Charlotte Hilton Andersen at Reader's Digest wrote about old Pokémon cards as an investment, and the numbers are startling: Card Ladder data shows the average card up nearly 46% in a year, and a first-edition Shadowless Charizard bought for $5,000 in 2013 sold for $390,000 in late 2023. My son was once obsessed with Pokémon, so I came to this one with some personal history.
The auction house expert in the piece credits nostalgia, scarcity and a new generation of kids. I pointed to another accelerant: I think a lot of what we are seeing is influencer culture. Not necessarily that influencers are the only ones investing in Pokémon cards, but they are driving the trend, and a market driven by attention can reverse when the attention moves.
The investment theory, as I explained it, is real. Supply is fixed, because the company is not reprinting old cards. Demand keeps growing, because the nostalgic millennial buyer pool is not getting smaller. And condition matters enormously; a professionally graded gem-mint card and the same card with a soft corner are different assets.
The caution is the same one I give for any collectible. It pays no income, it costs money to grade, insure and store, the market is illiquid at the moment you most want to sell, and a 46% year is not a return you can plan around. If the Trapper Keeper in the basement turns out to be worth something, wonderful. Treat it as a windfall, not a strategy.
Read the full article at Reader's Digest →
