How Pokémon Cards Got So Expensive 

Thanks for watching! If you enjoyed this video, be sure to subscribe - more great stuff you won't want to miss coming soon, I'm on a bit of a video game & pop culture history kick at the moment! ~~~ ​​EDITS for accuracy! Doing more post-vid research (s/o commenter @laulsach2641) and want to correct some information! All my points in this video still stand, nothing has changed any of that - but I want to do my due diligence & update numbers to reflect new info I’ve learned for accuracy. So here’s 3 quick addendums if you’d like to learn exactly what mistakes I made 😭 #1 - There are actually 124 PSA 10 First Edition Charizards - an article I read while researching this video actually got this number wrong and mixed it up with the number of Shadowless PSA 10 Charizards, which was 54 at the time (now 57). So your odds of getting one would be more like 1 in 500,000,000 ... still significantly worse odds than winning the lottery ;) odds of getting a Shadowless would be 1/1,000,000,000 though! #2 - Prices: When talking about how much cards sell for, there's a few things to think about: mostly (in my mind) how much money the most expensive sale went for, how much the most recent sale was for, and the valuation given to it by the PSA. The below information corresponds to PSA 10 cards: The most expensive 1st Edition Charizard sold for $399,750 on 3/7/2021 (cited as $420,000 in many articles about this sale, but PSA says $399,750 so I’ll stick with them). - The most recent sale was for $252,000. - The PSA values it at $181,900. The most expensive Shadowless Charizard sold for $75,600 on 2/28/2021. - The most recent sale was for $47,970. - The PSA values it at $120,000. The most expensive Unlimited Charizard sold for $30,800 on 10/28/2020. - The most recent sale was for $9,000. - The PSA values it at $10,000. #3 Prices on Dark Explorers / Dragons Exalted remain the same. Explorers sold for $5,500 July 17th and Exalted sold for $3,400 on July 16th (2023). So, the points all still stand … 1st edition -> shadowless -> unlimited in terms of value - BUT the numbers are a bit different. The biggest error I made was on the Shadowless variant - it is significantly less expensive than stated in the video. 1st edition and unlimited data tracks with my info in the video, though. Lastly, again - there are about 2.5x more PSA 10 First Editions than stated in the video! Another interesting fact brought up by commenter @hm_09865 - "There was a 4th printing of the base set. They are the 102 set, but they state 1999-2000. They were printed for the UK." If you read all this, comment “i’m a nerd 🤓” (working on a sources document in description if you wanna nerd out even more). Thanks for the love on the video so far!

I remember getting a sealed box of Dragons Exalted back in 2015 for $150 and cracking it open because it's my favorite set. My dear sweet Arceus how times have changed...

Feel like you could do a whole piece on the history of that PSA 10 Pikachu Illustrator alone, especially considering it was originally as PSA 9 and one of the owners it passed through just cracked it out its slab & kept resubmitting the card to PSA until someone slipped up and gave it a PSA 10 👀

absolutely fantastic video, the editing was so crisp and you made the topic really easy to understand and follow even if you are not the biggest fan of pokemon cards.

Hey Casey, this video is amazing, great job! I can totally see where you applied a lot of what we learned in frame by frame. Keep up the good work!

all the small channels now have such great videos! i hope you reach your goals on youtube!

Greatly edited and written video mate Also seeing evolving skies going for $400 now is just wild to me wonder if there is ever any going back

An absolute banger video 💯🔥

This was a really cool video! My only recommendation would be to use sold listings, as well as sites like 130point and pokemonprice to ascertain price on cards. Active listings don't really provide a ton of meaningful information, as you can list a card for whatever price you want, it doesn't necessarily mean it's actually worth that. So some of the prices you quoted for Base Charizard are quite inaccurate (too high). Otherwise, this was a great video and impressive to see from a small channel. Good stuff :)

This was a great modern historic video. Thanks. Can you do a video on comic book collecting too?

very nicely presented, great work. the almost constant use of the clicky sound effect is a little distracting, but overall the editing is very good :)

These are great videos😊

Dude is starting his RU-vid career with this high quality video and sound

How does this guy only have 300 subscribers? His vids are so good

Great video!

Excellent video

There was a 4th printing of the base set. They are the 102 set, but they state 1999-2000. They were printed for the UK.

I got a charizard from 2016 black and white packs

I think a very good reason why Pokémon cards retain their value even the newer ones is because of Pull Rates. (Also Popularity) Like example of a newer set you can’t just go to Walmart and buy the card your looking for you have to open packs till you get it or go on the second hand market to find one. And the most sought after cards of a set go for good amounts.

I started investing in pokemon cards in 2018. I knew something was different about pokemon from other Collectable & Commodity investment vehicles in the market unlike vintage starwars figures or baseball cards. Pokemon is actually a defining moment in popular culture which captivated the world and not just predominantly the west, and ontopnofnthat pokemon is multigenerational which is still the most popular IP among kids even today. When those kids grow up, the cards they have now will likely be sought out just like the vintage ones were for 90s and 2000s kids. Thats why I made incredibly stupid purchases in 2018 like $2000 for a first edition team rocket box... atleast thats what I was told at the time. Now that box is worth over $29,000. And sure people might tell me, "well something being valued at $29,000 is very different than actually being able to sell it" but I have news for you guys, I sold it, (granted for $26,000 after negotiations). Infact I've sold multiple of my vintage boosterboxes since then for similar high values and i have more in the bank after deposit box waiting for buyers. but point is, these cards are worth alot and the demand is real. And it makes perfect sense.

u are very underrated

I have that exact same gengar EX

This is a good video but like everything card price go up and down like everything does

There is a ishira gx

Why are you underrated

Wasn’t Logan’s pikachu illustrator fake? Or did he get his hands on a real one?

There's actually 124 PSA 10 1st edition shadowless Charizards. And 57 PSA 10 regular base shadowless Charizards

My mom in 2002 buy pack base bet legendary got charizard #3 the grandmu trash all pokemon card

The fisrts edition zard dropped enormous xd

Remember me one day you are going to be popular one day

The popularity of the monster has a big influence on price, charizard is normally the most expensive in a set, regardless of rarity.

I think in long term perspective (15 years +) an first Edition charizard will be one of the safest investments out there…

Pokerev I know him

Baset. Card. Psa 10. But. Editon. Pokemon card

I blame Logan Paul for jacking up the prices of Pokémon cards and ruining it for those who are truly, genuinely passionate for the cards and don’t care much about their value or see it as an investment at all. I belong firmly to this camp, and heck if the prices of Pokémon cards crash tomorrow I would actually be happier, knowing that my favourite cards can now be more cheaply obtained.

I traded for a 600 dollar card

Maybe make this kids only, everything is like no shit