How Spread calculates its numbers
Every figure on Spread comes from public market prices and the rules below. Nothing is hand-edited.
Data and timing
- Market prices: TCGplayer's daily price data (lowest listing, market price based on recent sales) for every card and sealed product, read from TCGCSV once a day after its update at about 20:00 UTC.
- Price history and graded prices: JustTCG, by condition. Daily points for the last 35 days, weekly before that.
- All prices are US market prices in US dollars.
Implied pull rate
For a set with documented pull rates, each pull's expected value per box is its rate per box times the average market price of the cards in that pull (cards under $1 count as $0). The sum is the documented contents value. The box price minus that value is what buyers pay for the chase cards without a known rate. Dividing the chase cards' average price by that gap gives the market-implied rate: how often a chase card would have to appear for opening a box to break even.
Listing spread
Lowest current listing minus market price, as a share of market price. Below zero is an undercut; above zero is a squeeze. Only products worth $20 or more from expansions released in the last 150 days are shown, and spreads beyond −80% or +60% are left out as stale prices.
Sealed spreads
Box vs packs compares a booster box with the same number of loose packs at market price. Case vs boxes compares a sealed case with its boxes bought separately. Pre-order vs latest box compares the next set's pre-order box with the latest released box. The latest released set is the newest one with a priced booster box.
English vs Japanese
English and Japanese printings are paired by card name and equivalent rarity, with the Japanese set released up to eight months before the English set. Pairs with more than one possible match are dropped. The gap is the English price minus the Japanese price, as a share of the Japanese price.
Game indices and movers
A game's index takes its 100 most expensive cards today and compares their total value with what the same cards were worth at the start of the window (1, 7 or 30 days). Movers list single products whose market price changed most, leaving out items under $10 on both dates.
Limitations
- Pull rates are community estimates; publishers rarely disclose them.
- Thinly traded items can show large spreads from a single listing or sale.
- Prices are estimates for information only, not financial advice.