Did PSA just get bought out?

[Willikn]

Originally Posted by Boo

A customer buying a company that has subjective grading, sounds like it will be legit.

I may be naive but that just isn't this. I don't envision this guy sitting is his basement with his brother trimming Kent Hrbek cards and sending them to PSA. Feel he's more of a buy it after grading kind of guy who is interested in preserving his investment, not perverting it further.

Has Nat sold anything.. ever?

[Boo]

Originally Posted by Willikn

I may be naive but that just isn't this. I don't envision this guy sitting is his basement with his brother trimming Kent Hrbek cards and sending them to PSA. Feel he's more of a buy it after grading kind of guy who is interested in preserving his investment, not perverting it further.

Has Nat sold anything.. ever?

Conflict of interest in EVERYONE'S eyes even if they don't want to admit it. Not saying anything will happen but I would think he'd want to come out with statement on how things will work moving forward.

[patchgenie]

[tier1dc]

maybe he'll reopen Blowout's Fantastic Store Account now.

[Miz]

Lol I guarantee Nat didn't pony up 700 mil. He probably 1 percent share holder

[Miz]

Originally Posted by Miz

Lol I guarantee Nat didn't pony up 700 mil. He probably 1 percent share holder

Which is still dope..but Nat turner doesn't own psa come on guys

[heatdawg]

WOW! That will seal the deal on PSA being the best now and into the future. Great news for PSA collectors, overall I would be happy with the future of PSA graded cards.

[Willikn]

Originally Posted by Boo

Conflict of interest in EVERYONE'S eyes even if they don't want to admit it. Not saying anything will happen but I would think he'd want to come out with statement on how things will work moving forward.

Conflict? Yes. Maybe for the good is what I'm saying. This is one guy, maybe more than anyone else, who's best interest is served by strengthening the hobby. Integrity is job one and he has to know that.

If PWCC bought it that would be the end of times.

[rangeljon]

If you follow Nat you would understand his whole M.O. has only ever been to get his stuff preserved by slabbing it. He's not a high-end collector simply posting PSA 10s. He likes cards in all grades; he likes sending in his pack-pulls.

I've never seen an instance of unsavory collecting from him.

I think that says a lot about his intentions.

[redboxer27]

Originally Posted by r338

David Hall, the original owner of PSA, had to sell his entire collection, including a high grade 1952 Topps baseball set, as he wanted to avoid potential conflicts. I wonder whether Nate will do this as well.

very interesting...we will see. but based on nat's interviews my guess is he would not

[pejc300]

Originally Posted by r338

David Hall, the original owner of PSA, had to sell his entire collection, including a high grade 1952 Topps baseball set, as he wanted to avoid potential conflicts. I wonder whether Nate will do this as well.

There is not a chance he sells his collection. He loves cards too much. But it will be fun to see every single one of his BGS cards crossover to PSA lol

[HalfNipponese]

I think we are seeing the dawn of automated grading (at least partial). Whenever a private equity firm takes over it's all about efficiency and growth models. It's also the first stage of industry consolidation. Get ready for a flurry of partnership announcements in 2021. SGC will need to find a partner with either massive capital investment potential or merge with another larger company.

[hauntedcomputer]

Originally Posted by HalfNipponese

I think we are seeing the dawn of automated grading (at least partial). Whenever a private equity firm takes over it's all about efficiency and growth models. It's also the first stage of industry consolidation. Get ready for a flurry of partnership announcements in 2021. SGC will need to find a partner with either massive capital investment potential or merge with another larger company.

Sure, why not? Technology already exists to automatically and dispassionately grade every single thing about a card as well as detect all but the most genius-level fakes--the only thing left is the arcane "eye appeal" rating.

Mets owner is also in on this, so expect a slew of PSA 10 Mookie Wilsons.

[salthill]

Originally Posted by hauntedcomputer

Sure, why not? Technology already exists to automatically and dispassionately grade every single thing about a card as well as detect all but the most genius-level fakes--the only thing left is the arcane "eye appeal" rating.

