WEEKLY MTGPRICE.COM MOVERS: April 6/15

By James Chillcott (@MTGCritic)

5 Winners of the Week

Most of the movement this week is coming from the ever-shifting Theros/Khans standard format, with new cards ascending and some old favorites slowly falling from grace. Let’s have a look at what’s up:

1. Bosium Strip (Weatherlight, Rare): $0.75 to $7.98 (964%)

This card is long forgotten by most of the older players and utterly off the radar for most new players, largely due to it’s one and only printing back in Weatherlight. Someone decided to make a move on it last week because it ostensibly has potential in the Tiny Leaders format. Rares from fifteen years ago are like super-mythics today so it wasn’t hard to corner the market here. As an utterly unproven card with largely casual appeal you should be digging copies out of your bulk box and posting them for sale immediately.

Format(s): Tiny Leaders/EDH/Casual

Verdict: Sell

2. Sapling of Colfenor (Eventide, Rare): $4.08 to $8.40 (106%)

This card is also a casual play speculation target, though this time EDH duty as a sweet general is the motivation. I’ve actually been fooling around with this card in Modern lately as well, as the power level is higher than it looks with the right build. Even so, this is another slam dunk chance to sell into the hype, holding back a copy for personal use.

Format(s): EDH/Casual

Verdict: Sell

3. Obelisk of Urd (M15, Rare): $1.89 to $2.76 (46%)

Both mono-red and mono-black aggro decks are trying to breath new life into this super-anthem in Standard, but its impending rotation this fall makes me want to wait until they drop back to $.50 to acquire any. If you aren’t using your copies, trade away now and max your value as they’re unlikely to rise much beyond $3.50 between now and October.

Format(s): Standard/Casual

Verdict: Sell/Trade

4. Thunderbreak Regent (Dragons of Tarkir, Rare): $7.82 to $10.98 (40%)

This is one of those cards that we all saw in the spoilers and said “yep, that’s good, moving on”. Sometimes though, it’s the deceptively simple cards that are the ones to watch, as proven by the appearance of this flying beat-stick in multiple mid-range GR and Temur builds, including 15 copies in the Top 8 of the SCG Open this weekend. Play that heavy, in a set with lower than usual EV (Estimated Value), can lead to some expensive rare cards, and this one is pushing past $10. My gut says this falls back to $5-6 during the summer doldrums, shortly after the release of MM2, so if you popped some, I’d trade them out now and reacquire later on for max value.

Format(s): Standard

Verdict: Sell/Trade

5. Dragonlord Ojutai (Dragons of Tarkir, Mythic Rare): $11.49 to $15.65 (36%)

My top pick from the DTK edition of Digging for Dollars continues to produce, up over 300% since I recommended snagging him for $4-5 just a few weeks back. There’s no doubt the card is powerful, but it earned 3 copies in the Top 32 decks at the SCG Open, so there is some doubt that we have further to climb. With returns like this locked in, I recommend selling. Sadly, this creates a conflict for me on at least 3 copies, since my new Standard deck is URw Ojutai Control.  If the card does fall back towards $5 at some point, I’ll be buying all over again, since it still has 18 months to find a proper home and a bright future in EDH/Casual circles regardless.

Format(s): Standard/EDH

Verdict: Hold

3 Top Losers of the Week

1. Congregation at Dawn: $3.41 to $2.00 (-41%)

The idea was that this card would be amazing with Collected Company in Modern to pull combo pieces to the top of your deck and go off. There’s a decent chance someone brings the deck into the spotlight soon as it’s already put up some results in Europe, but for now the hype has fallen back. If you had a stack of these in your bulk box, perhaps you had the chance to ship a few. If not, I think you may yet get another opportunity.

Verdict: Hold

2. Tooth and Nail: $11.00 to $9.02 (-18%)

I have no idea why this card is falling off, but it’s not particularly relevant in any format these days, so I’d ignore the movement if you aren’t holding, and ship if you are.

Verdict: Sell

3. Ojutai’s Command: $4.32 to $3.56 (-18%)

This card was on my list of overrated cards for Standard coming out of spoiler season, so I’m hardly surprised to see it falling back to a natural price in the $2-3 range. The decks that will play it will only want 2-3 copies max, and they haven’t shown up at top tables yet, so I’m staying well clear. The card isn’t good enough for older formats either.

