Market Report for Wednesday, February 4^th 2015

Welcome to the MTGO Market Report as compiled by Sylvain Lehoux and Matthew Lewis. The report is loosely broken down into two perspectives. A broader perspective will be written by Matthew and will focus on recent trends in set prices, taking into account how paper prices and MTGO prices interact. Sylvain will take a closer look at particular opportunities based on various factors such as (but not limited to) set releases, flashback drafts and banned/restricted announcements.

There will be some overlap between the two sections. As always, speculators should take into account their own budget, risk tolerance and current portfolio before taking on any recommended positions.

Redemption

Below are the total set prices for all redeemable sets on MTGO. All prices are current as of February 2^nd, 2015. The MTGO prices reflect the set sell price scraped from the Supernova Bots website (except for the FRF price this week, which is the sum of Goatbot’s sell prices), while the TCG Low and TCG Mid prices are the sum of each set’s individual card prices on TCG Player, either the low price or the mid-price respectively.

Note that it usually takes about a month after a set releases on MTGO for it be available for redemption, so expect FRF to be redeemable in the first week of March.

Return to Ravnica Block & M14

The outlook for both RTR and GTC remains unchanged, with future price gains anticipated as interest in Modern rises in advance of Modern Masters 2015. Both sets have fallen in the past week, but it’s important to note that these drops correspond to falling prices on rares, not mythic rares.

For specific cards from RTR and GTC, both Sphinx's Revelation and Domri Rade have found a new, stable price level. Further gains are possible in the short term depending on how the Modern metagame develops. But it’s expected that in the medium term, they will at least hold the current price.

It looks like Voice of Resurgence has found its footing in the 13-15 tix range. Likewise DGM has rebounded a little this week on MTGO. Nothing has changed about the prospects for DGM cards in general though; there is zero upside outside of the mythic two-drop, which happens to account for over half the value of the set.

M14 continues to slide as Standard seems to have moved away from Chandra, Pyromaster while Archangel of Thune needs a new home in Modern. This set is approaching ‘good value’ territory, so keep an eye on the mythic rares from this set.

Theros Block & M15

Prices are falling as players look to play FRF events and/or the new Modern format. It’s important to note that demand for tix in the MTGO economy increases substantially during release events. Sealed deck release queues are tix only and offer attractive prizes.

This provides a strong motivation for players to sell cards in order to play in these events. Simultaneously, the bots are trying to stock the cards from the new set and so they also need to have plenty of tix on hand in order to buy FRF cards from players.

Both of these factors together work to push down prices in the broader MTGO economy, so it’s not unusual to see staples from these sets take a dip. Notable droppers currently include Elspeth, Sun's Champion, Chandra, Pyromaster and Goblin Rabblemaster.

Sometimes the drop is justified as cards get pushed out of being Standard staples by the new set. But often the drop in prices is temporary due to the high demand for tix in the economy. Keep your eyes peeled for cards that look too cheap, starting with the three cards listed above.

Khans of Tarkir & Fate Reforged

KTK prices are also in decline for similar reasons to THS block and M15, but they also get the added effect of being opened en masse in release events. This set currently has zero cards above 10 tix, which is quite the anomaly for a Standard-legal set. If you are looking to finish a playset from KTK, this is an excellent time to do so, though speculative buying opportunities are currently quite sparse.

Don’t fight this uphill battle of trying to do any short-term buys from KTK. Once drafting slows down and DTK is on the horizon, prices will have finally found a bottom. Long-term buys, such as a card like Siege Rhino, are still fine to accumulate.

FRF just hit MTGO this past weekend. Similarly to the release of any new set on MTGO (or in paper), prices of individual cards start extremely high and are bound to drop dramatically within the next two to three weeks. Some bumps may be observed in the interim as the supply is still pretty low and players are looking for the newest cards to play with in Standard or Modern. However, the flood of supply is such that even a peak generated by this weekend’s Pro Tour results won’t last more than a couple of days.

Modern

Looking out to the Pro Tour, MTGO Modern prices rose a little bit more this past week. Fate Reforged release events didn’t prevent some of the most expensive Modern staples to reach near their previous record highs, or even beat them.

Future Sight Tarmogoyf reached 107.3 tix last Friday, a new record; Liliana of the Veil and Karn Liberated are only few tix away from their record highs at 98 tix and 46 tix, respectively. Fulminator Mage is now over 40 tix and Primeval Titan reached 32 tix to equalize its previous top price. Most of the other Modern staples seem to have now stabilized, waiting for the Pro Tour to begin.

At this point, speculators holding Modern positions face two options. A reasonable and conservative option would be to sell positions that have gained a lot of value since the B&R changes. The alternative option would be to wait for potential additional gains with the Pro Tour results.

To illustrate these two possibilities, cards such as Gifts Ungiven, Pyromancer Ascension, Primeval Titan, Bloodghast, Gravecrawler and Tarmogoyf are among the biggest winners, post-B&R list announcement. Selling them now is totally acceptable and would secure gains.

On the other hand, previous Modern Pro Tours and GPs showed that some archetypes are more favored by pros than others. Jund/Junk, Storm, Splinter Twin variants, Zoo and Affinity decks are to be expected this weekend. From this perspective, holding out until the new Modern metagame is more clearly defined by the pros is a slightly better choice.

At this point, you should be holding onto your tix and attentively monitoring your Modern positions. Many Modern staples will see an additional price increase as cards are featured on camera. Any card that sees on camera success at the PT, particularly on Sunday in the Top 8, should see a nice price bump as a buying frenzy occurs. Selling into this hype will be the best strategy for any of your current Modern positions.

Targeted Speculative Buying Opportunities

Modern

We only have one strong buy recommendation this week, a Guildpact uncommon. This card recently saw prices as high as 4 tix, and now it’s back down to around 1 tix. It is used as sideboard hate against Affinity decks which should see more play in the new Modern metagame.

Shattering Spree

Targeted Speculative Selling Opportunities

Modern

MMA Gifts Ungiven

Gifts Ungiven is in an ideal position to be sold now. It gained more than 150% in the last three weeks and came back to its previous record high. Although all cards have a chance to shine during the Modern Pro Tour this weekend, this card has never been an all-star in Modern pro decks. For this reason, we recommend selling Gifts Ungiven now.