Rare Pokémon card shatters auction record at $16.49M
A rare Pokemon card fetched a record $16,492,000 including the buyer's premium on Monday in New Jersey, making it the most expensive Pocket Monster trading card ever sold in a public auction, Kyodo reported.
The Pokemon Illustrator card, which depicts the iconic cartoon character Pikachu, has a hobby card authenticator rating of 10, the highest possible grade. It is one of only 39 of the illustration cards given to winners of a 1998 drawing contest held by the Japanese magazine CoroCoro Comic.
The card was consigned to the New Jersey-based Goldin Auctions house by Logan Paul, an American social media influencer with millions of fans. He bought the card in 2021 for $5.27 million, earning the Guinness World Record title for "most expensive Pokemon card sold at a private sale," according to the Guinness website.
The successful bidder, who won the Pikachu card with a diamond necklace it hangs from, appeared at a livestream watch party for the auction on Paul's YouTube channel to collect the item. However, the auction house did not reveal his identity Monday morning when the auction ended.
In recent years, prominent social media influencers have engaged with fans by opening boxes containing multiple packs of Pokemon cards, hoping to find rare cards that could be worth hundreds or even thousands of dollars.
Ahead of the online auction that started on Jan. 5, Ken Goldin, the founder and owner of the auction house, told Kyodo News that he thought the price of the card had appreciated since 2021 and "wouldn't be surprised" if the lot reached over $10 million.
According to the Guinness World Records website, the previous trading card with the world record price was an autographed basketball card featuring Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant that sold for $12.93 million at Heritage Auctions in August 2025.
Earlier, Qazinform reported that Fabergé’s “Winter Egg” achieved a historic record at Christie’s, selling for 27.8 million pounds sterling.
