I was recently chatting with an eBay member about a card they purchased. Can anyone find what is wrong with this item besides its horrible condition? 
I cannot see anything wrong with it other than the faded 1st ed sign that the seller pointed out . Having said that, the photo seems to be equally as bad as the quality of the card, so I could be missing something.
Was the first addition stamp faded in Photoshop or using a substance?
That Charizard looks very fishy to me… Something is off about the stamp.
I have opened lots of 1st edition base set booster packs, sometimes the stamps can be very light on cards (low on ink?) but they don’t look like that. They look crisp, but gray. That one looks blurry and off if I may say so myself. The 1 in the stamp also looks so fake.
What’s the deal with this card?
Exactly Jason! At a very quick glance it looks as if someone may have tried to fade it or manipulate an actual 1st ed stamp. However, whenever you examine the card next to another 1st ed stamp, it is obvious.
The 1st photo is the fake stamp, and second is the real stamp:
real"]
The fake stamp looks like someone purchased a stamp and did it themselves. This example is fuzzy and not clear whatsoever. If the card were scanned it would be more vivid that the stamp is not the correct focus. As Jason said, there are grey 1st ed stamped english cards but they are much more clear than this example.
The other component to it being fake is its size. Notice the size and spacing of each letter in the real photo. Every letter in the fake photo is bunched together. Also, the letter “N” is almost touching the border on the real copy, the fake copy is significantly far away.
I hope this helps anyone who is in the market for collecting 1st Edition base cards. There were plenty of fakes back in the “golden era” and some still re-surface such as this copy.
Oh man that’s awful. It went for so much too! Is the buyer going to take any action now that he’s been informed?
I have not heard back from him yet but I hope he does. He sent the card to PSA, I wonder if they will catch the mistake.
Real Faded Stamp:
I got this (and some others) straight from packs. Not to the extent as some I’ve seen, but noticeably light.
Notice the crisp-ness
Thanks Jason! That is prefect for comparison. The spacing is even and not jumbled as well.
I put two side-by side, should be better!
Nice! I wish I could get the picture of the fake in better resolution. It would be great to have them the same size.
I cant believe how high a thrashed charizard went!! Ive been wanting to pick up a beat to poop one for playing with but not if they cost more then my NM does! 
Here is an update from the seller of the card. He has listed it it graded PSA 2 for $1,500. Check out the photo that he has with the two stamps next to one another. I emphasized how the stamp is not legimiate but he says that PSA would not grade it if it were fake.
While I always side with PSA, they do not have the expertise in pokemon authenticity as they perhaps should. Their grading is consistent, but unfortunately they let this one slip by.
With all of this said, I feel bad for the seller. I doubt he would be able to get a refund from the original purchase. And now he is stuck with a real charizard with a fake stamp.
Very disappointed that slipped through the cracks. 
It looks like he won’t be selling it though according to what he wrote in his description. Is there anyway to inform PSA of this so they could somehow correct the issue? I was thinking maybe they could offer the seller a certain amount of free grades or something to make up for it?
I am going to talk to him and hopefully walk him through the refund process through eBay. It is difficult since it is now graded. He paid a premium for it as well, which is salt in the wound.
Why did it take him so long to realize it was fake…took me all of 30 seconds. I wish him the best in getting his money back
He should have consulted Professor Oak.
Lightheartedness aside, I pity the poor guy. I hope he receives a refund!
hahaha! I think since he paid so much he wanted to believe it was real. I really don’t know what his solution is at this point. Maybe just throwing it up in an auction and seeing what it earns.
Can he still open a case with eBay for item not as described?
I’m pretty sure it wasn’t described as fake when it was first listed. Although with PSA grading the card (instead if rejecting it as fake), it makes it really complicated because the original seller can claim that it was indeed a genuine 1st ed Charizard. This is bad. 