PSA by the numbers (Jan 2022)
 

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FLQSSzxU...jpg&name=large

My thoughts:

- Basketball card prices have dropped like crazy since last year, and so it's surprising to see the sport still leading by a wide margin.

- Holy freaking Pokemon!

- Where the hell is hockey? :confused::confused:

- We are obviously in another "junk wax era." Once this comes to an end, will this order change? Will baseball end up back in first place or will it slip further?

I agree. NBA Basketball (vintage and modern) has dipped, but is still the strongest by a mile in my opinion. Modern Football seems next to me, then vintage baseball. Apart from a few key rookies, I've never seen Hockey even "warm."

Anybody wonder how many of these are resubmissions for auction purposes?

I have read their backlog is still …. wait for it... 6 million.

Until you realize those cards were sent in a year ago. (They have 14 of my cards that I sent in last March, including RCs of Shaq, Steve Nash, Ray Allen, Tim Duncan, and Dwyane Wade. Probably wouldn't have chosen to send any of them in at today's prices.)

Serious question :

Does anybody have any idea how many opinion givers there are working at everybody's favorite opinion seller?

The backlog is distorting the data IMHO. If you look at the Jan 2022 numbers, the VAST majority of those graded cards were submitted in late-Nov 2020 to January 2021 (I know this, because a Bulk Modern order I sent in early Jan 2021 is still in Grading, and everybody submitted in the same time frame is still waiting). It seems like they are moving faster on Bulk Ultra Modern and Bulk Non-sports (ie more graders dedicated to those categories).

Back in late-2020 and early-2021, NBA was definitely on fire, so when everybody was preparing submissions, I think almost anything BBall looked like a winner for the $12 grading fee.

The backlog IS the data. It is odd that PSA is tracking and reporting month-to-month variations like this, seemingly implying that these numbers mean something, as if there is a correlation to the current market when there is none. If they wanted to actually provide useful data, they'd have to break out the numbers only for cards submitted in the last few months.

Sorry, I am confused. Is there another post or article about PSA numbers?

Or just provide monthly submission data, which I don't believe they do.

It may just be that despite the backlog, they wanted to show their production/output is up, so that people didn't think they weren't trying to address the situation at all. But showing submission data wouldn't necessarily be helpful or overly relevant since they shut down a large part of their submissions last year, and are still operating on a restricted/reduced submission scale now. What would be relevant is to see what monthly submissions and subsequent grading output is once they are back to whatever their fully open and normalized submission status will finally be, and their long-term pricing going forward has been determined and put in place.

Also interesting to see the surge in soccer. Soccer cards were an extremely small area of collecting just 7-8 years ago, and I have watched the surge in value of superstars, just like in our 4 main sports.

Pele, Maradona, Messi, etc. cards have reached astronomical prices, including a Pele rookie which just surpassed $1M! (This one hits too close to home for me - too soon to talk about it....) It really seemed to take off in parallel with basketball last year, but hasn't seen a dip in the same manner. And prices on eBay continue to show very strong results for soccer - I would expect the % of their business coming from soccer to continue to grow as these stats are shown in future months.

Read the related recent discussion on the PSA Board:

https://forums.collectors.com/discus...-for-the-hobby

And they put out charts like this as if to say, "look what a great job we're doing for our customers!" 🤣

I'm not as good as math as I should be nor do I have any way of saying this other than instinct but,...

for those who were hoping for $20-25 submission prices in 2022 think again. With the shows PSA will be setting up at (For example Long Beach this weekend) and the cards which are submitted from members of their club (not even counting group submissions) so.,.

It will be at least till January of 2023 if not later before we see some return to normalcy for PSA. At least we can guesstimate from all the information but that's just my supposition.

Rich

Rich, no fears, I just reviewed a copy of PSA's strategy to reduce the backlog to SOP in 60 days. Here's the highlights:

-1 Install a random number generator that spits out grades on a PSA label by simply pulling down an arm, much like a slot machine. No review of the actual card will be needed. Statistics from the test showed that the grade output is within a single grade of a card graded by a trained professional 58% of the time - good enough for PSA!

-2 Hire a trained chimp named "Alfie" to box all shipments immediately after slabbing. His match up rate of customer-to-order is an astounding 44%, or about a 10% improvement over current processes.

-3 Eliminate the QA process. PSA customer polling reveals that most customers don't mind a stray hair or dust bunny being slabbed with their $5,000 card. Also, revenue is forecasted to increase 8%, given that many "picky" customers will pay for a reslab.

What an amazing business plan PSA!!! Thank God Joe Orlando "retired." Now you can really get some things done!

This shows that PSA is dominating. No other TPG is close in their profits it's amazing!

There's a guy on YouTube that follows the actual population numbers each week for all the categories and gives you a grand total also. His YouTube name is Retro Hoop Collectibles. Those numbers are more accurate.

Nothing matters until we finally get our godd*mn 'Swinging Sixties' group sub back. It's gotten to the point where we had to give Bobby our next of kin info, because some of us will no longer be alive when the cards are returned.

I know that you all consider me "snarky anti grader guy", and I won't deny it, but..

Serious question :

Does anybody have any idea how many opinion givers work at everybody's favorite opinion seller?

You guys talk about hundreds of thousands if not millions of slabs, isn't anybody curious about the time spent on an individual card? Time that changes the value of the card exponentially?

Doug

My blood boiled when I learned PSA is performing in-person grading at certain shows. The national is one thing, but PSA has had our cards almost a year now, and some jack wagon at a regional show, willing to pay a highway robbery amount, jumps ahead of us all.

Shows how much PSA cares about the backlogged customers. The $15.00 a card, true-collector, guy continue waiting while the ultra modern $150.00 a card flipper gets ushered to the front of the line. PSA is probably grading cards at these regional shows that were manufactured and printed after it received our submission. Think about that!

Hahaha, they don't give a shit about "true collectors", at the very best they care about $15 true-collector guy one tenth as much as they care about $150 card flipper guy.

Not enough.

20-60 seconds would be my guess.

The Lottery Ticket Affect is Real….never down play that fact.

Mind forever blown. Thanks for that.