Printing More Money vs. High Card Prices

[rats60]

I agree that all the printing of money has caused prices to rise. I noticed prices on modern cards taking off when stimulus checks hit and now some of that is flowing into vintage. Also, people not being able to spend money in recreational areas frees up money for cards. If you didn't spend money on season tickets or vacations, why not put it in cards. It has also created a volatile stock market and people are looking to diversify into other investments like cards. There are plenty of influencers who got in at floor levels that are really pushing cards as investments.

[packs]

I don't know if I understand how stimulus checks are related. Personally, I've received less than $2,000 the entire pandemic. I don't see how that would open a door for me to buy a 20K card.

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by packs

I don't know if I understand how stimulus checks are related. Personally, I've received less than $2,000 the entire pandemic. I don't see how that would open a door for me to buy a 20K card.

I agree. People who can afford to pay 5 and 6 figures for cards are probably not doing it with stimulus money.

[JohnnyKilroy]

Originally Posted by jayshum

I agree. People who can afford to pay 5 and 6 figures for cards are probably not doing it with stimulus money.

The question is not about the stimulus money that people received. You are correct, people are not spending 1200, or whatever they got, on big cards. The question is about the fed “stimulating” the economy buy continuously printing money to keep us from imploding. So yes.. without a doubt.. it is a HUGE player in driving card prices up. I have to run, but I will explain later if someone doesn’t beat me to it.

[Leon]

Originally Posted by JohnnyKilroy

The question is not about the stimulus money that people received. You are correct, people are not spending 1200, or whatever they got, on big cards. The question is about the fed “stimulating” the economy buy continuously printing money to keep us from imploding. So yes.. without a doubt.. it is a HUGE player in driving card prices up. I have to run, but I will explain later if someone doesn’t beat me to it.

Correct. I got 600 dollars. That isn't going to buy much nowadays in nice cards. It's the feeling and sentiment of easy money that is my thought on the subject.

.

[Johnny630]

The Fed's Easy Money Printing Def is a big factor.

What I fear is happening is a lot of collectors are in somewhat of a panic mode of FOMO thus running up their credit card limit's on purchases because they're afraid if they don't buy now they will never be able to afford 6 months from now. This Upward Cycle in Ever/Always increasing values of cards doesn't seem to be ending anytime soon. If it does it could get ugly.

[byrone]

This is incomprehensible to me




25 highest-paid hedge fund managers made $32 billion in 2020, a record

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/02/22/-25-...n-in-2020.html

[FrozenInferno]

Originally Posted by JohnnyKilroy

The question is not about the stimulus money that people received. You are correct, people are not spending 1200, or whatever they got, on big cards. The question is about the fed “stimulating” the economy buy continuously printing money to keep us from imploding. So yes.. without a doubt.. it is a HUGE player in driving card prices up. I have to run, but I will explain later if someone doesn’t beat me to it.

A couple thousand in a stimulus check is not going towards a $20k card, but a lot of people took that money months ago and put it into a card or cards of some sort and those cards may have increased in value greatly in the months since. It's very plausible that if someone put $2k into the right card that it could be worth $10k today, and after flipping said card they can turn around and put the profits into something they deem to be safer such as a great vintage card.

The recent surge in vintage coincided with a drop in a lot of modern cards. I think a lot of flippers who were playing the game buying modern cards like Luka in basketball started seeing how volatile that game could be when these current players struggle to live up to hype in a real time season. I believe a lot of people made a lot of money during the last number of months flipping these commodity cards of modern players and now could be sitting on a five or even six-figure bankroll that allows them to ''get serious'' and begin buying safe blue chip vintage cards that have traditionally held and gained value over the long term and won't be susceptible to the up's and downs of an active player's career. Ruth, Mantle, Jordan, Gretzky, Aaron, whomever... These guys won't break their leg tomorrow and see their value plummet.

I can't say this is accounting for everything we're seeing but I can tell you this, I've been doing the exact same thing myself going back to December of 2019. I've turned my 12 years of modern collecting equity into some amazing vintage cards for my PC that I never thought I'd own.

[puckpaul]

Originally Posted by JohnnyKilroy

The question is not about the stimulus money that people received. You are correct, people are not spending 1200, or whatever they got, on big cards. The question is about the fed “stimulating” the economy buy continuously printing money to keep us from imploding. So yes.. without a doubt.. it is a HUGE player in driving card prices up. I have to run, but I will explain later if someone doesn’t beat me to it.

