Almost a month ago I wrote a post in the MTG Price forums advocating that Ghost Quarter – even Innistrad copies – were a buy. At the time there were still hundreds of copies in stock for under a buck and some were as cheap as $0.60. With the success of the Eldrazi deck in Modern, the importance of this card has multiplied fivefold. It’s no coincidence that the price has followed suit.

It’s great to see the buy list curve in blue follow the green curve, indicating dealers are also having a difficult time keeping these in stock. If you’re holding copies, I’d recommend remaining vigilant. I’m not sure if there will be a pullback when Modern season passes. We all know how volatile the Modern format is.

While it was cute to have called this $0.50 uncommon correctly, it doesn’t nearly balance out a couple of hits my portfolio has taken lately. This is what I want to address in this week’s article – some of my disappointing calls, and where I think prices go from here. After all, it’s easy to show off correct picks but one can learn far more from analyzing their own mistakes. Perhaps there are some tidbits we all could benefit from after digging into my misallocated positions.

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To be completely honest, I can’t say I’m surprised by the outcome of Pro Tour Oath of the Gatewatch. Most probably did not expect such domination by Eye of Ugin and its Eldrazi friends, but the results do likely reflect the most powerful decks in the post-Splinter Twin post-Oath of the Gatewatch metagame. And now we have silly things like this:

Fifty bucks is a lot for a card that was $6 a couple weeks ago, yet the price movement of course is 100% merited. This is now the deck to beat in Modern and it’ll be interesting to see how prices move from here.

My advice: sell.

Sell Winning Pro Tour Cards??

 Not all of them. Plenty of Modern mainstays such as Spellskite are fine to hold for the time being. There won’t be Phyrexian mana in Standard again until we return to a plane that matches the flavor, so the next possible reprint will probably be Modern Masters 2017. Non-Eldrazi cards are also fine to hold onto, including your standard Affinity fare as well as Infect, Burn, and the rest of the metagame.

But as for Eldrazi-specific cards we saw this past weekend, I’d say we’re treading on very uncertain ground. The newest block has certainly shaken up the format, and I often wonder if we’re getting a glimpse of what’s to come when Standard rotates. But given the hype, I have to imagine the right move is to sell. Stuff like Endless One will peak very soon, and then drift lower on increasing supply.

I’m not saying this card will drop back below a buck again, but $8 seems awfully high for a card printed in the same set as Expeditions. I’d recommend taking profits on all these Eldrazi creatures during this Pro Tour hype. Some may rise higher still if they become powerhouses in Standard, but others won’t make the grade and will drop hard from here. Leave the last 10% for the next guy.

Stepping away from the Eldrazi themselves, I’d form this basic rule of thumb: if the card is good strictly because of Eldrazi, then sell into hype. For me, this includes Eye of Ugin, Eldrazi Temple, and Chalice of the Void. All have seen tremendous rallies over the past couple weeks and it would be wise to sell into these spikes. There’s just more upside in other components of the deck which haven’t spiked yet.

Blinkmoth Nexus is a great example – it’s a powerful land in the Eldrazi deck as well as the Affinity deck, meaning a sudden banning of Eye of Ugin wouldn’t ruin this card’s utility in Modern. Simian Spirit Guide is another card that shows up time and again in various decks, and I see no reason to panic sell copies out of fear of banning. Mutavault and Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth are also interesting here because they haven’t moved nearly as much as other Eldrazi deck components.

To boil it down, if a card recently shot up in price due to the Modern Eldrazi deck alone, sell now and take profits. If the card is played in other strong Modern decks besides Eldrazi and it has shot up in price, it is a hold or sell. And if the card is strong in the Eldrazi deck but hasn’t moved much yet, it’s a buy…at least for now…

The Writing on the Wall

 I woke up Sunday morning and my Twitter feed was abuzz with a single message. Not the Super Bowl, not African American History Month, and certainly not positive things about Modern. Everyone was talking about the lack of Modern diversity in the latest Pro Tour.

The reality is, Modern – at least for now – is not a diversified format. Going forward, I strongly suspect the metagame will be broken into three buckets of decks: Eldrazi, Affinity, and decks designed to beat Eldrazi and Affinity. A healthy format this is not.