Verdict: Sell

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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What Warren Buffett Knows About MTG Finance

Last week, I shared an introduction to me, my motivations, and my risk equation. A Twitter conversation prompted the last of these, and it felt like an appropriate topic to share when establishing my investment style on a new website. In a way, it reveals what you can expect from me as a writer for the weeks and months to come.

But I’ll admit I got ahead of myself a bit. I began delving into the how before first covering the what. In other words, I haven’t even revealed what my current portfolio distribution looks like and how I came to these positions. Such an introductory piece is certainly merited, as it gives a baseline for future discussions. Additionally, the topic overlaps nicely with my general approach to resource allocation in MTG finance—a strategy I picked up from one of the greatest investors of all time.

Perhaps it is most appropriate to share the latter while integrating examples of the former throughout the column.

 The Oracle of Omaha

If I had to choose one particular influence in how I structure my investment portfolios—both in Magic cards and in stocks—it would have to be Warren Buffett. The Oracle of Omaha has been a successful, active stock picker for many decades. While it is cumbersome to establish a basis for his entire strategy here in one column, I will take the liberty to highlight a few key mantras I’ve picked up through my research.

  1. Find the right value at the right price.
  2. Stick to what you know.
  3. Take advantage of extremes.
  4. Know the management team.

Applying these strategies to stock picking is trivial and systematized already.  But did you know they are also highly correlated to how I conduct my MTG investing as well?

investidaglorioso

For example, consider the value equation and taking advantage of extremes. If I am confident a given MTG card or item is destined for an upward trajectory over long periods of time, then I’m most intrigued by that opportunity. The key, of course, is choosing your entry.

This is exactly how I approached my investment in shocklands. Recognizing the growth of the Modern format and WOTC’s dedication to helping it grow, I decided a sizable investment in shocklands was a wise move. Furthermore, the cheapest shockland during Standard block—Steam Vents—was also the cheapest for quite a while. Copies could be had for below $7 at one point!

Vents

The disconnect was that Steam Vents was one of the most played shocklands in Modern. Yet the card’s price was beaten and battered due to the high Return to Ravnica print run and the low Standard demand. Opportunity was knocking, and when I bought deeply into shocklands, I made sure to go deepest on Steam Vents.

The bet paid off to an extent. Just a couple years later, Steam Vents hit retail pricing nearing $14 and buylists have exceeded the low reached right around the release of Dragon’s Maze. This represents a nearly 100-percent gain from trough to peak. That was enough for me, and I rang the register at a recent Star City Games Open.

I noticed an extreme, I considered the long-term utility of the card, and made my bet accordingly. Warren Buffett would have been proud.

warrenbuffetukulele
Weekly World News

Of course, the other shocklands haven’t responded nearly as well, much to my disappointment. Abzan strategies are ubiquitous in Modern thanks to the printing of Siege Rhino, yet the shocklands corresponding to black, white, and green have barely moved. Overgrown Tomb from Return to Ravnica is flirting with its all-time low established back in May 2013.

Tomb

Would this worry Warren Buffett? Not at all. He recognizes that the market often takes time before realizing the mispricing of a given asset. Therefore, in a similar vein, I choose to sit on my copies and wait for the appreciation I’m confident will come. And if prices linger below $7, I may buy even more.  This is why shocklands remain a top holding in my portfolio.

Stick to What You Know

Because I track the Modern metagame closely, investing in shocklands is a large bet I continue to make with confidence. I understand how the format works—particularly when it comes to mana bases—and I use this knowledge to strategize how I invest.  I also recognize the risks associated with this investment and I am comfortable with the potential upside versus the downside risk.

This is directly related to another strategy of Mr. Buffett’s: sticking to what you know. Rather than chase the trendy stocks, such as 3-D printing or Chinese internet companies, Buffett prefers to invest in companies with tried-and-true strategies, large “moats,” and a history of consistent profit growth. Coca-Cola remains in Warren’s portfolio not only because of its dominant market position and global brand recognition, but also because he understands the company’s business model: make delicious soda consisting primarily of water; find an inexpensive way to bottle the product and distribute it globally; profit.

Do you believe me when I say this strategy is also directly applicable to Magic finance too? I use it all the time!

