More Piggybanx Chess

I've been posting about the series Top eBay Chess Items by Price (March 2010), for so long -- 15 years next March -- that I can barely remember all the different bits and pieces of info behind each post. Consider the following item.

Titled 'Piggybanx 1/1 Chess Piece Matte Variation Moneky D. Luffy', it sold for 'US $2,000.00 or Best Offer'. It was higher in the list of sold items than another chess item that sold for $1826 after 35 bids, so we can accept that the real price was higher than that.

'Piggybanx'. Where have we seen that before on this blog? It turns out that I featured another item earlier this year, A Goat Says, 'It's Chess Not Checkers' (February 2024), where I wrote,

The best items featured on 'Top eBay Chess Items by Price' are those that lead to other avenues of inquiry: 'What is this?' and 'What is that?'

And, yes, that item was also Piggybanx. For this current post I'll show both the front and the back of the Piggybanx card.

Since the item's description simply repeated its title, let's record the 'Item specifics' for posterity:-

Unit of Sale : Single Piece
Signed : Yes
Title : piggybanx 1/1 chess piece
Material : Glass
Framing : Framed
Subject : Anime, Art, Card
Type : Card
Year of Production : 2024
Original/Licensed Reproduction : Original
Style : 3D, Abstract, Art Nouveau
Theme : Art
Country/Region of Manufacture : United States

The first question that comes to mind is the name in the title, 'Moneky D. Luffy'. Is that first name a typo? Yessiree, Bob, it is. According to the Wikipedia page Monkey D. Luffy (wikipedia.org),

Monkey D. Luffy, also known as "Straw Hat" Luffy, is a fictional character and the protagonist in the Japanese manga series One Piece created by Eiichiro Oda. Luffy made his debut as a young boy who acquires the properties of rubber after accidentally eating one of the Devil Fruits that belonged to "Red Hair" Shanks.

The second question that comes to mind is how chess fits into our narrative. Repeating the relevant portions of the item specifics gives:-

'Title : piggybanx 1/1 chess piece'
'Unit of Sale : Single Piece'

That didn't help at all. I failed to answer the second question, but I didn't try very hard. Maybe I'll come back to it some other time.

The third question that comes to mind is why the item is worth $2000. I could probably spend an inordinate amount of time and never find an answer. It's just the way it is.