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Originally Posted by mferronibc
What's more concerning (I mean this in terms of pricing out us average collectors for good) is the massive amount of $$$ coming into the hobby from investment-type firms who are literally buying up cards as part of diversified portfolios for their clients. Yes this started with really high end cards, ultra-modern basketball, parallels, auto's, etc. but is now filtering down and affecting all aspects of the market as people are looking for the next "undervalued" place to invest. There is even a new focus on junk-wax era cards which have also seen a big boost. I read somewhere that an investment banker was literally trying to buy up every 260 PSA 10 '82 Topps Rickey Henderson card to "corner the market" and boasted he was already half way there. The price on that card has absolutely skyrocketed as a result.
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This same scenario played out in the 1990's-2000's with the Class III MG market. Early 90's an M16 was had for $3k with ease. Now, $40-$50k all day long. It pulled all the low rent MG's up into the $7-$8k range.
Population reports from the likes of PSA are problematic because it takes little market knowledge to corner it. A card with only 10 or 20 high grade examples can be scooped up quickly.