Exactly. The money printing has everything to do with card prices. There is so much money around, especially at the high end of finance. Its overwhelming the supply when people want cards.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by packs

I don't know if I understand how stimulus checks are related. Personally, I've received less than $2,000 the entire pandemic. I don't see how that would open a door for me to buy a 20K card.

There are people getting the full 3600, with another 2800 coming, that don't need that money. Add in money not spent on vacations, going to cards shows, going to games, going out to eat and to movies, etc and there is plenty of extra money being spent on cards.

It is not like this happened overnight. Stimulus checks started hitting last April. Vintage really started jumping in January. That is plenty of time for guys to flip cards and have 5 figures to buy cards. There were huge run ups in modern cards, especially basketball and Project 2020, last year and guys have moved from prospects into legends as more stable investments. This is not the whole cause, but is one of several major factors.

[dio]

Originally Posted by rats60

There are people getting the full 3600, with another 2800 coming, that don't need that money. Add in money not spent on vacations, going to cards shows, going to games, going out to eat and to movies, etc and there is plenty of extra money being spent on cards.

It is not like this happened overnight. Stimulus checks started hitting last April. Vintage really started jumping in January. That is plenty of time for guys to flip cards and have 5 figures to buy cards. There were huge run ups in modern cards, especially basketball and Project 2020, last year and guys have moved from prospects into legends as more stable investments. This is not the whole cause, but is one of several major factors.

I think money first goes to modern. And some gain so much start moving asset to more conservative and know vintage is better long run. They saw vintage market is undervalue for so long.

[packs]

That's a lot of benchmarking and criteria to clear for stimulus money to have anything to do with a 20K card.

[bnorth]

Originally Posted by rats60

There are people getting the full 3600, with another 2800 coming, that don't need that money. Add in money not spent on vacations, going to cards shows, going to games, going out to eat and to movies, etc and there is plenty of extra money being spent on cards.

It is not like this happened overnight. Stimulus checks started hitting last April. Vintage really started jumping in January. That is plenty of time for guys to flip cards and have 5 figures to buy cards. There were huge run ups in modern cards, especially basketball and Project 2020, last year and guys have moved from prospects into legends as more stable investments. This is not the whole cause, but is one of several major factors.

The stimulus checks are a smaller part. I have a few friends that got laid off. They are getting normal unemployment checks and a huge extra check every week. They are making WAY more money not working than they would make actually working. I could see this increasing the sales of cheaper(under 2K) cards but not the insane rise in the 2K+ cards.

[egri]

Originally Posted by packs

I don't know if I understand how stimulus checks are related. Personally, I've received less than $2,000 the entire pandemic. I don't see how that would open a door for me to buy a 20K card.

Originally Posted by jayshum

I agree. People who can afford to pay 5 and 6 figures for cards are probably not doing it with stimulus money.

I don't think it impacts those cards, but it is enough to turn a $75 card into a $315 card, as another thread here was discussing. And if someone had spent their first check in the stock market when they got it, they could have enough to pick up a four-figure card, or get a good start on a five-figure one. With the tear the market has been on, someone could have relatively easily turned their stimulus check into a much bigger sum; QQQ was at $180 in March, and it closed today at $322. VOO bottomed out at $200 back then and closed at $355 today.

[dio]

And what happen when next stock market crash. They just going to print more. Unlimited QE. Asset inflation even more

[dealme]

Originally Posted by rats60

I agree that all the printing of money has caused prices to rise. I noticed prices on modern cards taking off when stimulus checks hit and now some of that is flowing into vintage. Also, people not being able to spend money in recreational areas frees up money for cards. If you didn't spend money on season tickets or vacations, why not put it in cards. It has also created a volatile stock market and people are looking to diversify into other investments like cards. There are plenty of influencers who got in at floor levels that are really pushing cards as investments.

I think this is really a good point. While many people have been been greatly impacted financially by the pandemic (or more accurately the response to it), many others have not. Those that have not been negatively affected by the situation likely have disposable income that in the past was spent on tickets, vacations, etc. Some of that disposable income is now being spent on cards. Plus, at least with some of the higher dollar examples, it would seem that cards are now a trendy place to park ones investment dollar.