Pokémon Cards Post 28% in 2026 as $BTC Slides 29%, Onchain Platforms Chase eBay's $2.62B Print

A Pokémon card index gained approximately 28% year-to-date in 2026, outpacing the S&P 500's 13% return and sitting well clear of $BTC's 29% decline over the same period. The wider trading-card market carries an estimated value between $10 billion and $15 billion, with the graded-card segment alone placed at approximately $10.8 billion by TCGCharts. For the onchain segment, the number to track is Courtyard's reported $139 million in 30-day trading volume, set against the $2.62 billion in individual card sales eBay recorded across all of 2025.

Retail demand runs ahead of supply

Target reported nearly 70% growth in trading-card sales last year, with Pokémon the primary driver. Walmart's online marketplace logged a 200% jump in card sales over the same period. Both retailers imposed purchase limits to contain resale arbitrage. The stress on physical retail became visible in April, when hundreds of buyers reportedly queued outside a Costco in British Columbia at 3:30 a.m. to reach Prismatic Evolutions boxes. Products priced around $100 at retail moved to secondary markets at multiples of that figure.

The $16.5 million ceiling print

At the high-grade end, influencer Logan Paul sold a Pikachu Illustrator card to AJ Scaramucci, founder of Solari Capital and son of financier Anthony Scaramucci, for $16.5 million. Paul reportedly cleared more than $8 million in profit on the transaction. That sale is the sharpest public price anchor the market has produced this year.

Tokenization: the liquidity problem

Deadstock, Courtyard, and Collector-Crypto each authenticate physical cards, hold them in secure vaults, and issue blockchain tokens representing ownership for continuous trading. Holders can redeem the underlying card later. The model applies real-world asset infrastructure already used for gold, private credit, and US Treasuries to collectible cardboard. Courtyard's approximately $139 million in 30-day volume is the most specific figure available for the segment.

ATH Labs, through Deadstock's partnership with Japan Trading Card Center, has secured exclusive access to tokenize inventory from one of Asia's largest card-sourcing networks. Access to supply matters, but it does not resolve pricing. Cards of identical surface-level specification can trade at materially different levels depending on grade, centering, and provenance. Thin markets may have only a handful of comparable sales for any given card, making reliable price discovery the harder problem.

What to watch

eBay's $2.62 billion in 2025 card sales gives it a buyer base and transaction history that new platforms will take time to approach. The platforms most likely to close that gap are those that secure exclusive supply and build genuine secondary market activity around it. Courtyard's next disclosed volume figure is the setup's nearest confirmation point.