By James Chillcott (@MTGCritic)

One of the most common misconceptions about folks involved in MTGFinance is that we are constantly manipulating the market and feeding players misinformation to help fuel achievement of our personal goals.

It has occurred to us at MTGPrice that though we dole out a good deal of advice, most of you ultimately have very little insight into when and why our writing team actually puts our money where our collective mouths are pointing. As such running this weekly series breaking down what we’ve been buying and selling each week and why. These lists are meant to be both complete and transparent, leaving off only cards we bought for personal use without hope of profit. We’ll also try to provide some insight into our thinking behind the specs, and whether we are aiming for a short (<1 month), mid (1-12 month), or long (1 year+) term flip. Here’s what we we’ve been up to this week:

Buying Period: June 22nd – June 28th, 2015

Note: All cards NM unless otherwise noted. All sell prices are net of fees unless noted.

James Chillcott (@MTGCritic)

BOUGHT

• 6x Aether Vial (Darksteel) @ $25.00
• 3x Aether Vial (Foil MM) @ $39.95/per
• 1x Aether Vial (Foil MM) @ $34.15/per
• 4x Merrow Reejerey @ $4.95/per

My large collection deal is set to go down this coming week (kicking off a new article series called The Big Kahuna), so I’ve again be relatively quiet on single card purchases.  The Aether Vials and Reejereys are the result of tracking the rising tide of purchase activity premised on the Merfolk deck taking two Top 4 slots at GP Copenhagen and putting the archtype back on the map as a contender for Tier 1 status. With Harbringer of the Tides revealed in Magic Origins, the deck gains a new tool against other creature based tempo decks, and the future looks bright. If you’re looking to further capitalize I’d recommend scooping up some copies of Mutavault, which looks primed to make a move for $15-20 based on strong sales patterns (and after I posted that it could take up to a year on Twitter earlier this week.) Regardless of whether Merfolk continues to well, this tribal superstar land will find an important home sooner or later and I’d like to be as deep as possible on the card when that happens.

SOLD (Pucatrade)

• 3x Sylvan Scrying (pack opened) @ $3.97
• 1x Magus of the Moon @ $18.04
• 1x Sensei’s Divining Top @ $32.13

Outed a small set of unneeded cards that aren’t likely to see much further price movement in the near future on Pucatrade this week. I’m currently negotiating a few major deals on Puca, but hit me up if you think you have a really sweet high end card(s) you’d like to trade out for points.

Corbin Hosler (@Chosler88)

BOUGHT

• HARBINGER OF THE TIDES BABY FOIL 4x. (But that’s just me for my merfolk deck)
• 8x Gavony Townships @$3
• 8x Silvergill Adept at $2

SOLD

• 2x Blood Moon @ $54
• 4x Deceiver Exarch at $4

Editor’s Note: This was a play on the popularity of the Elves deck in Modern.

Douglas Johnson (@Roseofthorns)

Douglas says:

“Hello readers! I still haven’t been “speculating” by buying cards at retail over the past few weeks, but this summer has been quite busy for me with buying collections big and small. Instead of giving you the exist list of cards that I’ve purchased at buylist prices and telling you that picking up people’s shocklands at $5 is a good idea, I’d prefer to focus on a magic phrase that you can use while negotiating a collection buy over the phone, Facebook, or email that can heavily swing the buying process in your favor. You know that really annoying television ad for the company that tries to buy structured settlement plans (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HX0fIi3H-es ?) It exists because people are actually willing to sell out of a plan that would benefit them more in the long term, because they want cash NOW.

Similarly, I’ve been telling people the following while giving them my offer on their lot; “I have cash in hand and can drive to you in X minutes, if that makes a difference.” While your competitors might be able to get paid and meet up this Friday, you gain a huge advantage by cutting several days off their waiting period. You save yourself time from having to go to the bank or ATM, and they don’t have to spend any more time than they want to negotiating more offers, comparing time spent, and factoring in all of their others costs of selling. Having green paper and PayPal dollars at the ready and letting your seller know about it can go a huge way in sealing the deal.”

Note: The rest of the guys were quiet this week.

So there you have it. Now what were you guys buying and selling this week and why?

James Chillcott is the CEO of ShelfLife.net, The Future of Collecting, Senior Partner at Advoca, a designer, adventurer, toy fanatic and an avid Magic player and collector since 1994.

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