Pokemon can be a viable business opportunity, and if you have a business degree, you know all about various methods of market manipulation (both legal and illegal). It’s totally reasonable to expect someone to manipulate an unregulated market like the 3rd party Pokemon market.
Steps:
Acquire card before release (or not).
Sell card in a fake auction for an unreasonably high amount.
Sell multiple copies of card at higher price when cards become available.
What this does is set a precedent for future sales. Like you said, people will now expect this price.
Of course, the price won’t last that long as more auctions will show up and the prices will drop to what the supply/demand curve sets it at.
But those first few sales will be money!
We’ve seen this many times before in the past. Look at the old WoTC boxes, specifically the Neo series box. One sells for $600 (keep in mind, the sale could have been fake) and now all the boxes are hyper expensive.
@woolsluk said:What’s the story behind that $111 mincinno? Weirdly high priced items for tcgrepublic.com to be selling, please note, anyone who buys cards from them which aren’t the 1 2 and 3 in the shields, as they are as good as sealed, they are not the best for condition but have no issue offering store credit refunds if you can show them the damage with photos.
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How can you tell if they have the 1 2 or 3 in the “shields”?
In regards to the Minccino card:
Bulbapedia said:In Japan, this card was released as a promotional card during a shirt campaign by clothing company Uniqlo starting March 14, 2011.
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I guess it’s just an old promotion so the fact that an exclusive card resurfaced makes it valuable. Keep in mind, the price is gonna be a bit higher due to the seller being a store.
10% is lame, but at least they give you one without too much trouble. eBay sellers don’t always grant a refund without blaming USPS/the buyer for the cards arriving in subpar condition.
I just won’t be shopping with them anymore