Data cutoff: Sunday, 13 September 2026, end of day. Distributed: Tuesday, 15 September 2026. Source: JustTCG.
The Week in Brief
30th Celebration releases tomorrow on Wednesday, 16 September. We have now watched the sets holding its thirty reprints for two full weeks, and we have found nothing.
Here is where those sets stood at Sunday’s cutoff, three days before release.
Group | Cards | Median | Share declining |
|---|---|---|---|
Sets with a confirmed reprint | 8 | +0.72% | 25% |
Sets with a reported reprint | 38 | +0.16% | 45% |
Every other set we track | 253 | 0.00% | 46% |
The confirmed row looks better than it did last week and we are not going to make anything of it. Eight cards across two sets is not a sample, and two of those cards are currently unpriced in our data, so it is really six. The row worth reading is the middle one: thirty-eight cards across eight sets, 45% of them declining against a 46% baseline. That is not a signal. That is the same number.
Which makes two editions running. In edition three we noted that an unconfirmed reprint moved Destined Rivals 3.60% in a week back in August, while this confirmed one, ten days out, moved nothing. As of three days out, it still had not. Whatever a thirty-card anniversary reprint does to the sets those cards came from, it has not done it before anyone can open a pack.
Now a correction about our own numbers, because it affects every set figure we have printed.
On the measure we have used since edition one, Phantasmal Flames was the worst set this week at -5.42%. That number is an average of the five chase cards we track in the set, weighted equally. Two of them are cheap and they fell hard: Mega Charizard X 109 at $23 lost 15.9%, Dawn at $19 lost 10.7%. The other three are the expensive ones, and they finished at +0.9%, -1.9% and +0.5%.
So the set did not fall 5.42%. Two of its five cards did, and an equal-weight average carried them. On a median basis Phantasmal Flames is -1.92%, and the worst set we track is Ascended Heroes at -3.65%.
We are going to print both from here on. An equal-weight average answers “what did the typical card in this set do,” which is a fair question, but it is loud when one card moves a long way and it does not care whether that card is a $19 card or a $700 one. The median answers a narrower question and is harder to fool. Neither is the truth on its own. Where the two disagree by a lot, that disagreement is itself the story, and this week the biggest disagreements were Phantasmal Flames at 3.50 points and Crown Zenith at 2.63.
Away from that, one era kept doing what it has done all month.
Era | Median card | Share declining | Last week |
|---|---|---|---|
Sun & Moon | +0.20% | 20% | +0.03% / 23% |
XY | 0.00% | 29% | 0.00% / 32% |
Sword & Shield | -0.29% | 56% | -0.07% / 54% |
Scarlet & Violet | -0.56% | 63% | -0.63% / 66% |
Mega Evolution | -2.87% | 82% | -2.52% / 86% |
Fourth consecutive week with Mega Evolution last, and twenty-three of its twenty-eight chase cards declined. Four of the ten cards on this week's board are from that era, including both of the top two and both Mega Greninja prints from Chaos Rising.
One last thing about the shape of the week, because it is the exact inverse of the last one. The largest move on this board is 15.9%, against 10.9% seven days ago. But only eighteen cards moved five percent or more, down from twenty-four, and eighty-two cleared our two percent floor, down from eighty-nine. Last week was a quiet top over a busy middle. This week is a loud top over a thinner one.
The Top 10 Movers
One list. Gainers and decliners ranked together by the size of the move.
