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A LeBron James Rookie Card Just Sold for $2.5 Million At Auction

LeBron James

Trading cards can be a lucrative pastime and if you’re lucky enough to find one in your collection, you could be sitting on a goldmine.

A 2003-04 LeBron James rookie card recently came up for sale at Goldin Auctions and ended up selling for US$1.8 million — roughly AU$2.5 million — making it the most expensive basketball card ever purchased.

According to the NBA, it’s also the priciest trading card of any kind since 1980.

The buyer was a gentleman by the name of Leore Avidar, the CEO and co-founder of Lob.com — a San Francisco based company that automates direct mail for businesses.

There were only 23 of these cards produced at the time, with James himself having a few in his collection, the New York Post has reported.

“Guess who else has a couple of those exact ones too,” James wrote on Instagram.

According to the New York Post, Goldin Auctions have set three modern-day card record sales in 2020. While James’ rookie card is the bestseller by far, a Mike Trout rookie card sold for US$922,500 earlier this year. A card featuring both James and Michael Jordon also recently sold for US$900,000.

Ken Goldin, the founder of Goldin Auctions, told ESPN that the continued popularity of James is why his rookie card sold for such a large amount.

“If we were talking about a T206 [Honus] Wagner, or a 1952 [Mickey] Mantle, it probably wouldn’t be that much news,” he said.

“But when you’re talking about a card that was literally produced 17 years ago and is for a guy still playing in the NBA, it’s just shocking news to a lot of people. It’s really where my particular industry has been going for several years.”

The moral of the story here is to check your sports card collections!

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