AJ Fabino, Senior Editor, Stock Trader Network
GameStop (GME) should forget eBay (EBAY) and buy the company grading the Pokémon cards it sells, according to Stock Trader Network Chief Strategist Dennis Dick.
Dick argued Monday that Professional Sports Authenticator, better known as PSA, would be a far more natural acquisition for GameStop than the $55.5 billion eBay deal CEO Ryan Cohen continues to pursue.
GameStop is already moving quickly into collectibles—Stock Trader Network noticed that Pokémon cards are among the first products displayed on its website, and the company works directly with PSA to grade, buy and sell trading cards through its stores.
The question took on after GameStop announced plans to exchange $1.4 billion of convertible debt for common stock. The transaction will strengthen the balance sheet without using cash, but it will also dilute existing shareholders.
“Why would they do that?” Dick asked.
One possible answer is that Cohen is preparing GameStop for another run at eBay. The online marketplace rejected the company’s cash-and-stock proposal in May as “neither credible nor attractive,” citing uncertain financing, leverage and operational risk.
But Dick questioned why Cohen would stretch GameStop to buy a company roughly five times its size when a smaller target fits the business he is already building.
Collectibles generated approximately $1.06 billion in fiscal 2025 sales, an increase of nearly 48% from the previous year. The category accounted for 29.2% of GameStop’s annual sales, up from 18.8% a year earlier.
GameStop also became an authorized PSA dealer in 2024, and customers can submit cards for grading through participating stores, while GameStop buys and sells cards graded by PSA. The companies have since launched Power Packs, which allow customers to open digital packs containing physical PSA-graded cards.
Ryan Craver, founder and CEO of Commerce Canal, also sees more logic in buying PSA than eBay.
“Honestly, I’m skeptical,” Craver said of the eBay bid. “GME buying eBay is a massive leap. eBay’s market cap dwarfs what GME can realistically finance even with the equity conversion, and eBay shareholders would need a serious premium to vote yes.”
GameStop is currently worth about $11 billion, compared with eBay’s nearly $50 billion market value. Its offer calls for half of the $55.5 billion purchase price to be paid in GameStop shares.
“The dilution to GME holders would be enormous, and I’m not sure the collectibles thesis alone justifies absorbing a full-scale e-commerce marketplace,” Craver said.
Buying PSA would deepen a strategy that is already taking shape, and it would give GameStop a larger position in the authentication and grading process while strengthening the trading-card business driving an increasing share of its sales.
“Dennis’s PSA angle is actually more interesting to me,” Craver said. “A tighter, more defensible move that plays directly into the collectibles identity without overextending.”