But I don’t blame this trend on the banning of Splinter Twin and Summer Bloom. Those bannings made sense in a perfect vacuum, but I believe Wizards of the Coast failed to realize the impending changes Battle for Zendikar and Oath of the Gatewatch would bring to the table. It’s almost like they had forgotten Eye of Ugin and Eldrazi Temple were cards when they decided to print three mana Eldrazi. I remember reading an article years ago when Rise of the Eldrazi came out suggesting that Eldrazi would remain balanced as long as their converted mana cost remained substantially high. The column specifically called out concerns of having an Eldrazi creature with converted mana cost under five and Annihilator. While Wizards was sage enough to eliminate the Annihilator mechanic, they did not heed the other half of that statement’s advice.

Seriously? Did Wizards of the Coast flat out forget that Eye of Ugin was a card?! If Ornithopter is playable in Modern as a zero mana 0/2, then a “zero” mana 2/1 that has the potential to go huge later in the game is a serious powerhouse. When you look at the 3-drop Eldrazi cards the list of intimidating creatures becomes even longer – and all of them cost two less thanks to Eye of Ugin. I’m not one to cry “conspiracy”, but either WOTC forgot about Eye of Ugin and Eldrazi Temple, they didn’t care about the interaction, or they purposefully did this to showcase Magic’s newest two sets. “You insist on having a Modern Pro Tour? Fine, we’ll find a way to still ensure that Pro Tour showcases Magic’s newest cards!” Just sayin’…

Now we’re stuck with this overpowered interaction, and the clamoring for bannings has already begun. This is yet another reason why I say it’s wise to sell all Eldrazi-specific cards. It’s not just that they’ve already jumped significantly in price. It’s also because the downside risk to bannings is extreme right now. Take it from the guy who played Birthing Pod in Modern and sold Bloom Titan months before the banning – these are painful to endure. Don’t be left holding $50 Eye of Ugins. Please, I beg of you, sell your copies. Even if Eldrazi is now playable in Legacy, Eye of Ugin can’t sustain a $50 price tag on Legacy alone. If it’s banned, it will go the way of Splinter Twin.

Honesty Time: My Exposure

Most of you know by now that I’ve quit playing Modern. Once the rumblings of a Summer Bloom ban surfaced, I grew cold feet and sold the deck. Now that the deck is wiped from the face of the earth, I’m reminded how vulnerable Modern cards are to long term changes. It’s not a place I want to park money for the long haul.

Just because I don’t play Modern, however, doesn’t mean I don’t have a few small bets in Modern cards. My top picks have been All is Dust, Spellskite, and Ghost Quarter. I also have a few Verdant Catacombs, though it’s really interesting to see how many fetches made the Pro Tour Top 8 (hint: 8 Scalding Tarn and that’s it). Any card that has tremendous versatility in Modern is still a terrific hold. Spellskite and Ghost Quarter are especially well-positioned right now and I plan on sitting on them for a bit longer.

But other than the above, a handful of Shock Lands, and a smattering of stuff I opened from two MM2015 boxes, there’s little I’m holding. As cards fluctuate in price and jump to the upside, I’ll be looking to sell. It’s just too dangerous to hold Modern cards for the long haul unless they are sleepers and penny stocks. Reprints and bannings are too painful.

Here’s a reality check, just to put in perspective my “come-from state”. I did actually make a couple purchases throughout Pro Tour weekend. But for the first time in years, I didn’t make any Pro Tour related purchases. What did I buy? Two Unlimited Sedge Troll, an Unlimited Meekstone, an Unlimited Crusade, an Unlimited Drain Power, and an Unlimited Balance. Crazy? I think not – these have all been drying up on the internet and I wanted to make sure I had copies for my collection before they became silly expensive. In the case of Balance, I bought in just in time.

The chart above isn’t fully conclusive. You can see the recent steps higher in buy list pricing but not the full picture. Go ahead and search online for Unlimited Balances and tell me how many you find. On eBay I see an auction bid up to $20.50 and a Buy It Now listing for $60. On TCG Player, I see this:

I see zero copies on the rest of the U.S. Internet. This is a card I’d want to buy – I can hold it confidently without fear of reprint or banning. It’s not vulnerable to silly Modern metagame shifts and it offers tremendous upside. The last copy sold in the $10 range and now the card is trending towards 2x-3x that price. Getting in front of trends like these is a much safer way to invest in Magic.