You may have heard me claim ignorance of Standard in the past. Nine times out of ten, the format bores me, and the constant fluctuation in which cards are legal and which aren’t can be bothersome. One month you could be battling with the best deck in the format, and then a new set could come out with cards that completely redefine the format. Worse yet, Standard could rotate, nullifying half your deck.

nullify

Because I avoid researching Standard, I also tend to avoid investing in cards from the format. Sure, I’ve had some successes in the past: the Innistrad checklands, Terminus, and a few others were very profitable for me. But I’ve also missed nearly as often as I’ve connected, making Standard a very suboptimal investment area. I simply can’t predict which cards will be good enough. The only buying of Standard you’ll likely see me do is pick up cards on the cheap for a quick flip during a pro tour or new set release. I almost never buy deeply into anything Standard.

On the other hand, I’ve done thorough research on sealed booster boxes. Over time, I was able to identify which sets were most attractive for investing. Once I was confident that certain boxes were undervalued and destined to go higher, I made my buys. The most significant investments I made were in Innistrad and Return to Ravnica booster boxes, though I dabbled in a few other sets as well.

The Innistrad boxes paid off very well, and every one of mine are already sold.

Innistrad

Although I did make profit on this venture, I’ll be the first to admit I sold way too prematurely. With cards like Snapcaster Mage and Liliana of the Veil hitting record highs, and the set being one of the most enjoyable to draft of all time, I should have trusted my gut and held longer. A tough lesson learned, but one worth exploring more deeply in a separate article.

What I did manage to hold onto are my Return to Ravnica booster boxes. This set was also talked highly of by Limited aficionados, and the set contains an array of eternal favorites including shocklands, Abrupt Decay, Deathrite Shaman, and Supreme Verdict. While none of these cards have hit the same price point as Snapcaster Mage, they all have significant upside as the set ages further. Eventually, these will hit a turning point and boxes will move higher. In fact, they’ve already shown some appreciation—when I bought in, it was around the floor price of $80 to $85. Now boxes are consistently selling for just above $100. It won’t be long before these go even higher, just like every booster box with eternal cards and a good drafting reputation. Applying this insight after thorough research has helped me make well-informed investment decisions.

Of course, investing in booster boxes isn’t all sunshine and roses. There are some major pitfalls I have also learned about. I’ll share details in a separate article some time, but I wanted to add this disclaimer here before a reader gets trigger-happy and randomly buys ten Khans of Tarkir boxes or something. There’s a reason I’m not buying more boxes at this point in time: the investment could still pay off, but I think there are better opportunities elsewhere. The key is sticking to what you’re most comfortable with.

Know the Management Team

You may be wondering how I could possibly tie this Buffett-ism to Magic investing. Sure, it’s good to have trust in a CEO like Bob Iger who has helped Disney grow substantially over the past few years. But there really isn’t any “management” team in Magic, is there?

Perhaps not precisely, but there is a parallel. Consider who the key decision makers are, and you can begin to understand their motivations. These motivations could have a profound impact on MTG investment choices.

Allow me to elaborate. Who is the “boss” of Magic? If you ask me, I’d venture that the Hasbro management team is the answer. They’re the ones cracking the whip and demanding certain profit numbers be hit by the WOTC team. So when they demand consistent profit growth of their brands, WOTC does what it can to deliver.

And boy, oh boy, has the company succeeded: recent sets have been blockbuster hits and supplemental products like Commander and Modern Masters have bolstered sales even further.

Of course, sales are surely augmented when Wizards dangles a carrot in front of us, right? Khans of Tarkir was hugely attractive because of the Onslaught fetchlands that were reprinted in the set. Commander products give us cards like Containment Priest and Flusterstorm, sure to delight any Legacy player. And I don’t have to tell you how easy it is for Wizards to sell a product with $200 Tarmogoyfs in the mix.

In other words, Wizards knows that reprinting money cards and creating new staples results in more product sold. That’s the management team on which I am focusing. It is their motivations that inform my investment decisions.

Board-Room
Business-Ethics.com

So how am I using this information to allocate MTG resources? WOTC continues to focus on reprinting to improve barriers of entry for Modern and, to a lesser extent, Legacy. Therefore I’m focusing resources on eternal staples which are either a) likely to dodge reprint in the short term (e.g., shocklands), or b) guaranteed to dodge reprint (e.g. dual lands).