# | Card | Set | Era | 7D | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Mega Charizard X ex (109) | Phantasmal Flames | Mega Evo | -15.9% | $23.40 |
2 | Dawn | Phantasmal Flames | Mega Evo | -10.7% | $19.10 |
3 | Dachsbun ex | Stellar Crown | S&V | +10.0% | $73.52 |
4 | Mimikyu GX (Secret) | Lost Thunder | S&M | +9.5% | $290.82 |
5 | Squirtle | Stellar Crown | S&V | -8.6% | $107.17 |
6 | Mega Greninja ex (116) | Chaos Rising | Mega Evo | -8.1% | $167.11 |
7 | Primal Kyogre EX (Alpha) | Primal Clash | XY | +8.0% | $364.83 |
8 | Mega Greninja ex (122) | Chaos Rising | Mega Evo | -6.8% | $161.71 |
9 | Charizard VSTAR (Secret) | Brilliant Stars | SWSH | -6.7% | $71.22 |
10 | Moltres & Zapdos & Articuno GX | Hidden Fates | S&M | -6.5% | $53.34 |
Seven day window, 6 to 13 September 2026. Prices are ungraded Near Mint. 69 of 345 tracked cards qualified. Nine more were held out by the artifact guard and are listed below. No card failed to refresh this week.
Why It Moved
Context for each of the ten. Where the shape of the week matters, the daily closing price is printed.
1. Mega Charizard X ex (109)
Catalyst: Mega Evolution era decline
The largest move on the board and the cheapest card on it at $23.40. It drifted for four days and then gave way: $26.44 on the 11th, $24.72, $23.40. It has repriced on twenty-nine of the last thirty days and sits at the exact bottom of that range. Its expensive siblings in the same set did almost nothing, which is the point made above about set averages: this card is most of why Phantasmal Flames reads as the worst set of the week.
2. Dawn
Catalyst: Mega Evolution era decline
The other cheap Phantasmal Flames card, and the other half of that set average. It fell on six of the seven days from $21.39 to $19.10, no single day carrying it. At $19.10 it is still clear of our $10 inclusion floor, but it has given up a fifth of its value in a month, and a card that keeps doing that eventually drops out of our coverage entirely rather than appearing as a decliner.
3. Dachsbun ex
Catalyst: none identified
Rose on six of seven days from $66.84 to $73.52, with the largest single step on the 12th. Stellar Crown is a September 2024 Scarlet & Violet set that has not appeared on this board before, and it turned up twice this week pointing in opposite directions, this card at +10.0% and Squirtle at -8.6%. Its equal-weight average is -0.60% and its median is -2.20%, which tells you the set is pulling apart rather than moving.
4. Mimikyu GX (Secret)
Catalyst: none identified
Flat for three days, then three separate steps on the 9th, 11th and 13th: $265.51, $271.55, $285.05, $290.82. A perfect directional efficiency score, with the largest of the three steps carrying just over half the move. Lost Thunder was the strongest set we track this week on an equal-weight basis at +2.45%, though its median is 0.00%, so this card is doing most of that work too.
5. Squirtle
Catalyst: none identified
Declined on six of seven days from $117.22 to $107.17 and kept going after the cutoff. The mirror image of Dachsbun in the same set and the same week, with nothing we can find attaching to either.
6. Mega Greninja ex (116)
Catalyst: Mega Evolution era decline
Third appearance on this board in four editions, at -5.0%, then -7.2%, and now -8.1%. It declined on every one of the seven days, $181.84 down to $167.11, and it is down 21.1% across thirty days with twenty-nine repricings in that span. It sits at the exact floor of its range. This is the most persistent single decline in our coverage.
7. Primal Kyogre EX (Alpha)
Catalyst: none identified
Two steps early, then nothing: $337.96 to $343.39 on the 7th, then $370.44 on the 9th, then back to $364.83 on the 11th and flat for the last three days. That largest day is 71% of the week's movement against the 75% threshold at which our guard holds a card back. It cleared by four points. We print that, as we did for a similar card last week, because being inside the rules and being a thin observation are not the same thing.
8. Mega Greninja ex (122)
Catalyst: Mega Evolution era decline
The Mega Hyper Rare print of the card at number six, and it did something different. It fell hard for five days to $158.07 on the 10th, then recovered across the last three to $161.71. Same card, same set, same week, and only one of the two was still falling at the end of it.
9. Charizard VSTAR (Secret)
Catalyst: none identified
A steady decline from $76.31 to $71.22 across five moving days, then almost nothing: twelve cents across the final two. Brilliant Stars is one of the sets on the reported 30th Celebration reprint list, and it finished the week at +0.29% on average with two of its five cards down, so this one is not moving with its set.
