Health of Asset Class - Over/Under 1955 Topps Koufax PSA 9

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Rhotchkiss

Bob, all fair points and I edited the title of the thread to call it an asset class vs hobby. You and I seem to keep crossing streams on content of titles vs the post, but since I created both, I will admit I created the confusion.

My question relates to cards as investments/an asset class. And I believe this question is relevant to many on this board, even those who consider themselves collectors - these things value, plain and simple, and people care about the value of things they own that have value.

So, to be clear, it’s my bad- I am looking at this card/sale as a market for the health of cards as an asset class

Ryan,

It is not your bad, and I agree with you wholeheartedly that the lines are absolutely blurred because most old timers that started out as just collectors have seen the value of their cards/collections skyrocket in recent years. Especially when you start talking about vintage and pre-war. It is literally impossible in most cases to separate Collectors from Investors anymore. The value that people's cards/collections may now have makes it impossible for them to ignore that along with their beloved hobby collection, they may also be sitting on a big profit as well. And as everyone starts getting older, you can't help but start thinking about retirement and estate issues and planning for spouses/family.

Now as for the health of the investment side/aspects of the hobby, that is a tough question as well. Unlike traditional investments (stocks, bonds, etc.), cards themselves don't have anything that really changes, unlike with stocks and bonds where companies can have good years and bad years, or interest rates rising and falling. To me, cards are more like one of those investment options that people are now starting to look at as potential alternatives to the traditional types of investments when the values of those traditional investments look to be going down. When the stock market is tanking and the interest rates are down, people may see prices rising in cards as an alternative investment choice they think can possibly do better over a short/long term than those more traditional investments. This recent pandemic surge though was a somewhat unique situation that saw both the traditional stock markets AND card prices rising. Likely due a lot to the excess cash being poured into our economy in anticipation of concern for the pandemic's effect on our overall economic health. Now that that all seems to have pretty much passed and ended, I wouldn't be surprised to still see cards as an investment option/choice, but maybe now working more so as an alternative to the traditional investments. So right now, with talks/fears of a major recession still in the picture, people that have moved some of their investment assets into these high-end, high-grade cards, may just keep them there for now. But with all the crap that has been going on with the economy and world of late, including all the unrelated external issues, the fact that the stock market hasn't completely imploded (in fact I thought I read where the market just ended the best quarter we've had since back in 2020), many investors may be thinking we are at, or close, to the bottom, and the stock market will begin rising going forward. In that case, I can see people getting out of cards and back into the more traditional investments at some point in maybe the not so distant future. In that case, as that may eventually start to happen, I think you'll see the Collectors keeping the lower end/condition cards in pretty similar value to where they are now. But the higher-end, higher priced investment grade/type cards, I can see those cooling off some as Investors may move more of their money back into the more traditional investment markets. Exactly when that may start to happen, well if I knew and could accurately predict that, I'd have been retired years ago. LOL