To steer the conversation away from the Gold Star thread before the inevitable happens, I thought this could be an interesting time to talk about scrambled cert numbers.
We’ve already seen some cases where PSA deactivated a cert due to counterfeit concerns and reassigned it with a new one. I always find it funny when people talk about premiums for new certs especially because in situations like that, you’d never even know the cards history unless you knew.
So here’s my question to you all…
If PSA introduced a service where you could send in any already graded card and have its certification number completely randomised, would you use it?
Imagine sending in your 2× cert or 6x cert card and it received a new, fully scrambled 15 digit number. Every PSA cert number would be entirely random with no sequential pattern at all.
Would that be helpful for you? Would it improve your privacy? Would it make it a fair marketplace for everyone?
I think positively it would remove the ability for people to judge a card based solely on its cert number or even the ability to search through a submission to see what other cards you sent in.
It could also be detrimental as people specifically looking for older graded cards would have a tougher time. Likewise if someone did want a ‘freshly graded’ card if they believe in cert premiums they too would have more of a struggle.
I mentioned in the GS thread how I know someone who basically does this, they regrade cards they think are undergraded. Many upgrade, some stay the same. But if people truly start to value new certs that much, this trend will expand. It highlights the element of absurdity in these claims.
Yes I totally agree with you on that it will expand if it goes any further.
If the new cert premium does become the norm and are highly out selling the old, then all that’ll happen is more and more people will bump into that space.
They won’t even need to find a misgrade and try to get it bumped a grade higher, they’ll just find and regrade an old cert clean 10 to a new cert 10.
I like that you can infer approximately what year a card was graded based on the cert number. It adds some historical value down the line which is fun. For instance, was it a card that was graded the same year it was released or was it graded many years later? So, I think it would be a shame if we lost that. As an older collector, I do not care one bit about a specific range of cert numbers in terms of value.
I too appreciate the history of certain cert numbers! I have a card when I posted it, a friend reached out to tell me that they graded it! I would very much dislike to see them to by the way side.
Although, if you were selling a card knowing you could possibly get a premium would it encourage you to consider using a service like scrambling the cert? Especially since you weren’t planning on keeping it in your collection and to just maximise profits?
I could not care less what certification a slab has. I buy cards, not labels. If the card’s condition matches my expectations for the grade that I want, I will buy it.
In my opinion, the only benefit of newer certs is PSA scans.
I think this is an interesting idea! However, no, I don’t think they should. Am generally of the stance that the more information the better, and ppl can decide and do what they will.
First, anyone who cares will immediately say “ohh, if the numbers look like this, there is a 90% chance it’s been scrambled” → and then there will be some “scrambled cert” premium (discount?) that soon develops.
Second, while I 99% of the time don’t care about sequential certs… there are a few cases where I would prefer to have a sequential set, just because it tells you that the cards may have likely originally all “came together”. (At some point I may start a WTB for a particular cert of a particular card I’ve been waiting to see to complete one of these mini-sets haha…).
Third, I think searching through neighboring certs to see what other cards were sent in can in rare instances be helpful/interesting. For example, for very high-end trophies (not that I really play in that mkt heh), I would kind of want to know if they sent in 10 copies of the same trophy or something - it would probably raise some eyebrows. Since the certs aren’t tied to any personal data - I think that’s ok.
Fwiw, I think it would be cool if more customization of labels was possible. It’s a minor thing, but if I had my way, I’d have certs and barcodes moved to the back of the label… for aesthetic reasons. Maybe even the grades too.
I have a similar opinion to others here, I like knowing when the card was graded, but in terms of a premium I also couldn’t care less about the cert number being new. If that means I can start buying cards with an old cert number for a cheaper price, I am more than happy to take that deal.
I collect mostly old certs because I believe that it’s less likely that someone squirted juice or cream on the cards before submitting them. I don’t want creamed or juiced cards in my collection. Therefore I’d rather know that the card was graded long ago than it being a toss-up.
I don’t care about new cert vs old cert at all. I may have missed this but how would you be able to verify it’s even a legit graded card if you didn’t have access to a cert #?
As someone who doesn’t collect or own any graded cards I think the coolest aspect of them is the traceable provenance having an individual serial number provides, so I think it’s a shame when people reholder cards to get different numbers.
Ultimately I don’t think grading makes it any easier for casual collectors to obtain an authentic card, it just creates another middleman to pay. If anything I have more confidence in buying raw cards that aren’t behind a layer of plastic.
I’m sure if scammers can no longer copy existing certs they will find another way to sell counterfeit slabs. They could have a QR code on the label that links to their own PSA mirror registry or purchase a legitimate master copy of a card and sell copies based on that cert.
Honestly I’m much the same, like you I care much more about the card itself than the label it has. As long as I’m happy with the condition that’s what matters most above all.
That said, playing devils advocate I have previously rejected upgrading some of my PSA 9’s to 10s as I believed my copies were better at the time than the ones I was looking at. Maybe that was some form of mistake as the price spikes now. If the price difference wasn’t as ludicrous I wouldn’t mind as much but that’s just the collector brain wanting things to look uniform and not a real issue.
That’s true, but when booms burst, the PSA 9s have much less to fall in absolute dollars than PSA 10s. TCGFish has some really nice plots that show the much higher variance of vintage PSA 10s and the greater stability of PSA 9s, 8s, etc.
I often find that my collector priorities get in the way of being a better seller. During lulls, I would rather make huge progress on my collecting goals than stash away PSA 10s to sell in the next boom.
I’ve made my opinions clear in the other thread but I think another consideration is when does it stop? Will cards graded currently be considered inferior in 10 years time by the same people who currently consider them superior? I feel like if you buy too much into this hype then raw collecting may be the way forward for you in order to just be happy with what you have.
I’m a fan of sequential certs too! Find them quite fun actually. I’ve had a few sets when I upgraded a card it broke the run but honestly it never bothered me. It’s cool when it’s complete but you can’t expect a full row of 10s every time
The cert searching thing is super niche but it’s more about the privacy. If someone knows one card you’re selling it can become pretty easy to look up what else you might have if you subbed together. Not everyone wants their whole collection exposed like that, probably only matters in extreme cases but it’s still something that can happen I suppose especially like you mentioned if someone has a bunch of rare cards.
And yeah I’ve always thought a cleaner label would look great too moving barcodes and certs to the back would be nice. At the same time the current look is so iconic and it does make buying and selling easier especially since half the listings don’t even bother showing the back anyway!
Completely see the logic not wanting to risk having a card with any cleaner on it!
Just to pick your brain, if you were looking for a specific card and there were two available one old cert and one new cert I assume you’ll prefer the old cert. However, if the old cert had a higher asking price than the newer cert, would that sway your choice? How much of a price difference would it take? Just curious!
