100% of people surprised by prices live in a bubble. The comments reflect more of themselves than the actual market.
There is literally a new account on IG that spent $500,000 in a couple months. Meanwhile people are squabbling about 1k.
This same conversation has happened more times than cards have sold; Social Media Bubble, Pokemon Go Bubble, smpratte premium, manipulation = I’m a grown adult crying about prices of cardboard. Its entirely ignorance of the market.
One last number for all the 5usd dreamers (2018 meme), DACardworld spent $39,000,000 last year on collection purchases alone. Figure it out.
I’m not surprised by the instagram statistic. I think the hobby will only see more of that as the core demographic for pokemon ages into their peak earnings. Coronavirus will be an inflection in whatever the growth curve would have been otherwise. But it may still be positive growth even through this. Clearly it is so far. The base here is deep given the broad appeal and has legs. I didn’t own any pokemon cards in december. I’ve shifted a large portion of what I had in MtG to this hobby. There will be much more of this, IMO. And it will (generally) head for the rare, vintage, scarce, high grade first. There’s at least two more generations younger than me coming up into this so it should last a while.
Silver age comic books are a great example. Basically 1960s era comics have done nothing but increase in my lifetime and I have been watching the prices since about 1990. Why? Aging in of the demographic, maintaining relevance through movies, video games, theme parks etc. fixed supply of product, more income to spend over time. pokemon will be the same. Clearly not the mass printed new stuff. But the vintage, scarce, high grade.
Golden age comics (think pre- and post WW2 era) are the (sadly) other end of what the curve can look like. The people who these comics were sentimental to have been aging and passing away over the last few decades. I have watched those prices ebb with time after reaching their peak.
Sorry for the ramble these are the things I think about with respect to all collectibles.
I am surprised by the dacardworld stat. I don’t know why but that’s a far bigger operation than I expected. Wow.
