{
  "url": "https://www.moonstonehq.com/articles/cards-with-a-price-and-no-sale",
  "slug": "cards-with-a-price-and-no-sale",
  "title": "14,466 Cards With a Price and No Sale",
  "summary": "14,466 of the 21,416 priced English cards we track have no graded sale on record, 67.5%. Above a dollar the lookup is a census with no remainder, and 952 of the 4,879 cards asking five dollars or more still come back empty.",
  "section": "Liquidity",
  "published": "2026-09-22",
  "readMinutes": 9,
  "publisher": "moonstone",
  "findings": [
    {
      "value": "10,381",
      "measures": "cards asking $1 or more, every one of them probed",
      "basis": "6,674 answered plus 3,707 empty probes, no remainder"
    },
    {
      "value": "14,466",
      "measures": "that came back with no graded sale at all",
      "basis": "67.5% of the priced catalogue"
    },
    {
      "value": "952 of 4,879",
      "measures": "cards asking $5 or more with no recorded graded sale",
      "basis": "19.5% of the 129-set universe"
    },
    {
      "value": "54.4%",
      "measures": "HeartGold SoulSilver, the worst set of 107",
      "basis": "31 of its 57 cards at $5 or more"
    }
  ],
  "tables": [
    {
      "title": "Graded comp hit rate by raw ask band, all 21,416 priced English cards. Asks on 2026-09-22",
      "columns": [
        "Raw ask band",
        "Cards",
        "With any graded sold median",
        "Share",
        "With a PSA 10 median"
      ],
      "rows": [
        {
          "Raw ask band": "Under $1",
          "Cards": "11,035",
          "With any graded sold median": "276",
          "Share": "2.5%",
          "With a PSA 10 median": "1.2%"
        },
        {
          "Raw ask band": "$1 to $5",
          "Cards": "4,221",
          "With any graded sold median": "2,004",
          "Share": "47.5%",
          "With a PSA 10 median": "30.6%"
        },
        {
          "Raw ask band": "$5 to $25",
          "Cards": "3,513",
          "With any graded sold median": "2,336",
          "Share": "66.5%",
          "With a PSA 10 median": "48.7%"
        },
        {
          "Raw ask band": "$25 to $100",
          "Cards": "1,710",
          "With any graded sold median": "1,462",
          "Share": "85.5%",
          "With a PSA 10 median": "56.8%"
        },
        {
          "Raw ask band": "$100 to $500",
          "Cards": "806",
          "With any graded sold median": "742",
          "Share": "92.1%",
          "With a PSA 10 median": "59.6%"
        },
        {
          "Raw ask band": "$500 and up",
          "Cards": "131",
          "With any graded sold median": "130",
          "Share": "99.2%",
          "With a PSA 10 median": "63.4%"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "title": "Ranks 1 to 14 of 107, by the share of a set's $5-and-up cards with no recorded graded sale. Asks on 2026-09-22, graded record read 2026-09-23, 4,593 cards across 107 sets",
      "columns": [
        "#",
        "Set",
        "Released",
        "Share with no graded sale",
        "Cards",
        "Median ask of those cards",
        "Total asked"
      ],
      "rows": [
        {
          "#": "1",
          "Set": "[HeartGold SoulSilver](/set/heartgold%20soulsilver)",
          "Released": "2010",
          "Share with no graded sale": "54.4%",
          "Cards": "31 of 57",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$10.11",
          "Total asked": "$384"
        },
        {
          "#": "2",
          "Set": "[Boundaries Crossed](/set/boundaries%20crossed)",
          "Released": "2012",
          "Share with no graded sale": "54.1%",
          "Cards": "20 of 37",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$11.45",
          "Total asked": "$339"
        },
        {
          "#": "3",
          "Set": "[Legends Awakened](/set/legends%20awakened)",
          "Released": "2008",
          "Share with no graded sale": "52.3%",
          "Cards": "23 of 44",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$13.50",
          "Total asked": "$327"
        },
        {
          "#": "4",
          "Set": "[Burning Shadows](/set/burning%20shadows)",
          "Released": "2017",
          "Share with no graded sale": "52.3%",
          "Cards": "23 of 44",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$12.68",
          "Total asked": "$396"
        },
        {
          "#": "5",
          "Set": "[Great Encounters](/set/great%20encounters)",
          "Released": "2008",
          "Share with no graded sale": "48.4%",
          "Cards": "15 of 31",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$9.27",
          "Total asked": "$159"
        },
        {
          "#": "6",
          "Set": "[Aquapolis](/set/aquapolis)",
          "Released": "2003",
          "Share with no graded sale": "48.1%",
          "Cards": "77 of 160",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$14.30",
          "Total asked": "$2,404"
        },
        {
          "#": "7",
          "Set": "[Lost Thunder](/set/lost%20thunder)",
          "Released": "2018",
          "Share with no graded sale": "47.7%",
          "Cards": "31 of 65",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$8.86",
          "Total asked": "$450"
        },
        {
          "#": "8",
          "Set": "[Diamond & Pearl](/set/diamond%20and%20pearl)",
          "Released": "2007",
          "Share with no graded sale": "46.7%",
          "Cards": "14 of 30",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$16.43",
