A Gold Star Torchic Pokemon card recently sold for $2.7 million. A Level X Garchomp sold for $900,000. Now a hobby veteran is warning that the party may be about to end. Jake, who runs the channel TwicebakedJake, says that over the next couple of weeks a lot of vintage Pokemon cards are going to sell for significantly less than those record prices, with drops of 40% to 60% on a bunch of them.

His message is not that people suddenly hate vintage cards or that gold star cards and Level X cards have gone out of style. That is not the case, he says. His point is that collectibles, by their very nature, like to spike. They sit through long quiet stretches and then all the action happens in a single month.

This time it was vintage, and he says the same thing will happen to a bunch of other cards in the future. Understanding why, he says, can keep you from being the one holding the bag.

Why Collectibles Spike

Jake says the market is very inefficient, because not every card that could be for sale is for sale at any given time. A card like the Level X Garchomp or the Gold Star Torchic might see one copy come up for sale in a year, or maybe one every six months. When one does, buyers with deep pockets all chase the same single card, which is how it reaches a record price. Jake calls it a beggar’s quarrel: with only one card on the market, everyone has to bid on it.

The trouble starts after a record sale. Owners who planned to keep their cards forever see a six-figure or seven-figure payout and think it looks very juicy. They list their cards, and cards that were meant to be sold once a year suddenly appear at the same time. Jake says that is what is happening right now, because many of these cards have gone up 10 times in value over the past year at minimum.

Four Copies of a Pop 37 Card

To show it, Jake pulled up the Legendary Collection holographic reverse Zapdos, a card with a PSA 10 population of 37. Only 37 copies exist in the whole world at that grade. On any given day, he says, you might expect one or maybe two to be for sale. Instead, the Fanatics Collect auction block listed two PSA 10 copies, along with a CGC 10, a BGS 9.5, a normal version, and multiple PSA 9 and PSA 8 copies. On another platform, alt, two more PSA 10 copies were listed.

That adds up to four copies of a Pop 37 card on two platforms in the same week, set to sell in the coming days. If you are a millionaire shopping for one, Jake says, you suddenly have your pick of the litter, and the price cannot stay at an all-time high with that much supply.

It is not only Zapdos. He says Rayquaza Gold Star cards are being oversupplied, with multiple copies available at the same time, and there are plenty of gold star trio cards from the Legendary Collection. A Kyogre Team Aqua with a population of 11 could go years without hitting auction, but someone out there would rather have $42,000 than that card. A Pikachu with a population of 23 and a Dragonite with a population of 125 are also on the block.

Who Gets Burned

Jake is quick to point out that the people cashing out will still do fine. Many of these cards were not going for six figures a couple of months ago. When a card is up 10 times or 6 times in two months, he says, it is not surprising for it to correct down to a 2 or 3 times multiplier, and sellers will still make out like bandits.

The people at risk are those who bought at the peak. He says some vendors bought cards at six figures, or close to it, and are now holding bags worth $20,000, $30,000 or $50,000 less. One example he gives is a card bought for $100,000 that is now worth $50,000 or $40,000. Those cards are still worth more than they were a couple of months ago, but they could take a long time to recover.

He also expects the news to call it a crash. Over the next couple of weeks, he says, people will talk about how vintage is crashing. Eventually the market will flatten again, because holders who paid the higher premiums will not list their cards unless they can get a higher price.

Smaller Cards Do the Same Thing

Jake stresses that this is not just a millionaire problem. The Bulbasaur from the first Partner collection, the one with the hidden Pikachu, reached $80 at its high and quickly dropped back to $20, because as soon as it hit $80 everyone with a copy listed it. The Tag Team GX Mew and Mewtwo card reached about $4,000 a couple of months ago and is now back below $2,000. The Crown Zenith Mew has been pumped up to about $4,000 again, and he says it is realistically a $1,000 card.

His advice is simple. Resist FOMO, be careful about buying cards at all-time highs, and remember that the market can move quickly. Cards that seem very rare can come out of the woodwork when there is a lot of action. Jake sees the whole thing as a transition of collections from older collectors to new ones with deeper pockets, and he says it is a very interesting time to watch the market, even for people who cannot afford the top cards.

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