Pokémon scalpers are complaining that the franchise’s new 30th Anniversary set has been too generous with its rare cards — leaving resellers unable to generate their usual profits.
Last week saw the long-awaited 30th Anniversary Pokémon Trading Card game set go on sale, with the usual scramble for stock among scalpers looking to make a quick profit. We reported on long lines outside stores in the U.S., plus frustration over “ghost chairs” left outside for days. In the U.K., there were ructions after accusations that a minor celebrity had ignored purchase limits and skipped the queue to snaffle up supply.
But as the dust settled, collectors quickly found that the 30th Anniversary set’s rare cards… actually weren’t that rare. Indeed, it appears that The Pokémon Company has done its best to defeat the usual scalper market by making all of the set’s main cards findable with relative ease.
The only cards now being resold in the low thousands of dollars are the three eye-wateringly colored Red, Green and Blue Mew cards, which do seem to have a low drop rate. Otherwise, resale prices dip to well under $250 for everything else. Most of the top 15 expensive cards have been judged as being worth around $100 or less — a far cry from the thousands of dollars seen in previous sets.
This is great news for most fans, who will be able to fill their binders with the majority of cards — rather than a good chunk being left well beyond reach. However, it’s less great news for scalpers who invested thousands of dollars in buying up stock expecting to make a huge margin.
“2-3 years ago, quite literally on this subreddit, many people were anticipating the 30th anniversary as a bull catalyst for exit strategies for their investments,” complained one collector on dedicated reddit /r/PokeInvesting. “The literal complete opposite happened.”
“It’ll crush even more when more and more people start dumping,” wrote another collector. “It’s gonna be a bloody mess.”
Not everyone is upset, however. In another /r/PokeInvesting thread, one fan has suggested that the 30th Anniversary set’s easy hit rates were good for money-making in the long-term. Why? Because more children and potential collectors will be lured in by the high rate of rare cards this time around — only for things to inevitably be reversed in future.
“I actually think this set is extremely healthy for the hobby long term,” TommyC6852 wrote. “This is a set that is a blast to open; and should be decently available for the common collector. At some point you want people to have fun; and this set should give the hobby the breath of fresh air that it needs. The more fun people have, the longer they stay in. The longer people stay engaged; the higher our investments will go.”
The next Pokémon trading card set, Mega Evolution — Delta Reign, will launch as soon as November.
