Posted By:
Mike MasinickScott, you said:
"I can see if you had a really tough card, which some are and 100% of the shares started at level comensurate with the value of the card and then the traders followed the price of the card as if it were appreciating on the auction arena or Ebay it would make more sense."
I agree with you 100%. This is the ultimate goal of the marketplace, and if everyone in our marketplace were smart, educated, and only cared about money, this is what would happen. However, some people simply care more about having their name at the top of the owners list than paying 10-20% more for their shares than they should. PSA registry ring a bell? =)
You have pointed out the Gabby Street Broadleaf as an example, but I think most of our other cards outside of the broadleafs are very close to fairly valued. If you look at the Ted Williams 1941 Play Ball for example, check out the graph of the price history and look at the closed auctions for this card for the last year. Each and every closed auction affected the price of our shares. This card (PSA 8) has sold for under $4000 and $8000+ in the last year and our marketplace adjusts accordingly. Remember that not all PSA 8s are created equal, so it is up to each person to determine the value of "our PSA 8" verses each of the ones that sold and figure out if they should buy/sell the shares.
Like anything else, we have guys who are only in it to collect the shares, we have guys who only care about making money, and most of our users are somewhere in the middle. We're finding a niche and building a nice collection together.
I truly believe we are an entertainment company. We make money because we provide people something that they enjoy doing online. Yes, it involves money and sports cards... but honestly, people use CardTarget rather than buying the cards themselves because they enjoy the ONLINE community aspect of it.
I could get into a whole thesis on the development of eTopps and why people enjoyed it, but that's for another post. =)