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December 29th - January 4th, 2025

📋 TLDR

📰 TCG News: McDonald’s Pokémon TCG Returns for 2026 🍔, Meet the Artists Who Made Their Pokémon TCG Debut in 2025 🎨, Pikachu-Themed, Mobile Pokémon TCG Shop in Singapore 🚚⚡

🔢 Card Market Highlights: Majestic Dawn Diamond & Pearl Booster Box Sells for $19k 🌅, Ishihara & Akabane Signed Plusle/Minun Sells $7.2k 🔴, Dark Golbat Missing Print Layer Error Card Sells for $25k 🦇

😴 Potential Sleepers: Magneton #159 - Pokemon Center Stamp Promo ⚡

🏆 Card of the Week: This Relicanth card is featured in English EX Hidden Legends as 24/101 (left) and in Japanese Undone Seal as 36/83 (right) - Illustrated by Kagemaru Himeno. Relicanth is a deep-sea “living fossil” Pokémon, and this artwork leans into that ancient-ocean vibe with a calm, mysterious underwater scene.

📰 TCG News

Note: Some updates may touch on wider Pokémon news beyond the TCG.

🔵 McDonald’s Pokémon TCG Happy Meal Promotion Returns to the U.S. for Pokémon’s 30th Anniversary 🍔

McDonald’s is expected to run another Happy Meal Pokémon TCG promotion in the U.S. in February through March 2026 as part of Pokémon’s 30th anniversary celebrations, though exact timing and details have not been fully announced. These promos typically include a small booster pack of reprint cards, often with one holo card and a compact set size. (Source: Pokébeach)

🔵 Meet the Artists Who Made Their Pokémon TCG Debut in 2025 🎨

(Source: Pokémon)

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🔵 Pikachu-Themed “CardTruck SG” Turns a Van Into a Mobile Pokémon TCG Shop in Singapore 🚚⚡

As demand for Pokémon trading cards stays strong, a new Singapore seller is taking a mobile-first approach instead of relying on card shows or storefronts. Ace left a six-figure IT job to launch CardTruck SG, a bright yellow Pikachu-themed van that drives around Singapore selling mainly sealed products and running live selling plus customer-requested livestream unboxings, while avoiding loose packs due to “filtering” concerns.

He says he invested about $120,000 in the van and $40,000 in the setup, pricing items around market with optional delivery fees. (Source: AsiaOne)

📈 Card Trends

Source: Price data provided by TCGPlayer.com and chart visual provided by TCGMarketNews.com (which sources data from TCGPlayer).

Top Gains 🔼

Top Losses 🔽

🃏 Card Market Highlights

📦 Sealed Product Market Highlights

🔵 Majestic Dawn Diamond & Pearl Booster Box Sells for $19k

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Majestic Dawn from the 2008 D&P expansion is best known for the continued feature of LV. X cards. Majestic Dawn is among nearly vintage sets where top chase cards are usually in the single digit for PSA 10 graded cards and booster boxes very rarely coming up for sale. When they do, the sales are staggeringly high. There were two other sales of this booster box for $5-$6k in 2023.

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🔵 Lot of 973 S&V 151 Booster Packs Sells for ~$11.1k

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A bulk lot of 973 S&V 151 booster packs selling for approximately $11.1k works out to roughly $11.41 per pack. Big lot sales like this are especially useful as market signals because they reflect what a buyer will pay for instant scale but the buyers in this case are typically streamers opening packs on a live stream (to sell or just for making content) or card shops.

S&V 151 is most commonly sold as a half booster bundle containing 6 packs for which the market price is around $70 working out to about $11-$12.

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🔵 1st Edition Japanese Tidal Storm Booster Box Sells for $4k

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Tidal Storm (XY5-B) released at the end of 2014 and is the Kyogre half of XY5 that introduced Ancient Traits alongside heavy hitters like Kyogre/Primal Kyogre lines.