          "Total asked": "$283"
        },
        {
          "#": "9",
          "Set": "[Majestic Dawn](/set/majestic%20dawn)",
          "Released": "2008",
          "Share with no graded sale": "46.2%",
          "Cards": "18 of 39",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$11.51",
          "Total asked": "$216"
        },
        {
          "#": "10",
          "Set": "Emerald",
          "Released": "2005",
          "Share with no graded sale": "45.2%",
          "Cards": "19 of 42",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$49.99",
          "Total asked": "$1,235"
        },
        {
          "#": "11",
          "Set": "[Dark Explorers](/set/dark%20explorers)",
          "Released": "2012",
          "Share with no graded sale": "44.1%",
          "Cards": "15 of 34",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$9.86",
          "Total asked": "$258"
        },
        {
          "#": "12",
          "Set": "[Shining Fates Shiny Vault](/set/shining%20fates%20shiny%20vault)",
          "Released": "2021",
          "Share with no graded sale": "43.3%",
          "Cards": "13 of 30",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$8.23",
          "Total asked": "$129"
        },
        {
          "#": "13",
          "Set": "[Forbidden Light](/set/forbidden%20light)",
          "Released": "2018",
          "Share with no graded sale": "41.5%",
          "Cards": "17 of 41",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$11.47",
          "Total asked": "$306"
        },
        {
          "#": "14",
          "Set": "[Gym Heroes](/set/gym%20heroes)",
          "Released": "2000",
          "Share with no graded sale": "40.4%",
          "Cards": "21 of 52",
          "Median ask of those cards": "$11.02",
          "Total asked": "$238"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "charts": [],
  "sections": [
    "Why this is a census",
    "The sets where the expensive cards do not trade",
    "The four ways this is wrong",
    "What would overturn this"
  ],
  "method": [
    "As of 2026-09-22 for prices (`price_history` day 20718) and 2026-09-23 for the probe census. Universe as in every study in this wave: English catalogue rows with a TCGplayer product id, one row per product id after collapsing 240 duplicates, priced on day 20718: 21,416 products, of which 18,698 sit in the 129 sets carrying a release date and 60 or more products. A product counts as ANSWERED when `graded_snapshots` holds any row for it with a median above zero, read across both the catalogue id and the TCGplayer id; it counts as PROBED AND EMPTY when `api_cache` holds a `gradednone:` or `gradednull:` row for either key, which is an explicit written marker and not the absence of a join. 35,892 `gradednone` rows and 260 `gradednull` rows existed across all languages when this was written, all of them written between 2026-09-09 and 2026-09-23; that count rises every day the job runs and fell by expiry before it, so it is a reading rather than a constant. On the English priced catalogue the counts are 6,950 answered and 14,466 with no recorded graded sale. Of those 14,466, roughly ten thousand carry an explicit empty-probe marker and the rest do not, and every unmarked one asks under $1.00: park rows expire after fourteen days and the re-ask rotation reaches cheap cards last, so the split between the two moves daily while the sum does not. The partition is therefore exact on the $1-and-up half of the catalogue and only there: 10,381 products, 6,674 answered plus 3,707 probed-and-empty, 0 outside both. It is also exact on every population this study ranks, since all 4,879 products at $5 or more are either answered or explicitly marked. The graded cron writes a median only on three or more verified sales and parks an empty answer for fourteen days before re-asking (MIN_SAMPLE and NO_GRADED_DAYS in src/app/api/cron/graded-snapshot/route.ts), so 'no recorded graded sale' means fewer than three verified sales at the last ask, not never sold. Across the 129-set universe, 4,879 products ask $5.00 or more and 952 of them carry no recorded graded sale, 19.5%. The set ranking uses those same cards over sets holding twenty or more of them, which is 108 sets, less one removed by a stated age rule (released within 90 days of 2026-09-22: 30th Celebration), leaving 107 sets holding 4,593 such cards of which 891 have no graded record. ME05: Pitch Black would also have failed the age rule and does not reach the 20-card floor in any case. Ranks 1 to 14 are printed contiguously. Ties are broken by the larger count of untraded cards ranking first and then by the earlier release date; ranks 3 and 4 are an exact tie on both share and count, 23 of 44 each, and are ordered by release date, Legends Awakened in 2008 ahead of Burning Shadows in 2017. 27 of the 107 sets sit at 0.0%. The full ordered 107 is in the scratch dump. Registry populations come from the latest `population_snapshots` row per card; no per-card population absolute is printed, because a PSA registry line can be shared by more than one product. Emerald appears unlinked because that set has no set page. Scripts: apps/web/scripts/rs-probe.mts, rs-figures.mts and rs-extra.mts; figures in apps/web/.scratch-reddit-sets/figures.json. Nothing here is investment advice."
  ],
  "terms": "Figures are moonstone's own recorded measurements, dated as published. Quote them with the population stated beside them. The article at `url` is the human form of this file."
}