For many Chinese consumers, the star card may still be unfamiliar, but for some card enthusiasts, it is an interest and an investment.
"When I was in middle school, I used pocket money to buy blindly dismantled football cards. After work, I started to collect cards signed by top players." Zheng Jiaqi, the manager of T8 Collection Gallery, told Yicai that in the past three years, the stars he collected The trading price of the card in the open market has skyrocketed by at least 10 times, allowing him to realize "playing hobbies and earning money at the same time".
In August of this year, a star card of baseball star Honus Wagner was auctioned for an astonishing price of $7.25 million (about 49.7 million yuan), setting a new record for the highest transaction for a star card.
"This year's Poly Auction (Beijing Poly Auction 2022 Spring Art Auction), for the first time, the star card was used as an auction item. I inquired about the price of the star card between 600,000 and 800,000 yuan some time ago, and I got it this time. 1.17 million yuan, it can be seen that the increase is still good." Zheng Jiaqi said that seeing the growth potential of the industry, he quit his previous full-time job in August this year and was determined to focus on the international trade of football cards.
Such individual collectors are appearing more and more in China, giving birth to the explosive growth of the football card market, but also attracting more individuals, enterprises and platforms to accelerate the influx of cases with low-key cases.
100 billion market
The football star card originated in the United States. It is essentially a card printed with portraits of various sports stars and displays related information about the stars. It is a derivative of sports culture and has a history of more than 100 years.
For sports collectible cards with special elements such as star signatures or jersey slices, issuers with high IP authorization thresholds will control the number of issuances to ensure a scarce supply, so that those limited numbers of small cards have collectible value.
In 1996, Upper Deck, an American football card distribution and manufacturing company, entered the Chinese market for the first time and opened a physical branch in downtown Shanghai.
"This store is located downstairs in my house, and I also came into contact with the product of the star card." Zheng Jiaqi said that middle school students at that time generally loved basketball, and his enlightenment to the star card also started from basketball stars, and the classmates around him They were "brought into the pit" by him, dismantling cards together, and exchanging with each other, which became a great pleasure.
The primary market for football cards is often sold in blind boxes.
Some people say that the freshness and excitement of this blind-opening box make straight men addicted to the star card.
Because of its collection value and rarity, it has also formed a huge second-hand market like limited sneakers, artworks, and rare stamps.
Zheng Jiaqi, who regards football card collection as a long-term hobby, has witnessed the steady growth of this niche industry in China, but did not expect the football card market to break out under the epidemic.
"On the public second-hand trading platform, the price of football cards signed by top stars is rising by about 20% to 30% every year, but in the past three years of the epidemic, it has risen 10 times at once." Zheng Jiaqi said, in addition to the price , the transaction volume is also increasing. Taking the new store he just opened on the eBay platform in August as an example, the transaction volume has exceeded 50,000 US dollars (about 340,000 yuan) in less than half a month. Over 400 orders were traded.
As the main large-scale platform for global player card transactions, the category of player cards has maintained high growth for six consecutive years on the eBay platform.
In 2021, the sales of football cards on the eBay platform will more than triple compared to before the epidemic, with an average of 2 football cards sold every second.
As the most popular category of collectible cards, the star cards on the eBay platform include basketball, baseball, football, tennis, rugby and other sports categories.
According to data released by market research firm Verified Market Research in August 2021, the compound growth rate of the global star card market from 2020 to 2027 will reach 23%, and the market size will reach US$98.7 billion (about 676.2 billion yuan) in 2027.
Pang Tao, general manager of sales and category management in eBay Greater China, told China Business News that in recent years, the Chinese football card market has seen a boom.
Based on the needs of domestic Tibetan friends, this year eBay pays special attention to the category of football cards, and has begun to build a collectible card trading platform that integrates multiple services such as price guides and management tools, authoritative agency certification, and vaults. It will be launched. A series of exclusive subsidies to attract more Chinese traders to settle in.
Like Zheng Jiaqi, the star card collector HSC manager Minibus has also turned his hobby for more than 20 years into a business and entered the eBay platform in August this year.
Before that, his main business was offline stores, selling first-hand goods to domestic collectors by importing first-hand supplies from agency companies.
He told Yicai that the offline transaction scale is around 800,000 yuan per month, while the online transaction exceeded 1 million yuan in less than a month.
Such enthusiasm has made the capital market eager to move.
