1969 Topps Alcindor PSA 10

[itjclarke]

Originally Posted by T206Collector

The fact that the grading process is not more transparent suggests that people should buy the card not the holder. $400k for cardboard that isn't rare except for the number assigned to it by a third-party grading company is just irresponsible. So you have the only PSA 10 on August 19, 2016. What that company or number will mean with respect to that card or otherwise in 5 or 10 years is no certainty. It's just a bet made by someone with ridiculous amounts of disposable wealth.

To each his own, by I much prefer relative card scarcity to high grade scarcity.

Totally agree with this. Any number of things could burst a 1 of 1 PSA 10's bubble. Perhaps 4-5 more grade out as 10's over the next few years (totally possible with a 1969 card)... or worse, and in line with a previous post, perhaps a scandal is eventually outed, in which graders, or those paying off graders are buying and submitting 9's in order to have them bumped to 10's. Given today's market there could be hundreds of thousands, even millions to be earned, on easy to find, relatively affordable (8-9's of most of these are easily attainable) cards awaiting a bump to 10. I cannot imagine the wages/salary of a grader are enough to full offset the temptation to cash in, that one (or more) may eventually feel. It all seems pretty precarious, with an awful lot outside the buyers' control.