Collectors (PSA) Acquired SGC

[wolverinejayhawks]

This acquisiton is going to be very bad for the pricing of grading. Before the acquistion, it was pretty much a 4-firm Oligopoly with pricing remaining pretty high coming out of the pandemic and not returning to pre-pandemic levels. SGC became aggressive with fast $15 grading which hurt PSA, and PSA had to respond recently with better specials and reducing their backlog. The only thing propping up PSA's volume was a surge in TCG cards (which you can see on GEMRATE - Google it if you don't know GEMRATE), which is going to level off once the first wave of TCG collectors discovering grading ends.

Now, we are stuck with PSA/SGC, a seemingly disinterested BGS and a weakened CGS/CGC, which is a 3-firm Oligopoly where two of the firms are weak. I don't count other grading services (GMA, etc.) because they don't have the name, reputation and volume for auction buyers to pay attention on eBay and other outlets. I give SGC's $15 price with $9 for TCG about 2 months before "inflation" causes a price increase.

The FTC should leave Kroger alone and block PSA/SGC merger!