On August 23, eBay announced that it would acquire TCGplayer, a trading platform for card collection games, for $295 million. The transaction is expected to be completed in the first quarter of 2023; earlier this year, Card Hobby acquired Yaoji Technology. (002605.SZ) The strategic investment of 100 million yuan is the first external investment received by Katao since its establishment 7 years ago. Yaoji Technology holds about 38% of the shares.
Has fallen this year
Behind the explosive growth of the sky-high card and football card market, is it hype or just need?
In Pang Tao's view, with the popularity of global sports culture, a group of senior football star card enthusiasts and collectors have been accumulated in China, and sports fans of various sports are still increasing, and the collection of idols created by international events Interest will naturally increase.
Therefore, the growth of the star card market itself is first of all based on the hobbies of this group of people. It has rigid needs, not the value of buying and selling. "The financial attributes are given later, and it is difficult to determine the valuation of personal hobbies."
For Chinese Tibetans, there is already a certain amount of collections, but there is not enough smooth and diverse international trading platforms. This is the motivation for eBay to choose this track to focus on in China.
Zheng Jiaqi believes that under the background of the epidemic, many sports events around the world have been suspended or held in empty stadiums, and people's lifestyles have undergone great changes. This has led to a surge in people's demand for star cards, which has become the main factor driving up card transaction prices.
Coupled with the global inflation environment, the growth in asset prices is even more pronounced.
In addition to the epidemic, "historic" moments such as the sudden death of American basketball superstar Kobe and the birth of China's first official F1 driver Zhou Guanyu are attracting more people to pay attention to the event and the star market behind it, and then become millions or even tens of millions of sky-high prices. The driving force behind the birth of the star card.
At the Beijing Poly Auction 2022 Spring Art Auction held on July 28, the total turnover of the star card special session reached 9.4484 million yuan, with a turnover rate of nearly 95%.
Among them, the 2014~2015 season Panini Eminence series "Kobe Bryant (Kobe Bryant (Kobe Bryant) Championship Tag Inscription Signature Star Card") was sold at a high price of 4.0825 million yuan.
However, after the skyrocketing rise during the epidemic, the overall price of football cards has begun to fall since the beginning of this year.
"The short-term decline is a correction of the 10-fold increase in the past three years." Zheng Jiaqi believes that this is an inevitable trend for the market to return to rationality.
In the face of the uncertainty of the future economy, he does not want to blindly make large volumes, but wants to pay more attention to the value of the card itself for long-term investment. "Really valuable collectibles are long-term preservation and appreciation."
In the context of anti-inflation, cash is still king.
Since it is an investment, there must be risks.
The other side of the price increase and even a hundredfold increase is the slashing in half or even being reduced to waste paper.
The minibus once had a huge loss of two-thirds of the price of the star card it bought. "The expectations for the star are high, but the actual performance is not good, or if he leaves the stadium due to injury before he achieves it, it will affect the price. , and even make the star card a piece of waste paper."
The minibus said that if you don’t understand the market and market conditions, you will lose money, and it may be the peak when you start. “This happens to me too, so I will pay close attention to the dynamics of players and games. Even if I don’t collect cards, I will watch it. The game, but in order to collect cards, the purpose of watching the game is one more."
The minibus recently sent an F1 driver Max Verstappen's autographed football star card to a foreign auction. There is only one in the world, and it sold for about 3 million yuan (less than 500,000 US dollars). ) price, but ultimately failed to trade.
Although it was aborted, he thought it was a good thing. "At the time, my estimate for this card was $1 million."
This card was obtained after he opened a whole box of cards, which is equivalent to a cost of 30,000 yuan. Compared with his expected $1 million, the value (could be) increased by more than 200 times. Compared with the actual auction price, the increase Also 100 times.
An industry with a "get rich overnight" myth naturally attracts pure investors and even speculators.
In the channel of the market surge, there is also no lack of chaos in the speculation of cards.
"The ethos has been broken, and some people use the star card for gambling." The minibus said that many people will open the card live, and it is indeed possible to open a card worth millions, but this probability is extremely small. No less than buying a lottery ticket.
The minibus suggested that if you want to invest in a star card, you must be knowledgeable and pay close attention to the competition and the athletes themselves.
As a collector, his ideal is not just business, but he hopes to open a sports collection museum in 5 years, displaying collections including football cards, clothes worn by stars, as well as World Cup and Olympic gold medals, etc. Taste.