Wrapping It Up

 Did you buy into Eldrazi specs before the Pro Tour? Well done! You’re likely sitting on a gold mine. But don’t let that gold mine become a strip mine by holding too long. These cards are worth significantly more than they were two weeks ago, and the data is screaming “sell.” Take advantage of the opportunity to cash in. You’ll lock in some valuable gains while also significantly reducing risk to the likely banning that will come.

If you adamantly believe these cards will still rise significantly higher, then I’d recommend at least shifting your exposure to cards in the Eldrazi deck that also see play in other lists. Spellskite, Urborg, Mutavault, and Blinkmoth Nexus all offer exposure to this list without being all-in on the Eldrazi strategy. There are definitely smart ways to go about speculating on the new Modern format, and signing up for exorbitantly high risk is not my style.

What if you want to play the Pro Tour Eldrazi lists in some upcoming Modern tournaments? That’s a tough call then. Surely if you want to win, you’ll probably want to play one of these Eldrazi variants. But this offers up maximum exposure to an emergency ban. If you must purchase these cards to grind out some Modern events, at least recognize with eyes wide open that you’re signing up for sizable downside risk. If you look at this risk as the “cost of entry” into Modern now, then maybe you can rationalize the purchase. As for me, I’ll stick with my silly 6-mana 4/6’s (as Jim Casale put it on a recent podcast) in Old School MTG. Stuff like Unlimited Sedge Troll offer significant upside as well, but without all the fear and concern around reprints and bannings. That’s my kind of format!

…

Sig’s Quick Hits

• Worship has been receiving a lot of hype lately, presumably based on Modern speculation. I didn’t see the card on camera once throughout the Pro Tour, yet the card’s price is still climbing. Now Star City Games is sold out of English copies with a $3.99 price tag, and I’m sure they’ll relist at a higher price. What I’m not sure of, however, is why anyone would want to buy in at the “new” price.
• More Old School MTG hype? Oubliette may literally mean “a secret dungeon with access only through a trapdoor in its ceiling” but buying into the Black Enchantment is anything but a trap. The sweet artwork alone makes it worth owning a copy of this card, and I personally think this precursor to Oblivion Ring is a solid card in the classic format as well. Star City Games is completely sold out with a $14.99 price tag.
• Lord of Extinction has steadily risen in price, hitting all time highs. Nonfoil copies of the casual and commander staple is completely sold out at Star City Games with a $14.89 price tag. This will steadily climb higher without reprint, though I believe there’s probably more interesting targets elsewhere.

Once the full spoiler of Oath of the Gatewatch was revealed, one noteworthy omission was immediately spotted: Inquisition of Kozilek. The card seemingly could have fit in perfectly with the set, storyline not withstanding. Yet Wizards of the Coast didn’t seem interested (or hadn’t planned) in keeping the Modern staple at its once-affordable price. As a result, we have yet another $20 Uncommon on our hands.

I guess if you don’t want to shell out $25 to play Inquisition, you could always play the more “budget-friendly” discard spell Thoughtseize. Five years ago, who would have ever expected trend reversal?

One More Purchase

In reaction to the spike, I rushed out and did my usual thorough search of the internet for copies at the “old price”. I found a mild degree of success – eight copies on Card Shark at roughly $12 each after shipping costs were factored in. One seller shipped, the other cancelled – I still managed to net a decent profit from the endeavor. Besides these two play sets, I did make one other reactionary purchase…

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When I announced the purchase on Twitter (@sigfig8), my purchase decision was met with mixed reviews. Some denounced the buy, suggesting there was no room to profit from the Modern Event Deck. Others applauded the choice and even followed suit, arguing there was no cheaper way of obtaining the cards within the set. Naturally my primary goal was profit, but if the best I could do was buy all the singles in the Event Deck at a significantly discounted price, I wouldn’t be too unhappy.

Hindsight is 20-60?

 A few weeks later, I should be able to look at price trends and identify whether or not I made the right decision. However, I’d argue the data is still a bit unclear even now. I want to take a deep dive here, because this premise pops up over and over again – a card jumps in price and normal copies are bought out first before people consider possible preconstructed deck targets.

First, let’s take a look at the current price on the Modern Event Deck.

