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Gotta catch ’em all! – Pokémon cards fetch millions at auction
Pokémon cards are attracting many specialist investors and collectors, who are paying hundreds of thousands of pounds – or even millions – for the rarest assets.
The Pokémon cards phenomenon may have passed you by, but many specialist investors are now paying hundreds of thousands of pounds – or even millions – for the rarest Pokémon assets.
Pokémon is a Japanese media franchise, launched in 1996, featuring more than 1,000 fictional characters with special powers and features. Their human owners can train these creatures and send them into battle against other game players. Pokémon began as a video game series, but has rapidly expanded with the launch of TV shows, films, toys and trading cards.
Today, it's the Pokémon cards that are really attracting attention, partly from Pokémon players who compete in national and international tournaments and want the most powerful characters, but also from collectors and, increasingly, investors.
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Take the specialist auction of Pokémon cards held at auction house Stanley Gibbons Baldwin's in London last month. The centrepiece of the sale, a first-edition Base Set Charizard card, raised £442,800, and the total proceeds from the sale reached almost £750,000.
And while those sums are striking, they look small beer compared with a US auction held a few weeks previously. At that sale, AJ Scaramucci, the son of former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci, agreed to pay an astonishing $16.5 million for a Pikachu Illustrator card dating from 1998. He bought the card from social-media influencer Logan Paul, who had paid $5.3 million for it in 2021.
Logan Paul paid $5.3 million for a Pokémon card in 2021
(Image credit: Michael Owens/Getty Images for OBB Media - FANATICS STUDIOS)
Why are Pokémon cards so appealing?
Roy Raftery, head of trading cards at Stanley Gibbons Baldwin's, says that while this year's 30th anniversary of the launch of Pokémon has buoyed interest in the market, investors' appetite has been growing for some time. “There are collectors and investors in the US, the Middle East and in Asia who will pay almost any price for the cards they really want,” he says. “They work with scouts who go round the world looking to acquire the most highly prized cards on their behalf.” Data from Card Ladder, an analytics firm that tracks trading-card prices and sales, underlines the point. Its “Pokémon index” of card prices on the secondary market is up by 145% over the past 12 months alone.
As in all collectables markets, it's the older, rarer Pokémon cards that attract the highest prices – with good-condition cards selling at a premium. That has piqued the interest of Pokémon fans, both present and past.
Could a long-forgotten collection of Pokémon cards, now languishing in a bedroom cupboard, contain a priceless item? Probably not, but it's worth taking a look and doing a bit of research. Each Pokémon card carries details of its name and set number. You can then search resources, such as eBay's listings of sold items, to see what an individual card might be worth. Services such as Collectr, PriceCharting and Rare Candy can also be useful. Often, you can use your phone to scan a card to identify and price it.
Part of the fun with Pokémon cards is that they are still being printed – and rare Pokémon cards can be resold at decent prices. “Every set has really cool cards, but the occasional one is like the Willy Wonka golden ticket,” says Raftery. “You can go into a corner shop, spend a few pounds on a pack of cards, and end up with one that's worth £200, or even £2,000 if you get lucky.”
At this end of the market, it is fans who will be most active, buying and selling cards as much for the love of the game as in the hope of making money. And in any case, it makes sense to be circumspect about the investment potential of the cards. The price rises of recent times have been eye-catching, but collectables markets can be volatile and unpredictable. Highly fashionable assets can fall from favour quickly if investors lose interest and move on to something else.
Equally, even if you're only spending modest sums, tread carefully. As with any market where money is flowing, Pokémon cards attract their fair share of grifters. Raftery advises collectors to be very careful about buying cards on platforms, such as eBay and TikTop Shop, where it can be difficult to check the seller's credentials and to authenticate genuine cards. “There are definitely growing numbers of fakes out there,” he warns.
(Image credit: Patrick T. Fallon / AFP via Getty Images)
Pokémon cards have fans of all ages
If in doubt, steer clear – and if you are thinking about spending more, it's important to investigate provenance. Organisations such as PSA specialise in authenticating trading cards and can often offer assessments remotely. Bona-fide traders will usually be able to provide you with verifiable information from such organisations.
There has also been a spike in thefts, with criminals targeting gaming shops in the hope of finding valuable cards. One retailer in Peterborough lost £100,000 of stock following a break-in earlier this year. Insurers subsequently advised anyone with valuable Pokémon cards to make sure they had itemised these on their home contents policies.
None of which is intended to put you off the Pokémon phenomenon, which continues to have real appeal for fans of all ages. One reason that highly desirable cards are so widely coveted is that multiple generations have now grown up playing the game, including older fans who may today have significant wealth at their disposal.
By all means, have some fun with Pokémon cards – and there's always the chance of making a handsome profit. Pokémon probably won't be your pension fund, but in a world of mythical creatures with special powers, you never quite know when the magic might strike.
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David Prosser is a regular MoneyWeek columnist, writing on small business and entrepreneurship, as well as pensions and other forms of tax-efficient savings and investments. David has been a financial journalist for almost 30 years, specialising initially in personal finance, and then in broader business coverage. He has worked for national newspaper groups including The Financial Times, The Guardian and Observer, Express Newspapers and, most recently, The Independent, where he served for more than three years as business editor.
