Anyone else noticing this? Last 6 months have seen prices across many sets and boxes go well?
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Yes. There’s a noticeable trend of prices going up pretty much across the board in the last few months.
(At least with the vintage stuff I pay attention to, not sure about how more modern cards have been doing)
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No question - Fossil, Jungle and higher-end Japanese promos especially have seen crazy movement. This morning someone messaged me on instagram and offered $2,250 for my Snorlax PSA 10 1st edition. My friend sold a Lapras yesterday for $1,700. It’s absurd to me that these cards are approaching the upper echelon of base set holo pricing right now, but what do I know…
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I noticed that loose vintage Japanese booster packs like Base and Jungle have jumped like 200-400% since the beginning of 2019. I always assumed there’s an seemingly endless supply and low demand and I always can pick them up later… oh well.
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As someone who has a lot of stock of PSA 10 1st edition Base, Jungle, and Fossil holos… The 1st edition base set holos are superior from an investment standpoint.
If a 1st edition base set box was put up for auction on eBay today, it probably sells for around $70k. Meanwhile, we know that a Jungle box sells for $3,500 and a Fossil box sells for $3,000. The boxes sell frequently enough that they have an established market value.
So a Lapras selling for $1,650 is only going to encourage people to open more Fossil boxes and the pop report on many of those Fossil holos are already starting to get really high. I’m less concerned about the Jungle holos, but still, because the boxes are readily available, we have continued to see the population of the PSA 10 1st ed holos grow in the last couple of years (although the overall population of PSA 10 1st ed Jungle holos is still fairly small at the moment, in part because they’re really hard to grade as 10s).
Meanwhile, no one is opening 1st edition base set boxes anymore. They’re simply too expensive to open.
That’s why we have had exactly *two* PSA 10 1st edition base Charizards added to the population in the last 20 months and exactly *zero* PSA 10 1st ed base Chanseys added to the population over the same period of time. The true availability of these cards is only going to dwindle as more and more of them fall into the hands of true collectors. You really can’t go wrong with investing in base set, especially the holos.
A month ago, a PSA 10 1st ed Poliwrath sold for $1200. That card has almost the exact same population (96) as the Lapras (pop 95) that sold for $1650 yesterday. I don’t think there should be any question of which one was the better bargain / investment.
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$2250 for a snorlax? Take it. I sold mine at $1100 like…a month or so ago? And that was a high water mark. I know someone who sold heir Lapras for $2,000.
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One thing I’ve noticed a lot recently is that the price of Battle Road Japanese promo cards are selling a lot higher in Japan than they’ve ever been. On 4 or 5 occasions I’ve managed to pick up PSA 10 copies of cards on eBay which were selling higher raw in Japan. As an example, I’ve seen 3 052/PCG-P Celebi ex cards sell this year for 50000 up to 55000 JPY raw, yet I picked up my PSA 10 copy for the equivalent of 6550 JPY on eBay.
I think if this trend continues we’re going to see a large jump in Japanese promo prices in the western world. For these cards I think it’s safe to say that gone are the days we could pick these cards up from Japan and instantly flip them on eBay for a profit.
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It appears that Japanese cards are becoming (somewhat) more popular overall. In addition thereto the Japanese sellers are also using the online marketplace more often so I think that you might be right.
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Wow! Fossil Dragonite and Gengar PSA 10 Holo First Edition are much higher than I remember. Been a while since I checked the prices on those. Oh well, I’ll just get them in PSA 9 haha.
This is a common annual trend. Prices go up, up, up, until Christmas. Then Down, down, down. I’ve been serious collecting a little over 4 years now, and this has been true for every year. I have no doubt that there will he price retention to whatever extent, but it’s easy to see that this isn’t an sustainable pace of growth. All it takes is for the supply to catch up with the demand even a little bit because the prices are just too good not to sell, mixed with a little holiday “whoops I spent too much”, and were right back on the downward curve. I will say, there has been a lot of new faces in the hobby. At least with an online presence. Something I haven’t seen as much of, since the Pokémon go outburst. Boxes should sustain in my opinion, and most cards that the general population of serious collect, are set cards. But some of these cards feel like they are just far too deep in that category to be seeing the price spike we’ve been seeing. I mean. Come on… these are set cards, to think they won’t always be available is naive. People sleeping on base though. Lol. Have your fun collecting the other sets people, I’m enjoying this 
in Base. I’ll see you all back here shortly when you realize that you’ve made a mistake buying a snorlax at 2k+ 
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Are you arguing that prices won’t continue to rise gradually even if there is some market correction? Prices have been incrementally increasing each year. They might peak Christmas time and then drop, but they are still higher than they were at the same exact time the year prior, and they aren’t going to suddenly revert back to 2018 prices (if that’s what you are arguing).
For example, the Eeveelutions in 1st Edition Jungle Set in PSA 9 were generally obtainable for $75 and under through 2018. Now those cards are around $150. They might dip a bit after Christmas (which is not even a guarantee), but even if they do, they aren’t going to just plummet back to $75, even if the pop increases.
This is not just a Christmas spike. This has been going on for several months. “Set cards” or not, many of these cards are extremely popular items (with a rather strong difficulty to grade) and will continue growing as a result.
While I do agree that some of these cards (like the 2k Snorlax) will probably experience some price correction (we already saw this with some 1st Edition Base Set Non-holos a year or two ago), they aren’t going to suddenly experience a massive drop.
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To answer your questions.
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No, I’m not arguing there will be no price retention. “ I have no doubt that there will be price retention to whatever extent , but it’s easy to see that this isn’t an sustainable pace of growth.” This was the statement I made in my post. I think there will be price retention. Just not near where it’s at currently. At least until next summer when prices start to pick up.
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I never said this is a Christmas uptick. I said: “Prices go up, up, up, until Christmas. Then Down, down, down.” This is not referring to a spike in prices due to Christmas. I’m referring to the annual market cycle that usually starts picking up late spring, and ends somewhere close to Christmas. In fact. I was kind of saying the opposite. Christmas, and the winter. Seem to be a bit of a back breaker for the upward trend.
I want a healthy hobby. I’m not one of those people who wants to control the market either way. I’m also not one of those people that gets mad when they see what they would view as Crazy prices. I’m just simply stating observed truths, about my past 4-5 years of collecting insight.
Edit: I also live in Canada. Where recently a Potato with a haircut was elected for a second term as Prime Minister. Things don’t look so good here. I wish we had somebody with the intentions to prosper the Country in office. MAGA or maybe KAGA would be more fitting at this point.
I won’t comment on specific cards/sets. Everyone who know the hobby knows about base and it’s potential. I will say though, the holidays are usually when we see the downward trend. It doesn’t usually peak back up till late spring.
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Yessir. I say the exact same thing in my previous post.
I wonder what Neo Genesis PSA 10 1st Edition cards would sell for rn. A lot of those haven’t popped up in a very long time. I’d imagine cards like Meganium, Pichu, Feraligatr, Heracross could reach $1000-2000, Lugia could probably reach $3000.
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