If you've spent any time reading my stories on Wargamer, you'd know I'm not the 'Zard's biggest fan. But that doesn't mean I can't appreciate a solid card when I see it, and Phantasmal Flames' Mega Charizard X ex SIR is a solid Pokémon card to chase. Sure, I'm not going to go out of my way to buy it, but many have done. So many, in fact, that one collector has just bought a BGS 10 Black Label version for an unconscionable $54,100. We have truly passed through the looking glass here.
As a fairly small set with excellent pull rates, the Pokémon TCG's Phantasmal Flames expansion was a pretty positive experience for me - at least compared to the atrocious time I had with other recent Pokémon sets, especially Journey Together. Of course, most people are hyper-focused on the dual Charizard chases at the top of Phantasmal's list, but it was a set full of bangers: Piplup #98, Dawn #129, and Rotom ex #126 are all superb, to name just a few. That doesn't matter, though. Anything with the good ol' iconic 'Zard will immediately become a focus, and for that reason, it's an expensive card on Pokémon's secondary market.
According to Pricecharting, buying the Mega Charizard X ex #125 Special Illustration Rare will set you back around $800 (that's ungraded, may I add), while a PSA 10 will cost you $2,000, on average. That looks cheap against Prismatic's Umbreon ex #161, which is around $1,250 and $4,500, respectively. But there's one coveted gem of any modern chase, and that's Beckett Grading's BGS 10 Black Label.
As BGS' website explains, the highest 'ordinary' grade available is the BGS 10 Gold Label, where one of the firm's four grading categories (surface, edges, corners, and centering) is allowed to score a 9.5 without bringing down the overall score. The Black Label is reserved for cards that get a perfect score in every category. It's fanatical stuff, but when it comes to the most expensive rare Pokémon cards on the planet, this is the level of perfection buyers look for.
Personally, I'd just like to get some cards in my collection without spending astronomical amounts, but the Black Label grades are expensive for a reason, and I'm not it. Someone took a risk on sending in a card they deemed unmarked by printer quality issues or damage, and it paid off.
After five days of what I imagine to be a very intense bidding war, the Mega Charizard X ex #125 in a Black Label 10 sold for $54,100 on eBay. That's cash I don't even have saved up for anything essential in my life, let alone for a slabbed Pokémon card. This buyer shelled out the value of a brand new midrange sports car on one modern chase, and in all honesty, more power to them. I couldn't do it, or my wife would kill me - and I daresay most juries would struggle to convict her.
This may sound like a ridiculous, one-off, 'lightning in a bottle' sale, but I don't actually think that's the case. There's reportedly a population of 23 of these BGS Black Label 10s, and one sold in January to the tune of $50,000. The Japanese version of the card, which typically goes for a lot less than English variants, sells fairly regularly around the $12-15,000 mark on eBay. Once again, more money than I could imagine - but it means this 54 grand card isn't too far from the norm. Decide for yourself if that makes the news more or less bewildering.
If you're looking to test your luck on getting one of those rare Black Label gems, you can always buy the card ungraded at TCGPlayer. Of course, there's no guarantee it'll be graded that high with BGS's high standards, but if you want to give it a try, knock yourself out. Or, you could just stare at the eBay listing again and pass out that way, as I did.
Hoping to get your hands on as many Pokémon TCG products across the 30th Anniversary celebrations as you can? Make sure to join our free Wargamer Discord community, where we'll keep you up-to-date on all of the upcoming expansions, as well as sharing those retail-priced deals whenever we see them. Shocking that retail prices are a deal nowadays.