Why?

Other asset classes have grown substantially. Markets are flush with cash. SP 500 for instance is up 28% this year alone. Dow has almost doubled in the past 3 years. I think the stagnation has a lot to do with price manipulation and FOMO
but that, to me anyways, reinforces how small the card market is. I think this fraud will have an impact - it won’t take many big buyers to pull back to have an impact. That, plus demographics plus the fact we are at the peak of an incredible debt fueled asset bubble don’t make me confident in long term card values.

I AGREE with Everything you have said above, except I do not consider graded cards a asset class. THE GRADED CARD MARKET HAS BEEN SEVERELY FALSELY MANIPULATED SINCE LATE 2013.......
It's way to top heavy for me to ever consider investing in.......Long Term I think Levels Go Back to Pre. 2013 Levels.

i agree baseball cards are not an "asset class" atleast not to me! I can certainly see a "correction" with many cards...50's-70's high grade rookies...some T206...green cobbs...possibly goudey ruth's but I see desirable vintage blue chip doing just fine as the supply is low and the demand high.

I don’t count my collection against my net worth so I agree with you guys. But I’ve always suspected that there are a significant number of collectors that have cards as a large percentage of their net worth. I think this is a big part of the reason most collectors want this altered cards thing to go away.

Lets be real, this isn’t a hobby for kids anymore. You can’t even find cards for sale where I live. A small number of large volume collectors are driving price increases on vintage. Hard to see how it can last when most collectors are in their 60s. Anecdotal but everyone I know has money in RE, most own financial
assets, some have non trad investments like art or cars and literally no one collects sports cards. I have a huge network and don’t know one person outside of online communities that collects cards anymore. We all did as kids and
i’m the only guy that came back into it. Our hobby is incredibly small and top heavy.

Historically most hobbies are a bit flat when the stock market is doing well.

Yep, finally got a reply from them stating that. So unless Topps contacts them, the seller is free to keep using Etsy to sell the fakes.

Take sept 14th 18 to dec 19, only about a 10% increase in the sp. Most people arent showing that big Oct-dec dump in 2018 to tout how well stocks did this year. Hey 10% ain't bad, but the "28%" just is accounting for that big drop.


No FOMO and price manipulation in stocks?


No Fraud in stocks? People lost about 90% on this TEUM company lying about earnings. Did that stop the "28%" gain on the SP?

My point was equities have been doing well the past 4 years. And yes stock prices are a joke, pe ratios are crazy high. Cheap money, etc. The fact that cards have stagnated in this environment - easy, cheap money - suggests we are at a peak. If money tightens up look out, and if some whales exit could be real ugly. JMHO.

Whales
 

Yes, that is true for the people who are spending $50k or more on PSA 10's and high end 52 Mantles. For 99% of collectors, we won't even notice it.

Agreed!

Did anyone see this Interview?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_f3k5VSqVt4

Towards the end, he says he see's greener pastures and blue skies ahead for this marketplace/industy.....

I see Visions Of Silver Bracelets and Orange Jumpsuits

We discussed it in May here and at Blowout. In fact, it was one the things that threw gas on the fire of the internet investigation. People hated how smug he was in that interview and looked for more things to pin on him.

Peak schmeak, this is starting to sound like a seeking alpha article. The same was said Jan 19 rescission, global slowdown, etc


When people exit the stock market, they'll need to put resources elsewhere. Maybe something tangible that can make them think of days gone by when life was simpler, and MLBers needed winter jobs. Hoping its oil stocks, since it didnt happen last year!

Dont take it personally, anytime someone relates cards to stocks there are two sides to it. I never believed in these PWCC indices, I stick to what I know. Tough cards, more demand and signed 52 topps when I see 'em

More high profile cards are outed and the amount of damages incurred just keep piling up:

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showth...90614&page=248

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showth...333320&page=18

By the way where's Peter Spaeth been lately?

So what happens, once a card is outed; is there a data base of cert #'s, etc? just curious, are the owner's of these cards, requesting refunds, are they still changing hands, is anyone doing anything? I know maybe the fbi is involved, but I haven't heard any more about that since the nat'l. Seems like a lot of great work is being done, but is anything happening because of it? I was just curious. Is there another post I am missing that is providing the card details, etc?

these are hardly high profile cards????? but more cards nonetheless!

The best comment in one of the threads is that the card now had perfect centering: 45/45

He is alive and well, he quoted me and made a snide remark on another forum last night.:)

I do recall that there was a Blowout thread that kept a tally sheet of the number of cards and the prices paid for the altered cards. I don't have a link to it. As for the victims, PWCC did reach out and offer refunds for bad cards that they sold. I have no idea what the response has been and the amount of restitution has been for those parties. There are unofficial statements from board members stating that the FBI is involved with very little in the way of details.

Dan
What do you want to know about the FBI? They are absolutely, 100% investigating. That is all of the info we will know for now. No doubt more will come out later but I don't expect it to be soon. Too many rats to still roll over.

He's been busy searching for a nice-looking O-Pee-Chee Gretzky rookie. :)

Thanks Leon.

been another 2.5 years or so..