CARDS 2个月涨5倍，链上TCG卡牌是HYPE之后的又一大叙事吗？

Since mid-April this year, the TCG card market/card-pulling platform Collector Cards on Solana has seen its token, $CARDS, surge over 5 times to its peak. Currently, the circulating market cap of $CARDS is approximately $60 million, with an FDV of approximately $468 million.

In a year when the cryptocurrency market lacks compelling narratives and the market trend is sluggish, such market performance is undoubtedly very impressive. Let's first analyze why Collector Cards was able to buck the downtrend and show such strong performance, then take a broader view of the current on-chain TCG card track.

Reasons for Collector Cards' Rise: Genuinely Profitable

Perhaps surprisingly to many, Collector Cards has become almost the second most profitable dApp on Solana, trailing only pump.fun.

According to data from DefiLlama, Collector Cards has consistently ranked 2nd in revenue among Solana dApps over the past 7 days and the past 30 days. In the last 7 days, Collector Cards generated $3.86 million in revenue, and $9.48 million over the past 30 days.

This revenue surpasses that of familiar Solana dApps like Axiom, Phantom Wallet, Jupiter, and Meteora.

Furthermore, even when compared across the entire cryptocurrency space, this revenue is highly competitive. Over the past 7 days, Collector Cards ranked 7th in revenue among crypto projects, and 10th over the past 30 days. Excluding stablecoin projects like Tether and Circle, as well as Polymarket, Collector Cards is almost a crypto-native "money printer" second only to Hyperliquid and pump.fun.

The revenue composition of Collector Cards is simple: one part comes from card packs (pulling), and the other part comes from fees on the card trading market. These two parts are highly disproportionate. For example, in May, the total trading volume for card packs was approximately $194.7 million, while the total trading volume in the card market was only about $205,000.

Although the sales of card packs are extremely hot, it operates like a "gacha gambling" mechanism. Many players open packs, find the cards aren't valuable, and immediately sell them back to the platform at a discount. The buyback price ratio varies between different packs. Generally, for cheaper, high-volume packs (e.g., $25/$50 per pull), the platform repurchases at 85% of the price. For expensive packs (e.g., $2500 per pull), the buyback rate is 93%.

While the total volume from card pack sales is huge, a large number of players immediately sell their common, worthless cards back to the platform. Ultimately, the remaining profit is the figure shown at the beginning of this section.

One might wonder: are there really so many people coming on-chain to engage in this kind of soft gambling through card packs?

Let's not jump to conclusions and look at the data. So far, Collector Cards has had 23,733 unique users participate in card pulls, with an average spend of $26,843.71 per wallet on card packs. The total number of pulls exceeds 4.87 million, meaning the average unique user pulls over 205 times.

Nearly 60% of users spent more than $250 on card pulls, with 109 users spending over $1 million.

While these figures are impressive, one must consider that the points accumulated by players from card pulls are the core metric determining how many $CARDS tokens they receive in quarterly airdrops. The official team has explicitly stated that points earned in a new quarter are more important than the total accumulated points:

So far, $CARDS quarterly airdrops have been completed three times, each distributing 0.75% of the total token supply to platform players. This is analogous to the NFT era, where many people endured trading fees to accumulate Blur points.

Therefore, Collector Cards' profitability is genuine, but the revenue figures are undoubtedly amplified by the incentive of potential token airdrops. This amplification isn't meant as criticism or a long-term bearish view, but rather an acknowledgment of the success of its flywheel.

With this successful token incentive, Collector Cards has dethroned its former rival in the same track, Courtyard on Polygon. Its market share in card packs has stabilized above 50%, reaching 83.6% in the most recent week:

Looking at revenue, Courtyard generated $1.14 million over the past 7 days and $6.99 million over the past 30 days. Given that Courtyard does not have a token or token incentives, its revenue data actually proves that the demand for on-chain card packs is real. The competitive advantage amplified by tokens, if managed with good pacing and a long enough timeline, can also aid long-term user retention.

Returning to the discussion about $CARDS' strong price performance. Besides being highly profitable, it is currently the only investable token in its track. Collector Cards' total cumulative trading volume has exceeded $1 billion. Other projects in the same track, like Courtyard, have surpassed $1.1 billion in cumulative trading volume, Phygitals has over $336 million, and Beeize on Base exceeded $100 million in just 4 months.

