In 2010, to mark the release of Zoroark: Master of Illusions, Pokemon ran a design contest in Japan. The Kindergarten division was won by a six-year-old named Megu Taniguchi with a drawing of Zorua and Pikachu riding a bus together. Her drawing became an official promo card, the Illusion's Zorua Design Contest Promo, Kindergarten Winner variant. Roughly 100 copies were printed.
On September 27, a PSA 10 copy closed at Fanatics Collect for $156,000.
The comp that matters
A copy in the same grade sold for $8,700 in 2023. Same card, same plastic, same population: an 18x move in three years. Nothing about the cardboard changed. What changed is who is bidding on contest promos, and how few gem-mint copies exist for them to bid on.
Population is the number
On mainstream cards the grade premium is a ratio: a PSA 10 Base Set Charizard is worth some multiple of a PSA 9, and that multiple drifts with the market. On oddball cards the premium is not a ratio at all, because there is no deep market in the lower grades to anchor it. A PSA 10 on a 100-copy promo is not "a 10." It is one of perhaps a dozen that will ever exist, competing for a buyer pool that has decided these objects belong in the same conversation as trophy cards.
That is why the Zorua can jump 18x while a modern alt-art 10 with a pop of 4,000 goes nowhere. The modern card is scarce in grade but not scarce in existence; every new submission adds to the 10 count. The contest promo cannot be re-supplied. PSA's current pause on Value-tier grading, covered in the Chart of the Day, sharpens this for mid-pop vintage, but a 100-copy promo was never going to be affected by the queue either way.
What to take from it
Before chasing a modern 10 at a four-figure price, check what the low-pop vintage promo in the same bracket is doing. Low population with a story (a contest, a tournament, a magazine insert) has been the strongest category at the top of the market for two years, and this result says it is not done. Source: Dexerto.
Grade Expectations ran in The Pack Report, October 12, 2026: A $960,000 Cresselia? Sure, Why Not. Published by Rip Station.