The Cardboard Investment

Let The Madness Begin

It was the year 2019 and basketball cards were heating up. A number of hot up and coming stars had brought a lot of passion and intrigue back to the sport. Sneaker heads were starting to dabble in the very similar market of cards. A large group of people across the world had built a market for buying and selling shoes. Mainly men's shoes of old Jordan basketball sneakers, but this soon transitioned into shoes new and old. The hobby was continuing to grow at an unprecedented pace, and I was seeing incredible returns on the few basketball cards I had purchased. I also began to regret some of the sales I made, where some cards were now worth ten fold what I sold it for.

Unopened products began spiking in price and retail shelves were bare almost every time I visited a local Target or Walmart. Just a few months prior, you could stop by at any point and have a good selection of all sports card retail products.

I remember my brother calling me and telling me about the resale value of basketball products if you could find them unopened. A player by the name of Luka Doncic was beginning to blow up, and everyone was looking for his rookies in any product available. Another young player by the name of Giannis Antetokounmpo was also taking over the NBA and his card prices were looking completely insane. They had increased from $10 to $1000 in a very short period for one of his more collected rookies.

This massive change in the money coming into basketball cards forced a sort of speculation and future valuation for cards to occur. Of course, there was also the fear of missing out that drove this madness as well. Players that were projected to do well, with hardly any track record of success, began to increase in value. I was fortunate enough to have and to purchase a number of these more popular rookies. The temptation to sell at 3-4x gains should have been avoided, but any successful investor will tell you that profit is profit.