In fact, the largest position in my entire portfolio—exceeding my shockland and booster box holdings—is my dual land position. I completely understand what drives their demand, I believe in their long-term price growth, and I know “management” won’t reprint them. It may take some patience, but dual lands have to be some of the safest investments one could make in MTG at the moment. And with recent pullbacks in pricing, certain duals are the most attractive they have been in many months.

Savannah

Trop

These two duals in particular have drifted lower since their peaks in May 2014. Just because white-green and blue-green strategies are out of favor at the moment doesn’t mean they can’t ever return to center stage. Legacy is an eternal format, and I have to believe eventually the metagame will shift yet again, yielding to new dominant strategies. For now it’s red-blue strategies that seem to show up most frequently, but in the future, who knows? All I know is that I want to build up my position of duals now while they’re flat, so that I have them during their next inevitable spike. As long as “management” stays true to their word and doesn’t reprint these cards, then we can be confident in their long-term success.

Wrapping it Up

Hopefully, this Wall Street-centric approach to MTG investing makes at least some sense. To me, it’s the most logical approach. I could try chasing the buyout of the day or flipping cards quickly for short-term profits. I could also try the slow, steady grind, trading with the sharks at major events. But both of these approaches are time-consuming and arduous.

I would much rather use my time wisely by investing in cards with good long-term value, confident growth, and a wide moat. I trust in an investment like dual lands because I don’t think they’ll ever be outclassed and their demand is very steady while supply marches lower little by little over the years. This same reassurance just isn’t available for a short-term investment.

And when I find these opportunities—especially the ones with high upside potential and low downside risk—I make a decisive move.  In a way, this is also related to a Buffett type of strategy.  Once we find a great opportunity, we shouldn’t be afraid to move in with our resources.  Consider how Buffett’s current stock portfolio is very heavily weighted towards four individual stocks, making up 62 percent of his portfolio!

Portfolio

I follow this same weighted approach in my own stock investing.  But I also allow this principle to guide my MTG investing as well.  This is the reason I’ve got over 50 percent of my total MTG portfolio tied up in three primary investments: shocklands (foil and nonfoil), Return to Ravnica booster boxes, and dual lands.  These are three asset classes I’m confident in, and so I’m allocating my resources appropriately.  While I have plenty of smaller bets, just like Buffett, I try to place larger amounts in the areas I feel best about.

I may not make the most profit ever by following such a conservative approach, but I know I won’t be losing money either. And seeing as my goal is to make money to fund a college education, I can’t afford to be losing money too often. Therefore, I won’t be deviating from my strategy any time soon—in both my stock market and my MTG market investments. To do so would be bad for business.

Sig’s Quick Hits

  • Want to play blue-black in Tiny Leaders? Don’t look to Star City Games, then—they’re all out of the only blue-black leader legal in the format: Sygg, River Cutthroat. They’ve been sold out of the creature for weeks now with that same $6.19 price tag. I’m waiting for the inevitable price bump.
  • Ad Nauseam strategies seem to be showing up a little more frequently in Legacy top eights since the banning of Treasure Cruise. Perhaps this is why Lion’s Eye Diamond is once again sold out at SCG with a price tag of $86.29. As long as it doesn’t get banned, you could do worse than to pick up a copy or two in trade if you’re looking for a long-term investment beyond dual lands.
  • Need Rift Bolts for your Modern Burn deck? You’re not going to find any at Star City Games. Despite being reprinted a couple of times, the card is completely sold out at the major retailer. Prices range from $1.85 for the MMA copy to $3.99 for FNM and Time Spiral versions.

Let’s Talk Promos

By: Jared Yost

So we’ve got a few new promos on our hands. Historically, Wizards has used judge and World Magic Cup Qualifier (WCMQ) foils to distribute copies of cards that haven’t been printed in foil before or to add more copies of the card to the market because it is a tournament staple and needs to have a price reduction. Hopefully the Exemplar Program works out and distributes the same, if not more, copies of judge foils to the Magic masses. Because we’ve got some reprints on our hands this time that players have been clamoring about.

 For additional insight into the price of judge foils, I recommend you read the piece written by Travis Allen last year when judge foil Force of Will and the others were released. It’s a good introduction to this article and will supplement my own opinions for the crop of new judge foils.

judge foil damnation

Damnation

Numero Uno on the list of reprints, at least from a casual perspective, players finally got their wish. However, be careful what you wish for. What players really wanted was for their Damnations to be reprinted in a much more widely distributed set – say, Modern Masters 2015 or even a Commander release. Why do I suddenly get the feeling that this no longer will be the case?