Factoring in shipping, Modern Event Decks have been averaging a completed price of $91. This is a 20% increase versus what I paid for my sealed deck – a solid profit, right? Well, not really. By now I’m sure everyone is familiar with the profit erosion that takes place when selling sealed product on eBay. Take 10% off the top for eBay fees, 3% for PayPal’s cut, and another $8 or so for our United States Postal Service and you’re left with a net of around $71. Bye bye profits!

Next, I’ll take a look at buy list prices to see what sort of value can be driven from quickly selling the singles within this box, hassle free.

Using Star City Games’ buy prices, one could immediately ship key cards from the Modern Event Deck and net about $77. After bubble mailer and $2.60 for shipping, that’s a net of around $74 – with an entry price of $76, this represents a virtual break-even. I suppose if I wanted store credit, I could net myself about 20% in gains, but I would be left with a hundred bucks in store credit for my $76 cash purchase. This wouldn’t be the worst return, but I would be hard-pressed to convert that credit into pure cash gains.

The verdict: strictly from a profitability viewpoint, buying the Modern Event Deck has not paid off. Despite how the numbers fall, however, I’d argue there’s still a positive spin to this analysis.

Consider one’s decision to purchase the above singles now, on TCG Player. The total cost of buying LP or better copies of all the cards above is around $125. This price doesn’t even include all the cards you couldn’t buy list to Star City Games, nor the handy box and spindown die. Therefore, even at its current eBay price of $91, the Modern Event Deck still offers tremendous value over buying individual singles. This comparison makes an entry price in the $70’s extremely attractive, even though there’s no easy way to immediately profit off the delta.

With all this data in hand, I’ve come to the conclusion that buying the Modern Event Deck in the $70’s was a good decision. Even though there’s no immediate out for profit, there are two factors that tip the balance in the positive direction for me. First, if someone really wanted to, they could list all of the individual singles listed above on TCG Player and net a decent profit. Taking 15% off the top line to factor in fees and shipping still nets over $100. Granted, you may have a difficult time selling some of the smaller cards I listed. But even selling just the City of Brass, Elspeth, Inquisition of Kozilek, Isolated Chapel, Path to Exile, Relic of Progenitus, and Sword of Feast and Famine out of the deck would be enough to profit. Plus you’d have a bunch of smaller trade fodder left over.

Secondly and more importantly, the collection of cards one immediately acquires via the Modern Event deck offers up significant upside for the long term. Ghost Quarter and Relic of Progenitus will continue to be mainstays in Modern. Path to Exile is the premier removal spell of the format. Sword of Feast and Famine and Elspeth offer up terrific casual upside. The B/W lands have been gradually rising lately, and City of Brass will always be above bulk no matter how many times it gets reprinted. And last but not least, those two Inquisition of Kozileks carry more upside as long as they continue to dodge reprint.

The fact that the Modern Event Deck is a self-contained diversified investment in Modern should not be overlooked. This is perhaps the most attractive aspect of the deck itself. Besides, a few Godless Shrines and a couple other cards and you’ve got yourself a Tier 2 Modern deck to play in local events.

Extrapolation

 The Modern Event Deck is the most recent occurrence, but other card spikes have led to interesting discussion around preconstructed decks. When Birthing Pod became expensive, the Spiraling Doom Event Deck was an interesting target. The Dark Ascension Event Deck contained two copies of the once-$20 artifact, though it offered little else of value. The Jace vs. Vraska Duel Deck boasts a copy of Remand alongside some casual favorites in the form of two Planeswalkers, Night’s Whisper, and Future Sight. As Remand rebounds in price, this could become an interesting pick-up eventually. The Gleeful Flames Event Deck is also worth keeping an eye on, as it contains two copies of Modern staple Inkmoth Nexus. Unfortunately other than three Torpor Orb and a single Dismember, there’s not much else of interest in the list.

The New Phyrexia Event Deck Rot from Within is marginally more interesting, containing an Inkmoth Nexus, four Mutagenic Growth, a Green Sun’s Zenith, a Melira, and two Vines of Vastwood. Buying this deck gives you a fraction of the Modern Infect list, so you get some narrow exposure to a singular Modern strategy.

Plenty of other examples exist, but the overall premise remains the same. Sometimes a card will spike in price even though it’s in an older preconstructed deck. That respective preconstructed deck could have the potential to roar higher in price as a result. However, applying some of the rationale I present above, I believe one should remain highly cautious before committing funds to such a purchase. A quick glance at the above lists, and it is apparent there’s little else in those products besides the lone most valuable component. Therefore, you don’t get the added benefit of additional upside in nearly the same way as the Modern Event Deck.