The market for Pokémon cards is genuinely huge, sufficient to support the scale of these on-chain card-pulling platforms. According to data from pokeca-soken, the market price of individual Pokémon cards has shown a continuous upward trend over the past year.

As of March 2025, cumulative Pokémon card production has exceeded 75 billion units, sold in over 90 countries globally. Sales in the 2024-2025 fiscal year reached 410.9 billion yen, a 38.1% increase year-over-year. Its digital product, Pokémon TCG Pocket, generated over $1.3 billion in revenue in its first year.

Especially after the launch of "Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket" in the fall of 2024, demand for physical cards surged, leading to widespread shortages and scalping. The Pokémon Company is building a new printing factory covering 1.27 million square feet, expected to start production by the end of 2028.

In February 2026, famous YouTuber and WWE star Logan Paul sold the only PSA GEM MT 10 perfect condition Pokémon card, which he privately purchased for about $5.275 million in 2021, at a Goldin Auctions auction for approximately $16.5 million.

On-chain card pulling allows players to avoid buying physical packs in stores. They can immediately sell unwanted common cards back to the platform and claim physical cards for desired ones. This is undoubtedly convenient for many dedicated Pokémon card fans. Understanding the growth momentum of these platforms solely from a "gambling" perspective overlooks the vast young market size and demand inherent in Pokémon cards themselves.

Furthermore, the buyback of $CARDS is already underway. However, the project team stated they need to wait for the CLARITY Act to be enacted before disclosing details.

Other Types of TCG Card Projects

After analyzing $CARDS, it's clear that card pulling is the most profitable business in the current on-chain TCG card market track. But this isn't the only model; other directions exist.

Card Fractionalization

This direction differs from the previous NFT fractionalization logic, which primarily targeted on-chain DeFi or speculation. Essentially, rare and expensive cards are genuinely difficult to collect and invest in, yet have long-term, real market demand and price support. However, this also determines that the demand in this direction won't be as massive as card pulling. It caters to a more hardcore player base and investors seeking excess returns by investing in rare cards, rather than those relying on luck.

Recently, notable projects in this category include Grail on Base and $SV151, jointly launched by Sunrise and Meteora on Solana. The token price for a Cristiano Ronaldo card on Grail surged nearly 100 times from a low point since May 5th, while a Kylian Mbappé card token zoomed nearly 300 times from its low over the same period.

Meanwhile, $SV151 chose to tokenize the out-of-print SV151 card set featuring the original 151 Pokémon, briefly reaching a market cap exceeding $3 million.

However, the biggest problem with this type of project is its limited narrative and imaginative scope. When a token's market cap is tied to the actual storage value of cards, it's difficult to convince on-chain speculators to create a high market cap premium. Both fractionalized card tokens on Grail and $SV151 faced rapid retracements after initial speculation, falling back to price ranges correlated with the actual card values. For example, $SV151 announced they had purchased approximately $185,000 worth of related card assets. Yet, the token's current market cap is around $600,000, which logically already represents a several-fold premium.

Card Pull Lotteries

If card pulling is understood as a form of gambling, then this type of token is like adding another layer of gambling on top.

The most typical project of this type is $GACHA. Transaction fees are used for card pulls. Every hour, a lucky holder is drawn to receive all the cards pulled during that period. Alternatively, users deposit USD via credit card, which is used to open cards. Based on the proportion of USD deposited by different players, one player is selected to win the entire prize pool.

Meme Collection Vaults

This type mainly comes in two forms.

One example is $PIKA, which specializes in opening Pikachu-themed card packs on various on-chain card-pulling platforms. It has already amassed $85,000 worth of related Pikachu cards and collectibles, functioning somewhat like a "Pikachu Culture Fund."

Another example is $KABUTO. This coin was hyped up late last year, originating from a collector frantically buying up first-edition Kabuto (Pokémon fossil) cards. A meme coin was created, and all creator fees are used to purchase more Kabuto cards.

Card Perpetual Contracts

This direction has left on-chain players pessimistic following a rug pull by Trove earlier this year. However, some small projects are still attempting it, such as $POKE on Solana.

Overall, apart from card pulling, other directions within the on-chain TCG card track have seen little success. However, if the profitability of the on-chain TCG card track gains more recognition as a primary narrative in the future, new opportunities may emerge in these other directions.