Hey folks!

I remember a time when Pokémon cards had exactly one job: to survive the lunch break in school.

You'd proudly carry your favourite Charizard in a slightly bent plastic sleeve, challenge your friends to a battle, and occasionally get into an argument about whether someone had "cheated" by sneaking an extra energy card into their deck. Back then, the biggest financial decision anyone made was whether to spend their pocket money on another booster pack.

Fast forward a couple of decades, and the playground has been replaced by auction houses.

Today, people wear gloves while handling certain Pokémon cards because they became so valuable. They even send them to professional grading companies that inspect every corner under microscopes. Some are even locked away in vaults, insured like expensive jewellery, and traded for prices that would comfortably buy an apartment in many cities. 

Earlier this year, one particularly rare Pokémon card once owned by YouTuber Logan Paul sold for $16 million.

At that point, you're no longer talking about trading cards. You're talking about an asset class. That's exactly why Japan, the country that gave birth to Pokémon, is beginning to ask an unusual question: should trading cards be regulated like financial assets?

That sounds like an overreaction, don’t you think? Surely these are still children's collectables.

Well, the market has exploded over the past few years. In Japan alone, the domestic trading card market nearly doubled in just four years, reaching ¥338 billion ($2.3 billion) by FY2025. 

And as prices climbed, something else climbed with them. Counterfeiting, theft, and money laundering. Once an object becomes valuable enough, it starts attracting the same problems that plague any physical asset class, such as watches, handbags, and artwork.

And that isn't entirely surprising.

Think about what makes something useful for storing wealth. It should be:

1. Scarce,
2. Easy to transport,
3. Difficult to destroy,
4. Widely recognised, and
5. Easy to buy and sell. 

A rare Pokémon card checks most of those boxes. You can slip millions of dollars worth of value into a backpack, move it across borders, and sell it almost anywhere in the world to another collector.

Which explains why Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party has now formed a group to study appropriate rule-making for the industry. Interestingly, the concern isn't just about crime. Policymakers are also uneasy that the prices of iconic Japanese cards are largely determined by an American grading company. In other words, Japan created Pokémon, but someone else increasingly decides how much its most valuable collectables are worth.

That raises a much bigger question.

When does a collectable stop being a collectable?

We've seen this movie before. Sneakers became investments. Luxury watches became portfolios. Even Labubus briefly behaved like speculative instruments before that bubble cooled off. 

Each time, the object itself stayed the same, but the way people thought about it changed. They stopped buying it simply because they liked it and started buying it because they believed someone else would pay more later.

Perhaps Pokémon cards have reached that point too.

Because once governments start discussing regulation, anti-money laundering rules and market oversight, it's hard to argue that you're just talking about a children's card game anymore.

Here’s a soundtrack to put you in the mood… 🎵

Dosti by Saurabh Singh, recommended by our reader Piyush Thakkar.

Thanks for the rec, Piyush!

Also, folks, keep your music recommendations coming. We’d love to feature them in our Sunday editions, especially gems from underrated Indian artists many of us haven’t discovered yet. Can’t wait to hear them!

Ready to roll?

What caught our eye this week

Ayurvedic cannabis?!

A pack of cannabis gummies, a WhatsApp message, and twenty minutes later, they're at your doorstep.

If someone described this transaction, you would probably assume it happened in some illegal or shady way. But according to an investigation by The Reporters' Collective, that's increasingly how cannabis products are being sold in India today.

There’s no back-alley exchange, or some dealer asking you to "come alone" and check for tails. The entire experience resembles ordering something as simple as groceries or cosmetics online.

Which is odd, because most of us have grown up believing that cannabis is simply illegal in India.

The reality, however, is a little more complicated than that.

Under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, ganja (defined as the flowering or fruiting tops of the cannabis plant) and charas, the resin extracted from it, are prohibited. 

But the law treats other parts of the plant differently. Leaves and seeds, when separated from the flowering tops, are not included in the Act's definition of ganja. Over the years, that distinction has created room for licensed Ayurvedic formulations and other regulated cannabis-derived products to emerge, even as recreational cannabis remains illegal.

And that one word, ‘Ayurvedic’, is doing more financial heavy lifting than you'd think.

Because a narcotics business doesn't exist on paper in India. There's no license to sell recreational cannabis, no bank willing to touch that money, and no investor putting a term sheet in front of a founder whose product is a criminal offence. That business simply cannot be built.

Many of the products now being sold online are marketed not as recreational cannabis but as hemp-derived “wellness products” or Ayurvedic formulations. Their legality depends on how they're sourced, formulated and licensed, making the space far more nuanced than a simple "legal" or "illegal" label suggests. It is precisely this grey area that businesses have learnt to operate within.

And once it’s classified as Ayurveda, it no longer has to operate like an underground business. Companies can apply for AYUSH licences, manufacture products through recognised channels, open bank accounts, pay GST, and, perhaps most importantly, raise money from investors. 

That's what makes this story so interesting.

The same product can exist in two completely different economic worlds depending on how the law chooses to classify it.

Naturally, that has begun attracting serious money. Industry estimates suggest India's medicinal cannabis market could grow into a multi-billion-dollar business over the next few years.

It also explains why the government can't dodge this much longer. The Delhi High Court has given the government until July 2026 to formally decide whether the NDPS Act's restrictions need to be relaxed. A loophole this profitable was always going to outgrow the law it was hiding behind.

In the end, none of this changes the chemistry inside the product. Cannabinoids don't care whether they're sold under a licensed wellness brand or through an illegal supply chain. 

What changes is everything built around them. And if today's cannabis products can be packaged as gummies, there's little reason to think they'll stop there. Companies are already experimenting with capsules, chocolates and other edible formats that fit comfortably into the broader wellness market. 

The bigger question, then, isn't whether cannabis products will become more mainstream. It's how far this legal and commercial evolution will go before the law catches up with the market.

Readers Recommend

This week, our reader Himani Todi recommends reading Exhalation by Ted Chiang

Himani writes,

It’s a collection of science fiction stories that explores questions around technology, free will, memory and what it means to be human, all through ideas that feel surprisingly relevant to the world we’re building today.

Thank you for the rec, Himani!

That’s it from us this week. We’ll see you next Sunday.

Until then, send us your book, music (preferably from underrated Indian artists), business movies, documentaries, or podcast recommendations. We’ll feature them in this newsletter! Also, don’t forget to tell us what you thought of today's edition. Just hit reply to this email (or if you’re reading this on the web, drop us a message at morning@finshots.in).

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