For starters, the inclusion of Damnation in Modern Masters 2015 has an almost zero chance of happening. Crazier things have happened, but I would be pretty surprised if Wizards decided to reprint this in MM in addition to including it as judge foil. That’s a ton of Damnations running around and I don’t think Wizards is quite ready yet to make the price of this card nosedive to Wrath of God levels.

When considering Commander, I believe Wizards was remiss about not including it in the C14 Sworn to Darkness deck though I understand their reasoning behind it. Simply put, they didn’t want a True-Name Nemesis situation repeat. The counterargument to this is that Damnation is a not a Legacy staple, and so would be less desired overall than TNN was on its debut simply because it won’t be an auto-include in several Legacy archetypes. I understand this point of view yet I think it severely underestimates the casual demand of this card. Many, many players finally want to get a copy of Damnation that doesn’t cost $45. Based on the value of other cards in the Commander decks, it would have only made the black deck absurdly higher in value than the rest. They could have offset this by printing a higher run of black-only decks but I think Wizards wants to avoid that type of scenario in the future. Thus, we’ve been left with a judge foil compromise. 

The saddest part about this situation is that it won’t reduce the price of Damnation at all. The judge foils will be worth the same as regular copies (maybe a bit more, at least until the hype dies down) so the only bonus players are getting is that now they have a cheaper foil copy they can pick up. 

Now in the not-so-distant future, one year or more from the release date, I could actually see the price of this judge foil Damnation fall to below the price of regular copies without a non-foil reprint. The Exemplar Program could actually wind up distributing more copies of judge foils than were on the market in the past. With an overabundance comes a price drop, and the same would be true for Damnation. If the judge foil falls pretty hard, say to $25 or lower, then I feel that is a pretty good price to get in on a casual staple that will be desired by Commander players. 

Of course, everything I said above becomes completely useless if there is a Modern Masters 2014 or Commander reprint of Damnation this year. If Wizards does decide to bite the bullet on this and give us a non-foil reprint then my advice is to wait for the initial hype to die down, about three months or so, and then to pick up as many copies as you can fit into a suitcase. This card is casual gold and will always have some type of value as the black Wrath.

 

judge foil dual feldon

Dualcaster Mage and Feldon of the Third Path 

Dualcaster Mage and Feldon were both featured in the Built from Scratch C14 deck and are powerful cards in their own right that can certainly find homes outside artifact-themed Commander decks. For discussion on their non-foil counterparts, I’ll refer you to my previous week’s article. Where foils are concerned, I would imagine that the prices would probably be around $20 to $30 range with the initial hype, however will eventually take an Overwhelming Forces turn and head back down towards the $14-$16 range.

One thing I’m not considering in this price is Tiny Leaders hype. Both cards are pretty decent in the format, and Feldon could even be a Commander, so the price might swing upwards to reflect that. They could even initially be as high as $50 each, though I believe that this price is pretty unsustainable in the short term. Long term, without reprints the foil prices are sure to climb. Either way, wait a bit for the hype to die down, and if you want a foil copy of either card the judge foil will be a nice acquisition.

 

judge foil ravages

Ravages of War 

Now, here is a card that Cube enthusiasts and masochistic Commander players wanted to be reprinted! I think we can all agree that Wizards did this reprint right. Ravages of War was clearly a card that was maintaining an out-of-control price based purely on scarcity and not actual card utility. The price of this card is going to drop drastically due to this judge reprint. Since not everyone likes land destruction, there will be fewer players seeking out copies which means that this will further add to the price reduction. Do I think it will go below $100? Absolutely. Will it go below $50? That could actually be pretty likely. I think eventually this card will settle somewhere from $35 to $45, if I’m guessing at the demand correctly. 

If it turns out that everyone wants this card for their cube, I could see it maintaining a price of $60 or higher like the current judge foil Armageddon. Though the only reason that this ‘Geddon has a $60 price tag is because it is the only nice looking foil of the card printed and the printing happened back in 2004, eleven years ago. So again, based on casual players hating land destruction and players wanting it only ever needing one for their collection, I feel that $35 to $45 is the eventual sweet spot. However, I don’t think the price will be that low initially, as it will take time to distribute more copies of the card onto the market. So expect prices of $60+ for some time until the card saturates the market.

