This is a good point. When I made the poll I didn’t have “everything goes back down to pre-2025 prices” in mind but rather “cards stop hitting record sales every week in auction” and “people stop fighting outside Costco for modern product”.
There is some nuance as to what we can define as a bubble popping, but I think most would agree it “feels more relaxed” is when we’ve returned to more normal levels again, whatever those may be.
I’m still waiting for the original 1999 time magazine bubble to pop. 
Seriously though, everytime this topic emerges, arguing if its a bubble or not is frankly boring; the value is understanding what to expect. Its obvious right now the market is doing well, but its not really similar to previous bubbles. I’ve never experienced this much sales volume, especially for every single category. A better conversation is why is this happening, and what will slow it down in the short term & long term?
Pokemon actually printing to demand will kill it, which I kind of want but probably wont happen
For every 1 sneakerhead theres 10,000 regular people
We thought we saw them in COVID…
What fools we were
I’d love TPC to print to demand and absolutely blow scalpers out of the water.
the more things change…
What about adjusting pull rates, with a certain guaranteed “hit” per box/bundle etc?
Sure, but what about my daily sales that range from vintage - modern (excluding ultra modern)? Not trying to pick on your response, I agree that printing more will help current sets. However, speaking to the general topic, I think many people simply don’t have enough exposure to the market to understand the differences between what is happening right now vs 2020, 2016, etc. I was selling through all of those markets, and none of them are like what’s going on today.
How would you say that the current market is different to previous ones?
Feel like rip and ship is at an all time high rn. I hear of relatively small (by channel size at least) youtubers buying and opening tens of thousands of packs per month.
Here’s the bubble chart for reference, notice the little dotted grey line indicating the steady march upwards.
I think there are likely different root causes for different aspects of the current market. I’m in the “bubble” camp: the velocity of changes has been too fast, I don’t think the widespread demand is sustainable, and I’m a follower of the church of passion executive.
I think the modern frenzy is in part driven by Pocket. The amount of eyes it’s brought to things is significant, and the low barrier to entry is great for that crowd. There’s also a massive shift we’re seeing in mainstream gambling culture. Sports gambling, Whatnot streams for rip and ships/box breaks, it’s all a troubling trend that won’t end well for most participating.
I think the PSA 10 vintage market is being propelled by social media and speculators, which are symptoms of macro market trends. I don’t think those trends are changing anytime soon, but I do think those trends are fickle. That buying pool will jump ship to whatever will get them views/clout/tendies. I’m guessing it’ll be a while before there’s much of a correction, because I think there will either need to be macro market trend changes to suppress the money in the hobby, or there will need to be some other shiny object that offers similar/better financial returns.
I’m starting to reach the apathy stage of it all. There are certain categories of cards I’m just going to avoid for a while that have higher opportunity costs than I’m comfortable with. There are plenty of cards that are still affordable that I’ll focus on for the time being. I strongly believe that most cards that have seen huge price jumps upwards (100%+) since this fall will follow the chart included above.
For starters, more people than ever are interested in pokemon. More card languages exist today. China alone wasn’t relevant in 2020, now they are a main player, have exclusive promos, and it’s still early days. Conventions like collectacon and many others are a staple and didn’t exist 5 years ago.
The demand right now is more widespread. While stonkers and record sales generate a lot of noise, the customer base, at least from my end, feels more diverse. Even the most unsexy things like vintage Japanese holo cards are selling for me weekly. If I had to generalize, 2016 was pretty organic, 2020 had higher speculation and was more conditional than what’s happening today.
I already said that my most pessimistic estimations for things to get fixed was May. So far, I think I’ll be wrong. 6 months from now would be November. That would be a full year since the start. That sounds like it could be when things cool down.
That said, I don’t think its a matter of time anymore…And I’ll leave it at that for the purpose of this thread.
6 months final answer.
Yea this is a rare moment for Japanese vintage lol was surprised to see some of my holos double in price
Interest will end when either outside circumstances dictate so (wars, depression etc) or no interest in pokemon anymore… what are the odds of either happening anytime soon? Also would be naive to think they haven’t thought of how to maintain interest, rememeber many pillars to the marketing.
forgot jp old back trophies those are still way down or flat at best 
The current market puts me in mind of 1999 rather than 2020. Sure you had the huge sales, as well as some cards that were clearly overpriced ($500 birthday pikachu), but generally when people talk about that era the focus is on how much people (kids) just loved Pokemon.
We’re always arguing about how much of the demand is ‘organic’. Obviously we can’t measure that, but the feeling I have is that this boom, in general terms, is more organic than 2020 or 2023.
Why? Simple: none of my stuff has gone up 
critical skill issue
