Here's what appears to be going on with PSA, because if you've been sitting on a stack of commons you were planning to get graded cheap, you're going to have to think again. As of June 2nd, PSA suspended all four of their Value-tier submission levels — Value Bulk, Value, Value Plus, and Value Max. Gone. Closed. The reason? Their backlog hit somewhere between 10 and 14 million cards, and they can't dig out. They say they'll reopen Value tiers once the backlog drops to 5 million. They're estimating four months. We've heard PSA estimates before. I'll believe it when I see it.
What this means in plain English: the cheapest PSA option you can use right now is their Regular tier at $79.99 a card. Before June 2nd, you could submit through the Value tier for $32.99. That's a 142% price jump overnight. If you're grading cards worth $50 each, the math doesn't work anymore. I learned years ago — the hard way, on a shoebox full of vintage Topps cards — that grading commons doesn't make financial sense. PSA just made that lesson unavoidable for everybody.
Now here's the part that should make you nervous, separate from the backlog: Collectors Holdings, the company that owns PSA, also owns SGC. And in December they announced a deal to acquire Beckett — BGS, the one with the subgrades that half of you swear by. One company is buying up all three major graders. There's already an antitrust lawsuit and a congressman asking the FTC to take a look. I'm not saying the sky is falling. I'm saying when one outfit controls where you can get your cards graded, that's the kind of thing that ends up in your wallet one way or another. Keep your eye on it.
For now, if you have budget cards to grade, look at SGC ($24.99 base, fastest turnarounds right now) or BGS ($20 base). They're still operating independently for the moment. If you've got cards that justify $79.99 a pop, PSA Regular is still open. But if your collection plan was built around cheap PSA bulk grading, that plan needs a rewrite.