 

judge foil wasteland

Wasteland 

I’m sure this came out of left field for some people. Another judge foil Wasteland reprint? Doesn’t it have two foil reprints already? Geeze, even with it being a freakin’ uncommon in Tempest the cheapest promo copies are $212 currently. Don’t fear though, this price will continue to decline once the new Wasteland hits the market. I think we’ll finally see judge foil Wastelands drop to below $100, which is a great thing for Legacy. It will help more players enter the format, as current players are able to upgrade their non-foil Wastelands, which will put more non-foils on the market for players looking to pick them up. 

Legacy considerations aside, players do also like to have Wasteland for Commander since it can help get rid of pesky non-basics that might be bugging you. There will be some demand from casual, which will help bolster the price, however it is still coming down with this reprint. 

Unfortunately, I don’t think this is going to have an effect on the price of Player’s Rewards promos since they feature the original Wasteland art and will always be the most collectable. The first judge foil printings will drop but these Player’s Rewards copies will be collectors items for the most affluent of Legacy enthusiasts. Though, at the end of the day it will be dropping other Wasteland prices across the board, so obviously that’s a good thing. 

This judge foil reprint of Wasteland makes me think that the non-foil’s price is going to be volatile again this year. If Wizards continues to reprint Wasteland in this fashion, I think that the non-foil price will only continue to go down. I’m honestly not sure if Wasteland is a good card to hold onto for value anymore. If you guys feel differently, let me know in the comments, but from what I’ve seen pricewise Wasteland is only going down.

 

wmcq thalia

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben 

I mean, just look at that art – this is clearly one of the best pieces Wizards has commissioned for a promotional card. Players are going to want this card, and because it is being distributed at all the WCMQ events there will be plenty of foils entering the market. That pretty much means that foil Thalia is never going above $30 for the foreseeable future. 

Foil Thalias are currently around $30 per copy, which is significantly different than the non-foil price of $5. WCMQ Geist foils are only $5 less than their set foil counterparts, which means that this WCMQ Thalia foil will probably be around $25 once the dust settles. It is possible that some stores will upcharge based on the artwork and popularity of Thalia in Legacy, but I think that ultimately since it is a widely distributed foil that it will fall to slightly below the set foil’s value.

Now, the price of the non-foil is an entirely different matter. I think that non-foils at $5 are underpriced due to her popularity in Legacy, Modern, and Commander. Though this article isn’t about the non-foil counterparts, I feel that Thalia non-foils are due for a price increase soon without a reprint in a supplementary product.

Promo’ed Out 

Between Commander, Duel Decks, Modern Masters, and Promotional Foils, Wizards sure likes to reprint cards these days. Judge Foils and WCMQ foils generally are ahead of the reprint pack in terms of price, due to their print run being somewhat limited compared to the other mass released products. Being foil and sometimes having alternate art also helps their cause, since these additions help the card become more collectable and desirable. However, just like with any other financial Magic endeavour, it’s best to try and get the most for our money. I think that promos like Dualcaster Mage and Feldon will start out high and then come down significantly as more are released into the world. For these types of cards, I would advocate on the side of patience to get the most bang for your buck in terms of promotional cards that you might want for a deck or cube.


 

MTGFinance: What We’re Buying/Selling This Week (April 4/15)

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 recently occurred to us here that though we dole out a good deal of advice, most of you ultimately have very little insight into when we actually put our money where our collective mouths are pointing. As such we’ve decided to run a weekly series simply breaking down what we’ve been buying this week and why. These lists are meant to be both complete and transparent, leaving off only cards we bought without hope of profit, where appropriate. 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 were up to this week:

Buying Period: March 29 – April 4, 2015

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

James Chillcott (@MTGCritic)

BOUGHT (Dragons of Tarkir)

SOLD

My buy list was pretty concentrated this week, with a lot of money dropped into my belief that Sidisi, Undead Vizier will continue to play a strong role in Standard as a 2-3 in multiple decks heading into summer. With supply rising at present, it could be next fall before this card has a chance to push towards it’s likely $8-10 upper limit, at which point I’ll be looking to trade out or leverage Pucatrade to exit. The likely presence of Eldrazi spawn in Return to Zendikar should keep the card relevant into 2016.