Mets owner is also in on this, so expect a slew of PSA 10 Mookie Wilsons.

What’s your corpus for training a ML system on the qualities that are measured when grading a card? Old photos from eBay?

[csrockerzero]

Originally Posted by salthill

What’s your corpus for training a ML system on the qualities that are measured when grading a card? Old photos from eBay?

Like all supervised ML models, you can predict just about anything with enough properly tagged training data.

[HalfNipponese]

Originally Posted by hauntedcomputer

Sure, why not? Technology already exists to automatically and dispassionately grade every single thing about a card as well as detect all but the most genius-level fakes--the only thing left is the arcane "eye appeal" rating.

Mets owner is also in on this, so expect a slew of PSA 10 Mookie Wilsons.

My hope is that they will store individual card topography so they can finger print every submission. The days of cracking and resubmitting will be over and pop counts will be much more reliable.

[PelicanFly]

I hope Nat's experience can help streamline PSA and bring that company into the 21st century. We need his passion for the hobby to help fix what is currently broken; namely deterring the bad guys from being able to submit cards, making card grading a more efficient and accurate process, and making the user experience via submissions and registry as easy to use as possible. Nat's consultation is very valuable, and I think this is a win for the hobby.

[Promethius88]

Originally Posted by HalfNipponese

My hope is that they will store individual card topography so they can finger print every submission. The days of cracking and resubmitting will be over and pop counts will be much more reliable.

I'm no scientist, but I'm guessing that fingerprints can be wiped off.

[Orangejello727]

Originally Posted by redboxer27

very interesting...we will see. but based on nat's interviews my guess is he would not

Why would he. The company is going private, no need for him sell off his collection while having ownership of PSA.

There are pros and cons to both public and private companies. One of the pros of private companies is they do not nor are pressured to heed to the demands of shareholders who commonly enforce pressure on ROI and profit over quality, service and growth investment. Private companies tend to focus on the quality of service it provides more so than sacrificing things like quality and time in order to churn a profit first mentality like most publicly traded companies with shareholders.

Looking forward to see where this goes. Ill predict higher prices, better quality and turn around time and new tech that overall help with security and authenticity of grading in general. All positive for the inudstry

[hauntedcomputer]

Originally Posted by salthill

What’s your corpus for training a ML system on the qualities that are measured when grading a card? Old photos from eBay?

For basics: ink type, centering, paper stock, paper age, typeset registry, card size and thickness, edge-cut analysis, detection of surface flaws, objective measurement of corner wear, gloss composition. Using a small base of known high-quality original cards and what is already known about the manufacturing specifics of any given era/card.

Basically, everything except subjective "eye appeal."

[drobfan8]

Originally Posted by win1977

I am very long CLCT.. shares and derivatives... I am very happy !

Have a great day everyone !

Question, should I buy in at $77 per share? Do they pay any dividends?

I think grading will continue to get bigger and bigger. Nat isn't gonna do this unleas he thinks he can take it to another level.

[sheffield77]

As a shareholder of clct this deal is terrible. Buyout for like 2 dollars more than currently trading in a growing business. Should get like a 40% premium minimum

[1980bust]

Originally Posted by rippev

No, but maybe it’ll be run by people that are more efficient and faster now.

Everybody can help out in that regard simply by stopping sending submissions of 100 mid-tier base cards every time.

[win1977]

Hello, well, if you believe there will not be another suitor, don't buy cause you are paying 77 dollar for 75.25. That is never a good investment.

Interesting to see it trading at that level.... possible another buyer coming in ? I haven't heard of anything though.

Take care and stay safe !

[win1977]

I totally understand the premium was small, but I have a feeling there was some front running in this stock as the move didn't make sense.

Even now it's trading above it's deal price, so maybe there will be another bidder ?

This company is pricey, and one way to look at it.. knock on wood this vaccine is good and we can actually go out and enjoy ourselves, the collectibles market will react more in a traditional growth rate. If that happens, we received a great premium on our stock.

Let's see if we get another offer, if not the deal closes in Q1 21 and we get our cash.

Stay safe !