read tho.
Still, wanted to add that Evolutions is probably better than base 2 and legendary collection
Legendary collection introduced reverses with amazing firework holos, and added holo versions of previously non holo cards. Is evolutions better than base set 2? Probably, as the set is nostalgic or whatever, and used to be a far cheaper option than base
Evolutions is an amazing product and there’s tons of demand for it. There’s really not much else to say about it, is there?
Even if it is reprinted, we already know people pay over $1000 for a single booster box.
People/distributors will simply hoard all the boxes to sell them in a year or two once the prices go loco again. Only the flippers will try to sell em for a quick buck.
Distributors don’t ‘hoard’ boxes lol. They’re not investors or collectors; they need to constantly turn over product. If it gets reprinted, the price is going to drop like a rock. But that’s a big ‘if;’ I agree with others who have said that it’s unlikely that it will be reprinted. Not excessively unlikely, but certainly <50% chance.
Just trying to have a civil discussion with people about it . I have no personal stake in the price of Evolutions boxes. I don’t own any nor am I interested in owning/opening any. The price rise has been so meteoric and so clearly fueled by speculation that it’s been fascinating to watch people rationalize the price. The market is just a topic of interest to me; the price of Evolutions could go to $1 or $1 million and I wouldn’t be directly affected in the slightest.
Am I the only one thinking that the evolutions price surge is also related to the overall box price surge?It is obvious to me that if someone has to pay 200$ for a darkness ablaze box he will more than happy to pay 2-3-4-5 times that amount for a Evolutions box
) bubble here on e4, but when I look on IG for example, people absolutely LOVE Evolutions. Anyways, it´s impossible to make a conclusive statement as we have no actual facts - but still tons of fun discussing!
. I have no personal stake in the price of Evolutions boxes. I don’t own any nor am I interested in owning/opening any. The price rise has been so meteoric and so clearly fueled by speculation that it’s been fascinating to watch people rationalize the price. The market is just a topic of interest to me; the price of Evolutions could go to $1 or $1 million and I wouldn’t be directly affected in the slightest.