Author: Biteye
What? Coinbase also starts selling Pokémon cards?
Today Coinbase warmed up a new TCG (Trading Card Game) product: users can open card packages directly on their mobile phones, and each card they draw corresponds to a real physical collection. They can continue to host and trade, or choose to redeem the physical items.
In the past period of time, TCG has gradually evolved from a relatively niche on-chain collectibles to an independent track.
Now as leading platforms such as Coinbase begin to intervene, TCG is becoming the new main line of the Crypto market.
This article will sort it out:
Why did TCG come out first? And why is this Gacha business so profitable?
1. Why did TCG suddenly become Crypto’s new PMF?
If you only look at TCG from the perspective of Crypto, it is easy to understand it as a new round of RWA: put a Pokémon card into the warehouse and then mint it into a Token.
But after talking about the "Millet Economy" with people born in 10's, I came to understand TCG again: Crypto did not create demand for cards, it just tapped into an already mature market.
The millet economy essentially sells IP, scarcity and circle recognition, and limited editions, hidden items, and blind draws further spawn secondary transactions. TCG is one of the categories that is most easily “assetized” because it already has a clear version, rarity, rating system and historical transaction price.
Before Crypto entered, TCG actually had a very mature infrastructure: PSA, BGS, and CGC were responsible for rating, eBay and Cardmarket were responsible for trading, and Vault was responsible for custody. What the on-chain platform does is not to re-create this market, but to further digitize the physical cards that have been rated and managed.
Taking Courtyard as an example, users can save rating cards into Vault, and the corresponding ownership is transferred on the chain. After that, the card can change many owners in succession, but the entity itself remains in the warehouse, and only the person who really wants to take the card in the end needs Redeem.
This is very much like an upgraded version of "Zhuanzhuan": traditional second-hand platforms focus on solving inspection and transaction trust, while on-chain TCG further separates "physical movement" and "ownership movement".
Therefore, TCG is suitable for being on the chain because the rating, pricing and secondary markets have long been mature, and Crypto only plays a boosting role - making its ownership flow faster.
2. What kind of business is Gacha?
If you just Tokenize TCG, it is still a low-frequency trading business. When a card is sold from one person to another, the platform earns a handling fee, which is not essentially different from the business logic of traditional Marketplaces.
What really changes TCG is Gacha, which changes the user's consumption frequency.
Users spend 50U or 100U to draw once. If they draw a card they like, they will keep it. If they don’t like it, they will directly sell it back to the platform and get the money back to continue drawing. Cards recovered by the platform can also be put back into the prize pool and then sold to the next user.
This model essentially combines "blind box" and "second-hand recycling": randomness stimulates users to consume repeatedly, and Instant Buyback reduces exit costs very low.
For example, a user only has 100U. After the first draw, he sells it back for 90U, and then uses 90U to continue drawing. Funds do not increase, but transaction volume can be generated repeatedly; similarly, a physical card can also go through "withdrawal-repurchase-re-entering the pool" and be sold repeatedly.
This is why the transaction volume of Gacha on the chain seems very exaggerated. Blockworks statistics indicate that the five major platforms had approximately US$284 million in Gacha Activity in July 2026, of which approximately US$249 million returned to users through Buyback.
Rather than understanding Gacha as an on-chain gashapon machine, it is better to think of it as a business of random consumption + instant recycling + repeated inventory turnover.
3. What on-chain TCG projects are there now?
At present, the model of TCG on the chain has become relatively similar: physical card custody, digital ownership, Gacha, Instant Buyback, plus a secondary Marketplace. The real difference mainly lies in where the users come from, the type and number of cards, and whether the platform ultimately wants to be a "Crypto product" or a "collectibles platform."
1️⃣ Collector Crypt@Collector_Crypt｜XHunt Ranking: 2335
Collector Crypt is currently the project with the largest transaction volume in the physical card on-chain track. It is mainly run on Solana, and its products cover categories such as Pokémon, One Piece, and sports cards.
The core product of the platform is Gacha, and prize pools at different price points provide about 85% to 93% Instant Buyback
Collector Crypt's core competitiveness is that inventory, liquidity and distribution channels have formed a closed loop, which connects supply sources, vaults, random sales, secondary transactions, buybacks and physical delivery.
As of September 29, 2026, DefiLlama counted its transaction volume in the past 30 days to be approximately US$128.26 million, and its protocol revenue in the past 30 days to be approximately US$11.03 million, ranking first among similar projects.
💡How to participate: $CARDS has been issued, and there are still quarterly airdrops. The official has made it clear that the remaining Community allocation will be used to reward platform users, but the specific formula has not been announced. Normal participation in Gacha, trading and platform use can accumulate subsequent air investment capital.
