The thing is I always expected many of these cards to rise just not shoot up suddenly like this. Lillie Cosmog and the Dreams Come True (extra battle say Chinese) I owned a bunch and was going to hold. But I sold to get other things because I thought I had more time. Lillie Clefary another one I felt over time would do well.
Yea, but doubling or more on prices that had already like 5xād in the weeks prior. Idk, i get what youre saying, i just personally dont really see correlation between the promos and FA trainers continuing to spike. They may both be correlated to a third variable, but i dont rly see a direct connection there
Well for discussion sake, I can see how a chaotic promo release can make people view cards that have already been steadily rising as ābeing on saleā and making a run on the market. Idk either because I canāt point to any one thing. And Iām just likeā¦ discussing stuff in case anyone has alternative theories? lol
I donāt think itās Nagaba either. My take on factors causing the hype this month are:
- TPC announcing Clay Burst reprints and made-to-orders. This acts as a warning sign for card dealers as TPC can suppress market prices through large-scale reprints, so they have to find a replacement to maintain their current business. Cards between 2016 and 2021 became easy target as they are more of an eye candy to the public than vintage, and TPC wonāt bother reprinting them as theyāre out of rotation.
- Clove. There are two kinds of card shops in Japan, ones similar to LGS you all familiar with, and the new kind which focus on promoting cards as luxury products. Take a closer look at how they run their stores and youāll see the difference - the latter spend their budget on things not related to the TCG itself such as decorating stores to make them look like jewelry stores, signing with big influencers and building business infrastructure such as online mystery packs, selling price chart data to rivals or ownership sharing platforms. Two major hypes in Japan were triggered by these kind of shops raising their buyback prices at an abnormal pace, last time it was magi, and this time it was Clove with their PSA 10 daily buybacks.
- Resellers switching their focus from products which no longer brings profit such as PS5 to PokĆ©mon TCG. This was once mentioned in an interview with people who get paid waiting in line outside Yodobashi Camera on Clay Burstās release.
- Price chart tweets. I already mentioned this above, basically these were pushed through Twitter trends to those who were not aware of the hype and attracting them to step in, further spreading the hype. Plus most of them rely on data sources which can be manipulated.
People also mentioned other factors such as influencers like Hikaru, but I donāt watch many YouTubers and certainly donāt know this guy anyway so not sure how that affects the whole situation. As for Nagaba, the cards may turn peopleās focus from trainers to Eeveelutions for a while (as we can see how Eevee Heroes suddenly hiked after Nagaba cards were released), but itās not a factor bringing the hype as a whole.
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Thank you for the insights! Points 1 and 2 definitely seem to be playing a more acute role in the recent spikes.
This is pretty great insight. Specially point 2 which is something that I was never aware of. Thanks for sharing.
Cheers!
This just doesnāt reflect well on anyone.
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Regardless of whether itās a bubble, I wonder to myself where is all this money is coming from. Income, inheritance, debt, collection sales, bitcoin?
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Iāve actually wondered about point 3. A bunch of my v star universe boxes came with āSNKRDUNKā stickers on them. Itās a sneaker app similar to StockX I believe. It made sense why sneaker guys would be interested in boxes selling for 2x MSRP.
itās all very much in line with global consumer spending trends
How do you figure? Also, what does that mean?
Beautiful post.
Online retail for non-essential goods has experienced significant growth, particularly during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. The Pokemon card market is driven by e-commerce, which in turn also affects the prices of cards in brick-and-mortar shops in the US and also Japan.
Iām personally not surprised by the amount of money in the hobby, but rather why people are putting their money in certain places.
I am not involved in selling and generally avoid card stores like the plague for a number of reasons so I have no real opinion on the Sun and Moon/Sword and Shield stuff anymore. What I do know is that from the average consumer perspective, the day an 8 year old can walk into a 7-11 at any time and buy a 150 yen pack of the latest set and pull the latest female trainer is the day these big prices for cards are over.
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Is that likely to ever happen though?
Feels like it can only get worse when they are also printing for China now.
They need to acquire another printing facility or outsource.
I have no idea honestly, but this is how it always was before.
Man the demand for these products is absurd.
These cards got thousands of copies available and yet they keep selling pretty high on a daily basis. Pretty much everything japanese except vintage is out of control.
still the best girl
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I went into Clove and Maji the other day and they refuse cash transactions for buy-backs/consignments - they will only deposit into a bank account in your name. So I think money laundering is likely out of the question.
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