Typical resale price of sealed Japanese Pokémon booster boxes relative to list price, for sets released in 2023, 2024 and 2025, at release and up to a year later

How it’s built

1. Took monthly flea-market resale prices from PRICE BASE, a Japanese card reseller that tracks sold prices on large flea-market apps.
2. Divided by each box’s Japanese list price, then took the median across the five or six sets released in each year.
3. For example, 2023 sets started at 2.3 times list and fell to 0.6 times after a year; 2025 sets started at 2.2 times and held near 1.7–2.2.

What we assumed

• Flea-market sold prices represent the resale market.It is a reseller’s survey of sold listings; the research has no other monthly Japanese series.
• Five or six sets per year are enough for a median.They are small samples; one unusual set can move the median. A second version drops four special sets and changes little.

Sanity check

The cohorts behave very differently, so there is no single “boxes lose value” rule in Japan. Later years’ ratios also include a market-wide price jump in April 2026.

Where it comes from

Our calculation from other figures in the trainer’s notes:

• EstimateBox ratio to list by set and horizon, release to +12, 2021-2026
• EstimateCohort median ratio to list rel, 2023 sets (30-pack)2.31 ratio to list
• EstimateBooster box flea market price p6, July 20257,500 ¥ per BOX

Where it’s used

• StoryMarket
• Chart · MarketJapanese boxes from 2023 and 2025 both opened above twice list; only the 2025 sets held most of it
• ProfileCollector and resale market

Related figures

Built from this one

• EstimateJapan excess demand gauge for Q26, 2023-2026