2️⃣ Courtyard@Courtyard_io｜XHunt Ranking: 3464
Courtyard is a comprehensive physical collectibles platform. Initially focusing on rated cards, it has now expanded to sports cards, Pokémon, comics, coins, watches and sneakers.
Users can buy fixed-price Vending Machine packages and obtain a physical asset at random, or they can directly buy and sell specific assets in the secondary market.
Courtyard has raised a total of US$37 million in financing and established its own dedicated warehouse for collectibles. Therefore, it no longer relies solely on third-party custody, and it is easier to expand from cards to high-value categories such as watches, coins, and sneakers.
As of now, the trading volume in the past 30 days is approximately US$98.29 million, second only to Collector Crypt.
💡How to participate: No coins have been issued yet. Points can currently be obtained through daily check-ins, opening Vending Machine Packs, Weekly Quests and invitations. Points can be exchanged for Pack Credit and ranking rewards. It is more of a member points system.
3️⃣ Phygitals@phygitals｜XHunt Ranking: 2823
Phygitals is a physical collectibles trading platform on Solana, specializing in rated cards such as Pokémon, One Piece, sports cards, and Yu-Gi-Oh!
It is more like an asset-light TCG platform. It does not rebuild the entire warehousing system by itself, but directly connects to existing warehouses such as PSA, Fanatics, and Alt.
Each card drawn by the user corresponds to a real rating card. The physical card continues to be placed in a professional warehouse. What the user trades is the digital ownership of the card. If you want to cash out, you can list it on the Marketplace, or you can sell it back directly at about 85% to 90% FMV. If you want to get the physical card, you can apply for mailing.
In addition to random bag opening and digital claw machines, Phygitals' core products also include Duels, Drafts and other game modes. Each draw generates results from a public VRF with probabilistically verifiable results. After the user draws the card, they can continue to host it, list it in the secondary market, and redeem the entity, or they can directly sell it back to the platform at a price of about 85% to 90% according to Alt's real-time market valuation.
💡How to participate: No tokens have been issued yet, and the official has not confirmed the Token airdrop. Now you can earn Points for every purchase and participate in weekly leaderboards and rewards, which is suitable for accumulating real platform usage records first.
4️⃣Renaiss@renaissxyz｜XHunt Ranking: 7257
Renaiss is a physical collectibles platform on BNB Chain, currently focusing on rated cards such as Pokémon and One Piece. Compared with the previous project, it not only wants to make Gacha, but also wants to make "physical card on-chain" itself a set of infrastructure.
The core is Vault OS: cooperative card stores or custody institutions are responsible for the verification and custody of physical cards, and Renaissance maps the corresponding card information and ownership to the chain. After the card enters the system, it can be used for Gacha, P2P transactions, or ultimately redeemed physically. The platform is also expanding to Collectibles-Fi products such as price indices, APIs, and lending.
According to data previously disclosed by Renaiss, after the launch of Beta, 6,140+ cards have been locked, corresponding to more than 1.1 million US dollars in on-chain assets, with more than 231,000 registered users; the cumulative scale is approximately 14.31 million US dollars, of which Gacha related approximately 12.16 million US dollars and P2P approximately 2.15 million US dollars.
5️⃣ Deadstock@deadstock_app｜XHunt Ranking: 145790
Deadstock is a high-end TCG platform launched by ATH Labs, running on Arbitrum. It just completed a $2.5 million Seed in September 2026, led by Bullish Capital.
Compared with other Gacha platforms, the biggest feature of Deadstock is that it only produces PSA 10 and builds its supply side directly from Japan. The project has reached an exclusive Tokenization cooperation with JTCC, a large Japanese card dealer. JTCC will provide continuous Pokémon card inventory. After each physical card enters the professional Vault, an on-chain Digital Twin will be generated at a 1:1 ratio.
Users can purchase random Packs, draw cards and continue hosting, list them in the P2P market, accept platform buybacks, or directly redeem physical cards.
🌟Write it at the end
I prefer to look at TCG within a larger trend: Crypto is moving from creating native assets on the chain to gradually moving existing off-chain assets onto the chain.
Under the main line of everything on the chain, TCG is likely to become the next asset class to take the lead after the tokenization of US stocks. It itself has mature pricing, trading and collection needs, and after being put on the chain, it can further improve liquidity and transaction efficiency.
And TCG is no longer just the narrative of Pokémon's 30th anniversary. On DefiLlama, the head Physical TCG project has generated considerable real income: Collector Crypt has generated approximately US$10.33 million in protocol income in the past 30 days, Courtyard has generated approximately US$2.17 million, and Beezie has also reached the million-dollar level.
Maybe by the end of this year or early next year, we will really see a market trend belonging to TCG.