Whiskey, Rolex Among Collectible Markets Slumping
People have been collecting things like trading cards and Rolexes for decades, but it appears that the market for such rare items might be cooling off. A new report from Business Insider outlines the numbers from the indexes tracking the price and sales of these collectible items.
“In 2023, traditional markets experienced a resounding recovery, while collectible markets suffered a continued decline that spread across nearly every sector,” collectible data and analytics company Altan Insights said in a recent report. “Yes, the bubbles have popped. The frothy markets of 2020 to 2022 are no more.”
Take, for example, the prices for rare bottles of whiskey. According to the Rare Whiskey Icon 100 index, prices for hard-to-find Scotch peaked in May 2022 and fell 22 percent between then and November 2023. Prices for rare bottles of whiskey have also tanked over the past year-and-a-half, after peaking in May 2022.
The same goes for other alcoholic collectibles. Liv-ex’s Fine Wine 1000 Index found a 14 percent drop through 2023, while its Champagne 50 index fell 18 percent since late 2022.
Luxury watches haven’t been immune from the sales slide, either. WatchCharts’ Overall Market index tracks the price of 60 luxury timepieces and reported that prices have dropped 13 percent over the past year. The so-called “big three” brands—Rolex, Patek Phillipe, and Audemars Piguet—all tumbled in consumer cost.
Even trading cards haven’t been able to withstand the slump. Per CardLadder’s CL50 index, the price of rookie cards for 49 sports icons and a first-edition Pokémon trading card featuring Charizard spiked 337 percent between 2019 and March 2021 but fell 23 percent 2022 and another 9 percent last year. And 95 percent of NFTs, once billed as a sort of digital trading card, are now trading for next to nothing.
Video game collectibles sold at GameStop, including trading cards like those bearing Pokémon, saw a significant drop in sales by July 2023. Sales for GameStop’s collectibles, which include tabletop games, dropped 24 percent year-over-year after being up 17 percent in 2022.
Rising inflation and costs of living have forced collectors of all kinds to make an impossible choice. A Wall Street Journal report chronicled the decisions of collectors—whether it be of sneakers, Barbies, or sports memorabilia—to sell off their prized possessions to make ends meet. The collectibles market is in the midst of a major shift, and it remains to be seen how interest rates and other external factors will determine where it lands. In the meantime, it might be time to look into investing in other assets for the future.
