I would rather collect something that is valuable than something that is "cool".
Trading cards are cool again
31–40 of 94 posts
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#32I would rather collect something that is valuable than something that is "cool".
Collectibles being “cool” is how they become valuable
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#33Absolutely everything is frothy right now. I wouldn’t make any long term conclusions from the markets today, since this seems like an exceptional time. That is to say, I think the “bull case” for many things atm are heavily tainted by irrational exuberance.
> That is to say, I think the “bull case” for many things atm are heavily tainted by irrational exuberance.
Even Limited Edition Warhammer books have been selling for absurd prices. Many books are selling for 10 to 20 times RRP. It’s been very odd to see
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#34My kid couldn't agree more. The topic, however, sadly changes 2x per year from pokemon to ninjago and back.
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thing is everything feels frothy because people haven't reset their mental model on what the dollar is actually worth. Over the past year or so the Fed took every pre-pandemic dollar in your pocket and made it worth about 70-80 cents. PPIA (Post-Pandemic Inflation Adjusted) the values on a lot of things are just fine.
Even if there were a direct relationship between printing and inflation, this wouldn't make sense. Pokemon cards aren't up 25%, which is what you'd expect if dollars were worth 80% as much and everything rose to accommodate. Pokemon cards are up way way way more than 25%.
Why would that be the case? Inflation doesn't put 25% more dollars in the pockets of people willing to buy Pokemon cards. It's distributed differently.
Plus the existence of high inflation makes people demand inflation hedges way more, so why wouldn't they go up in price faster than inflation?
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#36As someone who has been into cards and collectibles all my life, the past few years have been wild to say the least. What we saw in 2020/early 2021 was really a classic bubble - FOMO buying pushing prices to unsustainable levels. Then throw in the grading shutdown caused by backlog of new collectors and investors sending in millions of garbage base cards for grading, clogging up the grading companies, plus profit tak…
Do you collect as a hobby or for profit? Seems like something I’d enjoy trying as a side-hustle but never really done before outside of Pokémon
> Do you collect as a hobby or for profit?
I never got the idea of being a hobby collector in modern times. Nowadays, everything is available on the Internet for sale, so completing the collection is only a matter of coughing up enough money. How is that interesting or exciting?
I can still understand collecting items which aren't mass produced for the purpose of being collected - things such as history/war memorabilia, rare books fro XIX century etc. There, every item can be unique and obtaining them can demand more from the collector than just typing in their credit card numbers.
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#37Anything that is based purely on speculation will swing wildly. Crypto, baseball cards, beanie babies, sneakers, Magic the gathering, etc.
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#38From scanning this, it sounds like the author is specifically talking about sports trading cards, most characterized by baseball cards. This market certainly went crazy price-wise but then, as the author pointed out, tanked. It basically tanked because everyone started collecting the cards. Like any collectible market, it mainly took off to begin with because no one was collecting these things and keeping them in min…
> It's impossible to predict where this market will go just like any collectible market because it's so driven by market sentiment. As someone who knows little about trading cards or "markets" in general I guess, how is this different than any other market? Seems like everything is driven by market sentiment, even things like toilet paper from time to time.
You don't use up trading cards like you do toilet paper. Neither are trading cards continuously produced like toilet paper.
Re: Trading cards are cool again
#39Re: Trading cards are cool again
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's impossible to predict where this market will go just like any collectible market because it's so driven by market sentiment. As someone who knows little about trading cards or "markets" in general I guess, how is this different than any other market? Seems like everything is driven by market sentiment, even things like toilet paper from time to time.
You don't use up trading cards like you do toilet paper. Neither are trading cards continuously produced like toilet paper.
Sure, that was just one (tongue-in-cheek) example. What about stocks?