And some of them are definatly being used for scams
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I basically agree with everything you (and plenty of others) said here but I just want to add something to this statement. As someone who has witnessed the 2008 financial crisis I find it crazy as well that plenty people (mainly Gen Z but even some Millenials and older) really think that every asset (doesn’t matter whether it’s stocks, gold, cypto or collectibles) is guaranteed to go up all the time.
When the tariffs were announced in the beginning of April and global stock markets went down rapidly there were many people having a complete meltdown. On platforms like reddit and other forums there were so many people (mainly aged 25 or younger) completely desperate begging for advice what to do (and plenty of them panic selling everything at a loss). We know now that the markets bounced back up very quickly but I really don’t know how those people would react if we have another situation like in 2000 or 2008, where markets go down for a couple of years and don’t recover that quickly. Hope nobody understands this wrong, I invest in stocks since I am 18 and have a monthly savings plan because I believe in them, but it’s not guaranteed that they will go up every single month.
Sorry for getting off topic, back to Pokemon: There is the saying that everybody is an expert in a bull market, but even over the last 5 years we saw two major hype phases (WOTC/some modern in 2020/21 and the Japanese Waifu boom in 2023) were prices are lower today (even though almost everything skyrocketed in price over the last few months) compared to their peaks. And especially when stuff rises in price that quickly I always act with caution.
Does this mean that everything will certainly go down in the near future? No. But it’s also not guaranteed that it will continue to go up or keep it’s value. Nobody really knows actually.
I would never tell anybody what to do with their money, everybody can do with it what they want. But I agree with the statement that putting 10-20% of ones income as a 25 year old in Pokemon cards would have been crazy to me (even if one has a high paying job and a low-cost of living). There are plenty of other things that I would prioritize first (housing, stocks, …).
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