Written by: San
In the past half month, the Pokémon card RWA sector has seen a surge in popularity, rooted in the nearly tenfold increase of the token CARDS from the on-chain Pokémon card trading platform Collector Crypto within two weeks.
CARDS was issued at a price of $0.04 in early September, and in recent days, its price has continuously hit new highs, once approaching $0.4, with a fully diluted valuation exceeding $668 millions.
This rapid price increase has pushed the niche Pokémon card RWA sector into the spotlight. The card pack mechanism, which combines the excitement of opening blind boxes and the emotional appeal of the Pokémon IP, has also triggered market FOMO. According to Dune data, the top four platforms in the TCG (Trading Card Game) sector generated card pack sales revenue of up to $31 millions in the past week.
Recently, another platform in the Pokémon card RWA sector, Phygitals, has attracted market attention and discussion. A series of recent moves by Phygitals also seem to hint at an upcoming token launch, and many investors who missed out on CARDS are pinning their hopes on Phygitals.
A Canadian Startup That Refuses VC
From a hackathon prototype to gaining market validation and recognition, Phygitals seems to have always maintained a unique style.
Phygitals can be traced back to the Solana hackathon in January 2023, where founder “Mister Colada” proposed the concept of a “tokenized trading card marketplace.” After nearly two years of refinement, the public beta officially launched in February 2024, and the card trading market began operations in March of the same year.
Unlike most crypto projects that seek VC funding in their early stages, the Phygitals team insists on a zero external funding route. The team has repeatedly emphasized in public that they do not need VC or financing.
This idealistic persistence not only avoids the liquidation pressure brought by VCs but also maintains the purity of the project. However, it also means that its growth relies entirely on cash flow. Fortunately, judging by the current hype, the Phygitals team’s persistence has paid off—according to DeFillama data, Phygitals platform’s fee income alone exceeded $2.4 millions in the past two weeks.
A Brand New Card Collecting Experience
Phygitals official website link
The core of Phygitals’ product is to fully digitize the traditional card pack opening process, ensuring that each digital card corresponds one-to-one with a physical card and has ample secondary market liquidity. Pokémon NFTs obtained from opening card packs can be exchanged for corresponding physical cards or traded on the secondary market, eliminating the traditional card trading problems of low liquidity, high logistics costs, and difficulty in authenticity verification.
Users can choose card packs of different prices to open on the Phygitals platform: $1, $25, $50, $80, and $250. The more expensive the pack, the higher the probability of obtaining rare cards. Due to recent popularity, the $80 pack is even showing as “sold out.”
Phygitals’ biggest innovation is that it allows users to instantly sell the cards obtained from opening packs back to the platform at 85%-90% of the current fair market value. This mechanism introduces a market maker-like liquidity system to the card trading market, solving the long-standing liquidity problem in the NFT market.
Currently, Phygitals allows users to sell cards back to the platform at 85%-90% of fair market value within 30 minutes of opening a pack. In the future, Phygitals plans to extend the buyback window to 7 days. This design gives digital cards liquidity close to that of fungible tokens.
In addition, Phygitals has recently announced that it will soon enter its “second phase.” From the content displayed on its official website and Twitter, it appears that Phygitals may focus on developing social features, launching live streaming and other functions, allowing more users to watch streamers open card packs and try the pack-opening experience themselves.
From this series of mechanism designs, it is clear that Phygitals places great emphasis on “liquidity,” providing a reliable buyback mechanism and liquidity for all “pack-opening” users. This undoubtedly encourages more card enthusiasts to overcome their hesitations and purchase card packs. The blind box nature of the packs, combined with the emotional value of the Pokémon IP for a generation, has led countless users into FOMO, eagerly opening packs and showcasing them on social media, resulting in viral marketing.
Token Launch Imminent? How to Get Airdrop Expectations
Although Phygitals has not released any tokenomics or related information, multiple signals seem to indicate that a token launch is in preparation.
On September 12, Phygitals posted a tweet hinting that “something big is coming.”
Combined with the previously launched mechanism of earning points by opening card packs, and the team’s hints that accumulated points and holding Phygitals-issued NFTs may yield future rewards, many users speculate that Phygitals is about to launch a token. Such discussions have attracted a group of users who missed the tenfold increase of CARDS to join the Phygitals pack-opening army, hoping to catch another leading project in this sector.
At this stage, users can earn different point rewards by purchasing card packs of various prices in the “Packs” section of the Phygitals website. Each pack purchase grants points equal to 100 times its price.
Considering the different probabilities of obtaining high-level cards from different pack tiers and Phygitals’ buyback mechanism, if you want to earn points for a potential future airdrop, the $50 or $80 packs currently offer the best overall value. Of course, opening packs is also a blind box process, with a very small chance of obtaining high-level rare cards, but a much higher chance of getting regular cards that can be bought back by the platform.
According to some users’ experiences, the buyback price for regular cards obtained from a $25 pack is about $13-$25. Lower-level cards can be automatically bought back by the platform at 85% of fair value, while slightly higher-level cards require manual confirmation of the buyback price. However, since the card level obtained from packs is random, this data is for reference only.
Although a series of actions seem to indicate that Phygitals is highly likely to launch a token soon, its token issuance is still speculative at this stage. Investors should be aware that opening card packs carries significant uncertainty.
The Two Sides of Market Feedback
Currently, market feedback on Phygitals is clearly polarized, with excitement over high-value card pulls and skepticism about the authenticity of pack probabilities.
Positive feedback mainly focuses on its liquidity and physical card redemption. Phygitals supporter @Legendarygainz posted on Twitter that he pulled a misprinted card worth $3,000 on Phygitals, confirming the existence of high-value cards in Phygitals’ card pack inventory.
Another Pokémon card collector, @pominik, shared that redeeming his digital card for a real card on Phygitals was a very smooth process.
However, criticism in the market mainly targets the transparency of pack probabilities. Some users report repeatedly pulling low-value cards from high-end packs, suggesting possible algorithmic bias. At the same time, many users on Twitter reported pulling the same card at the same time, leading to suspicions that the platform may be collaborating with users for fake marketing using the same materials.
Overall, the majority of the market currently holds a positive view of Phygitals. Most users and KOLs believe that Phygitals can take over from CARDS and push market FOMO sentiment to the next level.
Phygitals now stands at the intersection of a trillion-dollar collectibles market and the emerging RWA sector. Although it faces many doubts, it is undeniable that the FOMO sentiment for opening card packs has already swept the market. Many friends around the author are willing to spend tens of dollars to enjoy the blind box experience.
Whether it’s Collector Crypto or Phygitals, both have successfully integrated Pokémon cards with crypto technology. After CARDS, more users both inside and outside the card RWA trading sector are eagerly awaiting the next opportunity. Let’s look forward together to see if Phygitals can bring the Pokémon card craze into the crypto world.