Although a bit newer than Majestic Dawn, it still falls into a similar Niche set but this time in Japanese which is potentially more scarce especially as a booster box that was also released in 1st Edition. This set is one part of the English release of XY Primal Clash in English (which are in the $3k-$4k).
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⭐ Singles & Graded Cards Highlights

🔵 Lot of 25 Van Gogh Pikachu Sells for ~$12.4k

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Van Gogh Pikachu is up nearly 100% in the past year with raw prices in a PSA 10 also up around $1.5k. Raw and graded prices have dipped in the past 3 months. This sale of sealed raw copies (which is how they were distributed) puts each copy near $500 which is about the current market price. This might just be another dip for the next jump in 2026.

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🔵 Tsunekazu Ishihara Signed Minun & Takumi Akabane Signed Plusle Sells $3.7k Each

​Plusle Listing & Minun Listing​

Tsunekazu Ishihara is the longtime President/CEO of The Pokémon Company and Takumi Akabane is likewise tied to the TCG’s earliest creation/creative leadership (and is also known as a TCG illustrator). The Plusle/Minun these signatures are associated with the EX Trainer Kit 2 (2006), a sealed learn-to-play product with two half decks (Plusle + Minun) plus an EX-series booster pack and play accessories.

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🔵 PSA 10 Victory Cup Battle Carnival 3rd Place Sells for $16k

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Victory Cup (Battle Carnival 2011) – 3rd Place is the placement trophy promo awarded to 3rd-place finishers in the Climax Stage of the open-entry Victory Cup tournament at Pokémon Battle Carnival 2011, held at Mydome Osaka (November 5–6, 2011) and Sunshine City Tokyo (November 19–20, 2011). Only 6 copies of each placement Victory Cup were printed with the 2011 designation.

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🕰️ Vintage & Niche Market Highlights

🔵 PSA 10 No Rarity Symbol Item Finder Sells for $13k

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No Rarity Symbol Item Finder is a Japanese 1996 Base Set (“Expansion Pack”) Trainer from the earliest print run, identifiable because it lacks the rarity icon in the lower-right corner that later Japanese Base Set prints include.

Despite the fact that this seems like a standard Trainer card with nothing special about it but the fact that it’s from the earliest print run makes it easily just as desirable. There are 5 other copies in a PSA 10 with a total of 148 copies graded.

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🔵 Dark Golbat Missing Print Layer Error Card Sells for $25k

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This is a Team Rocket–era misprint where a card that should show strong green Grass-type coloration on the front (left) instead comes out washed-out (right) because the sheet went through printing without receiving all four CMYK color passes. This can happen if an ink station isn’t properly loaded or a printer faults mid-run, and if the affected sheets aren’t scrapped they can make it into packs.

Fun fact: Early TCG consolidated some types with Grass type containing Poison types among others.

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🔵 Pokémon Fanbook & CoroCoro Issue with Promo Cards Sells for ~$245

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The 1997 Pocket Monsters Fan Book contained two promo cards: Mewtwo (Glossy) and Super Energy Retrieval. Of 112 graded, Mewtwo (Glossy) has only 2 PSA 10 copies. Super Energy Retrieval has 2 auction sales but no listed grades.

The January 1998 CoroCoro Comic included the Computer Error (or "CPU Error") and Meowth glossy promos. The Computer Error card has a PSA 10 population of 39, while the Meowth glossy promo has only 8.

😴 Sleeper Pick

Surging Sparks PC ETB Promo - Magneton #159 Pokemon Center Stamp

PSA 10 - 9,099 pop / 15,278 total - $175 average

Ungraded - $53 average for near mint condition

This Magneton is at a really good price to buy and has all the right things going for it. Decently popular Pokémon, amazing art from the incredibly popular and talented Shinji Kanda, and it has the Pokémon Center stamp or in other words the modern 1st Edition stamp.

📜 Poké History

In 1999, a 1st Edition Base Set booster box originally retailed for roughly $100 USD. Adjusted for inflation, that is about $185 today which of course is a staggering contrast to the six figure price tags seen in modern high-end auctions.

Questions or feedback? Send a message to news@luckyeggreport.com 🥚.

Note: Sold listing links sometimes redirect to active listings after some time, but should still be discoverable by searching for the listings manually.

Chart Source: TCGPlayer, TCGMarketNews