10. Moltres & Zapdos & Articuno GX
Catalyst: none identified
Declined on five of seven days from $57.07 to $53.34 with no single day dominant. Hidden Fates is a 2019 Sun & Moon era set, which puts this card on the older side of a market where the older side has generally been the firmer one for four weeks. It is the exception on this board rather than the pattern.
What we held out, and one thing we got wrong last week
Nine cards qualified on the numbers and were held back by the artifact guard, down from twelve last week. No card failed to refresh, which is the first clean week on that front since we started publishing.
Gengar & Mimikyu GX (Secret), Team Up. Last week we put this card in Early Signal as an example of something climbing into a confirmed reprint rather than away from it, and used it to argue the market was not treating the reprint as supply pressure. This week the same card stepped 5.0% on 9 September and has not moved since. It tripped the guard we had written six days earlier and is held out. The thirty-day figure we quoted for it last week, +16.3%, was built partly on steps of exactly this kind. The observation may still be right. The card we used to make it was not the one to make it with.
Latias & Latios GX, Team Up. Fourth consecutive edition without it on the board. It has now not changed price for thirteen days, sitting at $4,271.62 since 1 September. It did not qualify this week because a card that does not move cannot clear a two percent floor, so there was nothing for the guard to catch. It remains under review and will stay there until it records four separate prices after its last step.
A change in how we keep track. The review list used to be a file we carried from week to week. It is now rebuilt each Monday by replaying the guard over the previous three weekly cutoffs using the ninety days of history every card already carries. Same answer, nothing to lose, and anyone with the same data can reproduce it.
What Qualifies as a Mover
A card clears all of these or it does not appear. This week 69 of 345 tracked cards qualified.
Era. XY forward.
Rarity. Chase tier only.
Price floor. $10 minimum.
Move floor. At least 2% across the week.
Direction floor. The move has to have gone somewhere rather than churned.
Confirmation. A move carried by one day has to be confirmed by a later price change.
No sealed product.
No sets under 90 days old.
No stale prices. A card that failed to refresh cannot be a mover.
Coverage is 345 chase tier cards across 69 sets. All 345 refreshed successfully this week.
Informational only. The Spike Report is a market pricing publication. It describes observed secondary market activity for collectible trading cards. It is not investment advice, financial advice, or a recommendation of any kind, and nothing in it is a directive to take any action with any card or collectible. Trading cards are collectibles, not securities. Prices can move sharply in either direction and past movement does not indicate future movement. Any decision you make is your own.
Early Signal
Three cards whose price data currently shows a recognizable pattern. This week: a thousand-dollar card that has not changed price once since July, a Mega Evolution card grinding into its floor, and the one card on the reprint list that actually looks like reprint pressure. Included with Tome Intel and above.
Methodology. Data from JustTCG, the same source as the Chase Modern EN 50, so the two products cannot show contradictory prices for the same card. Coverage is 345 chase tier cards across 69 sets, XY forward. Cards qualify on a move of at least 2% that travelled in one direction rather than churning, and are then ranked by the size of that move.
What changed this week. Set-level figures will carry both an equal-weight average and a median from here on, because the two can disagree by several points when one cheap card in a five-card sample moves a long way. Separately, the review list of cards under investigation is now rebuilt each week by replaying the guard across prior cutoffs rather than carried in a file.
Sources this week. 30th Celebration release date of 16 September and the Classic Collection subset from Bulbapedia; the thirty-card reprint list as reported by PokeBeach, community sourced and not official except for the six cards Bulbapedia lists as confirmed. We reviewed Pokémon TCG news across 6 to 13 September and found no announcement, tournament result or supply event that attaches to any card on this board.
Cadence. Data cutoff end of day Sunday, distributed Tuesday.
Corrections. If a number here looks wrong, comment below. Corrections get published. This edition contains two: a set-average method change, and a card we used incorrectly in last week's Early Signal.