The new Pokémon McDonald's cards are being sold online for outrageous costs. Pokémon is currently celebrating its 25th-anniversary and has teamed up with McDonald's. The Pokémon Company is celebrating by releasing exclusive stained glass Pokémon figures, a new video game in the form of Pokémon Legends: Arceus, and a music album featuring Katy Perry and Post Malone.
The Pokémon Trading Card game initially released in the United States back in 1998. It has remained popular to the present day, as the Pokémon franchise continues to receive support from a large and loyal fanbase. Billions of cards continue to be bought, traded, and sold. Pokémon TCG continues to be one of the top-selling card games as well. As the value of certain cards increases, there is a greater incentive for outsiders to come in and hoard rare cards and sell them later for a much higher price. Legacy cards in particular are becoming more valuable.
As part of the collaboration, certain Pokémon cards can be found in a Happy Meal box at participating McDonald'slocations. Each box contains 50 different cards, including some rarer holographic cards. However, according to Gamerant, some scalpers have marred the release of McDonald's Pokémon cards. Similar to the PS5 scalping controversy, boxes of McDonald's 25th-anniversary cards are being sold on sites like eBay for hundreds of dollars. This includes a recent transaction in which a single Pikachu Pokémon card sold for $500.
Pokémon cards remain a hot commodity. A Japanese man committed fraud by forging 25 different popsicle sticks in an attempt to acquire rare Pokémon cards from an ice cream company. This was done to boost his chances of winning a rare Mythical Zarude card, in perhaps the strangest example yet of the lengths fans are willing to go through in order to get their hands on these highly valuable cards.
The ongoing commercial success of Pokémon is undoubtedly a major factor behind the huge profits these cards are generating. This is influencing many people who hold no real interest in Pokémon to swoop in, purchase popular cards and sell them at a higher price to bring in some major profit. Considering how common scalping has become within the Pokémon trading card game, the McDonald's 25th-anniversary cards never stood a chance from the moment they were first leaked in early January. The hope is these high prices will eventually decline.
Source: Gamerant