Ebay which started their sports card Authenticity Guarantee program in early 2022 will change the role of two industry leading grading companies, PSA and CGC in that program. The original system had graded cards sent to PSA in California for authentication. Ungraded, or Raw cards, were sent to CGC in Florida. However, according to a source, PSA will be the only company used for all of the cards that fall under eBay's Authenticity Guarantee. In an email it was also explained that:
"...later this year we'll become the exclusive authentication partner for trading cards for eBay across both graded and raw cards. We've already staffed up the team and are ready to go, we just need to make sure everything is flowing correctly operationally with eBay. We'll be doing this bicoastally to ensure fast turnaround times. "
Bicoastally can only refer to the use of the New Jersey facility to speed up turn around times! This would be exciting news for anyone on the East Coast who has had to wait for the cross country shipments. Also, it's clear that this new program is not fully up and running, but it is done as a business decision. CGC is no longer involved in eBay raw card authentication as of later this year. One of the reasons behind ebay's decision may be PSA's success in actually enforcing the Authenticity Guarantee. According to my source:
"As an aside, since we've been running the AG program for graded cards for eBay we've been catching a larger percentage that expected of both fake and significantly not as described items, which has been a great value add (I believe) to buyers of trading cards on eBay."
No Argument, if PSA is truly catching more fake cards and cards that are way off description, that is a good thing. I asked "Will buyers be able to grade raw ebay cards directly through PSA directly?"
"Hopefully later this year as well, although there are some operational flows to figure out. Harder than it seems at surface (for example, connecting eBay and PSA user accounts to make sure customer's orders are tracked correctly in each account), so we need to make sure everything works to ensure a smooth launch."
Well there is it is. By the end of the year you will be able to go on eBay, buy a raw card, have it sent to PSA for authentication and grading, and then put if up for sale in the eBay or Goldin Vault. I hope this sheds some light if you buy and sell on ebay. We will update this article if more information becomes available.