The fourth and final instalment of our H1 2026, Cards vs Capital series, and appropriately the most layered. Magic: The Gathering is the oldest major TCG in the hobby, we are talking a game that has been running since 1993, (yes, before Pokémon Younglings), and its investment market reflects that complexity. Unlike Pokémon’s broadly shared
We are going to get straight to the number that matters in this one, because it deserves to lead. The NASDAQ 100 returned +17.92% in H1 2026 (the first half of the year, January through June). The Card Ladder index for One Piece TCG returned +119% in the same six months. Yes, you read that
One Piece TCG vs The NASDAQ: How Did Cardboard Stack Up in the First Half of 2026? Read More »
Welcome to the second instalment in our H1 2026 (the first half of the year for the new peeps) TCG franchisee vs the NASDAQ 100 series, this one’s for the Yu-Gi-Oh gang, where we put each major TCG head-to-head against the NASDAQ 100 for the first six months of the year. This one is the
Yu-Gi-Oh TCG vs The NASDAQ: How Did Cardboard Stack Up in the First Half of 2026? Read More »
Every six months here at The TCG Times, we are going to do something that most card publications do not bother with: put our hobby’s investment performance directly next to the traditional financial benchmark that most of our readers money is sitting in when it is not buying cardboard, as we have said before, we
Pokémon TCG vs The NASDAQ: How Did Cardboard Stack Up in the First Half of 2026? Read More »
Two sets, two very different launches, two very different relationships but both have a sh*t ton of nostalgia. Like we have said before, nostalgia in TCG usual mean money. Celebrations arrived in October 2021 as Pokémon’s official 25th anniversary released a limited, special-distribution set built specifically to mark the occasion. On paper, Celebrations should have
Pokémon 151 vs Celebrations: Which Anniversary-Style Set Actually Held Its Value Better Read More »
A Rayquaza VMAX alternate art from 2021 is sitting at $1000+ today, and the price is climbing higher than the sky pillar, comfortably the second most valuable card in its entire set, despite sharing identical pull rates with three other Eeveelution chase cards currently trading at a third of that price. That is not a
Why We Think Mega Evolution – Delta Reign Will Be Worth Investing In Read More »
Every TCG investor eventually learns the same uncomfortable lesson: the company printing your cards has the power to make your investment worth significantly less, at any time, with a single business decision. Not through malice, not through some grand conspiracy, but through the most mundane corporate logic imaginable, they printed more product to meet demand,
The $2 Pack Problem: What Happens When Konami, WOTC, or TPC Print Too Much Read More »
At some point last week, a small group of speculators bought Magic: The Gathering Lord of the Rings Special Edition Collector’s Boxes for somewhere between $7,000 and $9,000 USD each, then immediately sent emails to YouTuber Penguinz0 offering to flip those same boxes to him for $12,000 USD. Within 24 hours, he had publicly announced
Here is a number that should terrify any chase card investor: Evolving Skies, released in August 2021, contains over 30 different alternate art secret rares, with each one appearing at a rate of roughly 1 in every 400 to 500 booster packs (if it doesn’t scare you keep reading…). That set has been opened, by
The Moonbreon Paradox: How One Overprinted Card Defied Every Rule of Chase Card Risk Read More »
Here at The TCG Times, we get asked some version of the same question almost every week: “What do you think my collection will be worth in a few years?” It’s a great question, and honestly, it is the right question to be asking, lets be honest, most of you reading are collectors looking to
How to Project the Value of Your TCG Collection in 2030 Read More »
