Conor McGregor Cards Skyrocket in Value Amid Anticipated UFC Return

While most sports card markets have been booming as of late, the same can’t be said for all of them. It’s true that many mainstream sports have bounced back after correcting from the COVID-era boom. However, UFC cards have notably remained relatively flat. Take a look at the image below from Card Ladder, a popular platform for tracking trading card values, which illustrates the lack of resurgence in the UFC card market over the past few years.

UFC Card Market — https://app.cardladder.com/indexes/ufc-mma

We can see that although the overall sports card market is considerably stronger than it was before COVID (with sales volume records being broken on a regular basis), it’s been hard to find a strong comeback in the UFC market in the same way we’ve seen with other sports. That is, until now. As the UFC’s biggest icon Conor McGregor prepares for a comeback that seems more likely by the day, his sports card values have begun to soar.

Conor McGregor Card Market Over the Past Three Months | https://app.cardladder.com/players/Conor%20McGregor

Let’s take a look at his 2021 Panini Prizm Silver parallel in a PSA 10. This card is significant in that it comes from the debut year of UFC Prizm and features one of McGregor’s most recognizable poses. It sold on February 16th for $150, which may not seem like much at first glance, until compared to its previous sales. The most recent sale prior to that came in at just under $85, making this latest result roughly 176% of the previous one. In fact, to find another time this card sold for more than $150, you’d have to go back to January of 2023.

Conor McGregor 2021 Silver Prizm — https://www.psacard.com/cert/111838574/psa

Now we know how important popularity is in the card market. Demand is ultimately what determines how much someone is willing to pay for a card, so it makes sense that a potential return from the most popular fighter the sport has ever seen would send his cards skyrocketing. That said, this resurgence in McGregor’s market may be a sign of something more to come.

2021 UFC Prizm Debut Conor McGregor Silver Prizm PSA 10

The reason the UFC is what it is today.

Population: 63 pic.twitter.com/gO7zRZb9Lh
— Don (@DonCards) May 5, 2024

With the UFC confirming an upcoming fight card on the White House lawn, it’s by no means a stretch to suggest that the UFC card market could be significantly undervalued at the moment. The media coverage and sheer magnitude of an event like that could easily surpass anything we’ve previously seen from a fighting promotion.

Even on its own, the trajectory of the UFC’s popularity over the past few years has the sport primed for huge numbers in the years to come. Nothing is ever certain in the hobby and it’s always important to reiterate that, but you can’t help but wonder whether the UFC card market is still largely untapped and waiting to explode.