Snapcaster Mage can easily hit $60-70 this year, so I can’t pass up on a $35 entry point from a friend who chose to reward me for turning him on to the spec 18 months ago. A great example of the value of building community and working karma when pursuing your #mtgfinance objectives. Given that I can out the Snapcasters to Pucatrade for the equivalent of $50 immediately, this is just a solid all-around play.

Collected Company took down a mid-sized Modern tournament in Europe during it’s debut last weekend, and my ears perked up at the prospects on foils for this DTK rare card. In a world where power creep on low casting cost creatures is very real, this is a card that just keeps getting better as it finds more interesting aggro, tempo or combo oriented pieces to go searching for. The deck in question was even running a couple of copies of Garza’s Assassin so I snagged a few copies to test with.

Ashiok was a sell for me since Sultai has fallen of my radar for Standard and his price is surprisingly high given his pending fall rotation. I actually think Ashiok has potential legs in Modern, so I’ll be looking to re-enter around $5 come October.

 

Douglas Johnson (@rose0fthorns)

BOUGHT (Pucatrade)

Note: Points roughly equal USD/100. e.g., 700 points equals $7 in card purchasing value.

Douglas says:

“As noted in my article this week, I believe Nyxathid is a solid example of a spike waiting to happen. The card has casual appeal, minor competitive play, and has never been reprinted. I think non-foils can hit $6-7, and foils could go as high as $15. i want to have these so that I can list them on TCGplayer into future hype. 

The Olivia is for my Marchesa EDH deck that I’m slowly in the process of foiling out, and the rest of the mono-black EDH pieces are to complete a local customers’ order who buys singles from me. Always nice to turn Pucapoints into cash at a 1:1 ratio and be the hero who has stuff that no one else does!”

Jared Yost

Jared says:

“Similar to Dragonspeaker Shaman, Dragon Arch is another way to accelerate dragons into play in casual formats. Even though it only affects the multicolored ones, we just received a ton of them in Dragons of Tarkir and I feel that if the card becomes more known then more players will look to pickup copies. There is only one printing, so it also has that going for it.  It’s just a very solid overall card. It can even act as a slightly worse Quicksilver Amulet since it can put any multicolored creature into play.”

Ross Lennon

Ross says:

“DP feels like the exact kind of card to break out at a Pro Tour, and at ~30 cents each, it’s low risk and even if it tops out at $3-5, I’m still in at the ground floor. I plan to buy even more soon.

Pitiless Horde has an incredible amount of versatility in terms of playability, and it kills people FAST. I am a big believer in this card as a finisher for every possible archetype. “
Danny Brown
Note: Points roughly equal USD/100. e.g., 700 points equals $7 in card purchasing value.
  • 1x Dragon Hunter @ 52 points
  • 1x Zurgo Bellstriker @ 300 points
  • 1x Tasigur, the Golden Fang @ 774 points
  • 1x Dack’s Duplicate @ 105 points
  • 1x Craterhoof Behemoth @1197 points

Danny says:

“These were 100 percent Cube pickups, but if you read my introductory article, you know that I carefully consider all my pickups, even ones to play with. Dragon Hunter and Zurgo Bellstriker are both examples of me not being patient, as they will both likely be available for about half these prices at some point in the next year or two. I sucked it up because I can never have enough one-drops in white or red, and these ones are easy includes.

Tasigur, the Golden Fang has proven its power in Standard and Modern, and I would not be surprised to start seeing it more often in Legacy. It’s only a rare, but it’s from a small set, so even its floor is a little lower, it can’t be that much lower. I would start stockpiling these if they dropped to $6 or lower.

Conspiracy wasn’t hugely opened, so Dack’s Duplicate will probably never go lower, even if it never necessarily goes up from here. I’m going to try it out over Prophetic Bolt. Haste on a clone is pretty big game, and there’s even more upside here, so I’m hoping for big things.

Finally, Craterhoof Behemoth was a $6 boat I missed, but after hitting the $15 to $20 range at one point, this seems like a fine time to get a slightly better price before some Legacy Elf win causes the hoof daddy to jump overnight. Plus, it’s insane in Cube and it was impossible to justify not having it in my list.”

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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