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The story
The Pokémon Card 30th-anniversary commemorative set “30th Celebration” saw a wave of bulk-buying and high-priced resale worldwide right after launch — but according to a report from Kotaku in the US, it turns out the pull rate for high-rarity cards was much higher than expected there, and prices are now crashing. The headline cards, “Mew ex” and “Mewtwo ex,” were fetching $850–$1,400 on eBay before release, with some hitting over $3,000 at the peak — but five days after launch they’d dropped to around $120, and anything priced above $100 is reportedly struggling to sell. On 5ch, reactions ranged from skepticism about the article’s premise (“isn’t this still way too profitable?”) to criticism of scalping itself, to speculation about the company’s own motives in controlling pull rates.
Yahoo! Original Article, 9/22 (Tue) 7:01
Last week, as soon as the Pokémon Card 30th-anniversary commemorative set “30th Celebration” went on sale, bulk-buying and high-priced resale broke out worldwide. But at least in the US, Kotaku reports that the pull rate for high-rarity cards turned out to be far higher than expected, crashing prices and leaving scalpers reeling.
In particular, “Mew ex (FUR)” and “Mewtwo ex (FUR)” reportedly sold on eBay for $850–$1,400 before release, with some examples fetching over $3,000 at the peak. But five days after launch, they were listed around $120, with anything above $100 said to be a tough sell.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Honestly it'd be better to feel a little guilty and just own up to being a scalper.
There are dead-serious collectors well past 30 too.
Creepy.
How do you even write such a sloppy article?
Making some feel "rare" is exactly what fuels scalping in the first place.
Just give every card equal odds — it's baffling why they don't.
So dumb.
Guess you don't know, so let me break it to you: Pokémon cards are for playing a card GAME.
Go for it lol
Why are you the one getting all riled up?
You all really need to realize how creepy you look.
Nintendo's on the kids' side.
If they were really on the kids' side, they'd just print more stock.
Print a ton more and tank the value.
Lol, what a joke.
Anyone who wants that stuff is an idiot.
The whole idea of adults desperately wanting kids' toys and characters is insane to begin with.
He was pulling a ton of them.
And there it is — one of the classic scalper excuses lol
Just be happy for them.
Way too intense for a kids' card game.
What a gross world we live in.
I was shocked when a card I bought for about ¥1,000 back in the day sold for ¥140,000.
Same with everything, really — even Tomica die-cast cars, when they make new "reissue" versions, they sometimes just sit unsold.
Guess it only means something if you got it in its own era.
Before that, the manufacturers running these limited-release marketing schemes are the real villains.
Background and key points of this story
What’s being reported as a “price crash” here is specifically the secondary-market price on eBay in the United States — a different market from Japan’s flea-market and buyback prices. The pushback in the thread (“they’re rolling in cash,” “prices are through the roof”) likely stems from that difference in country and market. The 30th Celebration is a commemorative pack loaded with newly designed high-rarity cards like Mew ex and Mewtwo ex, and it’s possible a higher-than-usual pull rate was intentional for this particular release. Since trading-card prices are fundamentally driven by “rarity × scarcity,” once it became clear the pull rate was higher than expected, the scalpers who’d bought up cards at inflated prices were the ones most exposed to losses. The thread’s discussion spread from criticism of scalping itself to speculation about the motives of both the company and the buyers driving that criticism.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports Express+) thread “[Pokémon Cards] Pokémon Card 30th Anniversary — Scalpers Who Bought Up Stock Left Reeling as High-Rarity Cards Prove Easier to Pull Than Expected, Crashing Prices.”
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