Honestly, I wouldn’t consider any of these other options as worthwhile buys even in the face of a price spike.  These products are deriving their elevated value from a single card within, and there’s little other upside.  If Inkmoth jumps to $70, then of course buying an Event Deck with a single copy for under $70 is a no-brainer.  Just don’t get caught paying a premium for other bulk you’ll never gain upside from.

Wrapping It Up

 A few newer preconstructed deck lists offer up some attractive buys. My favorite option is the Magic Origins Clash Pack.

The product, which sells for under $30 shipped, contains a number of valuable cards with plenty of long-term upside from Modern play. This includes a Windswept Heath, a Collected Company, a Siege Rhino, an Anafenza, and possibly a Dromoka’s Command. This is definitely a product you’ll want to keep in the back of your mind should we see a price jump in fetches or Collected Company any time in the future. As we’ve witnessed with Inquisition of Kozilek, players will be very swift in buying up copies of the card. But they often are slower to drive up prices on preconstructed products where the individual singles may be lingering.

If you’re interested in pursuing this strategy, please learn from the data I presented earlier. Just because a card in an Event Deck jumps doesn’t mean there’s ample profits to be made on that Event Deck. In reality, I can’t sell my Modern Event Deck for profit yet. In the same way, a double-up of Collected Company will not mean Origins Clash Packs will become immediately profitable. They may be a great way to acquire copies of Collected Company for use, because you’ll get some other good cards for “free” in the bargain. Just don’t expect to make significant bank with the endeavor. If you approach such investments as ways to obtain copies of diverse long-term cards, however, then you’ll be quite pleased with the results.

…

Sig’s Quick Hits

• Speaking of Collected Company, did you know the Dragons of Tarkir rare is currently sold out at Star City Games with an $11 price tag? The instant is all over Standard, and it wouldn’t surprise me if one day we saw this spell fetching up Tarmogoyfs and the like in Modern. The fact this card isn’t rotating for a while yet adds additional upside, making the Clash Pack a very interesting long-term buy…for the singles, more-so than the potential profits.
• Another card I mentioned earlier is also sold out at Star City Games: Inkmoth Nexus. The land is currently retailing for its highest price ever – $39.99! I would never have expected this card to achieve such lofty prices. Then again, I also never would have expected Wizards to ignore reprinting this land for so long. It will happen eventually. Until then, I guess this card goes to $50 retail next?
• Despite having its price butchered from reprint in the Modern Event Deck, Sword of Feast and Famine really offers healthy upside. There are only three copies of the equipment in stock, and it’ll cost you $16 to get one from Star City. These swords are casual and Commander favorites, and without additional reprint they are only going to rise.

Social media has transformed the MTG finance pastime. What used to be a mysterious field of insight and connections has since evolved into a public event. The “group think” nature of MTG finance leads to rapid price corrections and manipulations, manifested in the form of buy-outs and price spikes.

Sometimes these moves make sense – World Breaker received positive camera time at the SCG Open in Atlanta yesterday, and it sent the card higher. The flow of logic is simple: players witness the card on camera, talk about it on Twitter and Reddit, players blindly follow suit, and the card jumps in price. The fact that artificial scarcity is at play here on this brand new mythic rare only means the price can shoot even higher before enough product is opened to meet surge in demand.

Other times the move makes little sense to the community. Mindslicer was a recent example, and this morning I woke up to another perplexing jump: Battle Screech.

While I will confess I’ve played Battle Screech in a casual Birds tribal deck for over a decade now, someone’s going to have to explain this sudden movement to me.

But the story and catalysts are still the same here, regardless of root cause. A card gains traction, earns some discussion (wouldn’t surprise me to see someone ask about this on Twitter today), and drives the price higher in a matter of hours. The fact that this was the number one Interest on mtgstocks.com only means this move will get even more attention.

The Old and Obscure

It may come as a surprise to you that some price spikes actually occur under the radar, despite all the openness of social media. It’s actually quite impressive when you step back and consider this notion. Cards can still gradually or rapidly increase in price without taking the notice of the hive mind in MTG finance. Despite our best efforts, a card can still move in value without our knowing. I guess with over 10,000 unique cards, this really isn’t that hard to believe, is it?

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