There's like what? Five threads near the top all asking variations of "is it worth investing in XXX". Really? Investing in small colored pieces of cardboard, printed in the millions of units, by one company that controls all of the supply.
Magic cards are extremely illiquid. Unless you have a large network of buyers, or very high feedback on eBay, you aren't making money. And even if you are, you're clearing what? Low to mid five figures a year? That's an average salary at best, and you are probably putting in way more than 8 hours a day.
Geez, what ever happened to people picking up cards because they wanted to play a good deck, or have fun with their friends?
And please don't tell me how if you had bought 1000 Underground Sea in 2002 you'd have made 90k today. You wouldn't have. You'd have flooded the market and crashed the price.
Or, to put it another way, magic cards WERE a great investment, back when no one thought they would be investment-grade. e.g., 18 years ago. Now, with the volume of cards printed, they are not. You can speculate and "double your money" on a card (if you're lucky). But doubling your money on 10 or 20 or even 100 $10 cards is not an investment. It's a hobby. There's nothing wrong with that, but there are a million ways to make better money than that. For me, it's not about the money -- I don't come close to making minimum wage returns on trading. Instead, it's fun. I have a day job, and I trade and play in the evenings. If I'm lucky, it covers part of the cost of playing the game.
For a little perspective, when someone talks about a "huge price jump" in a standard card, they usually mean like $5 or $10. Most college grads with decent jobs make that much money in about 10-20 minutes.
For a little perspective, when someone talks about a "huge price jump" in a standard card, they usually mean like $5 or $10. Most college grads with decent jobs make that much money in about 10-20 minutes.
Most college kids don't have time for jobs. The idea of sitting around in your house analysing some graphs and reading some website content for some quick bucks sounds quite prospective.
Did you really just post this in "Market Street Cafe?". What exactly did you think to point of this section of the forum happens to be?
And yes, cards that literally double in value in the span of days could be used for investing purposes if you are a big player.
The bottom line is that people like to 'go infinite' and not spend money on the hobby. I have personally made money over time on MTG. I paid for my wedding and honeymoon on the profits of ebay sales 6 years ago. It is a lot of work, but I personally enjoy it a lot more than grinding the day away at my office job.
In summation.....Star Trek wins a prolonged naval battle against superior, yet less technologically advanced, numbers, with Picard leading the assault, while Kirk takes your soul by laying out Solo and probably his manservant Chewy as well, before impregnating and ditching your Princess.
Did you really just post this in "Market Street Cafe?". What exactly did you think to point of this section of the forum happens to be?
And yes, cards that literally double in value in the span of days could be used for investing purposes if you are a big player.
The bottom line is that people like to 'go infinite' and not spend money on the hobby. I have personally made money over time on MTG. I paid for my wedding and honeymoon on the profits of eBay sales 6 years ago. It is a lot of work, but I personally enjoy it a lot more than grinding the day away at my office job.
And I bought my BMW and put a down payment on my condo with 'profits' from Magic. What's the point? I got lucky on a lot of calls. For example, I had dozens of Grindstones because I liked the card, and then suddenly Painter's Servant comes along. Oh look 1000 dollars. Or Dark Depths, same thing. Or buying a ton of P3K when it was cheap. Or even collecting a playset of Magic because I wanted to have 4 of a card. And then proceeded to get lucky with the Legacy/Modern boom.
Most of it is dumb luck, not an investment. There is no science. There is no analysis. There are very few trends to follow. Cards are hard to move in large (1000+) quantities at once.
Lastly, this forum isn't an investment advice forum, last I checked. Its a forum for people to make sure the trades are even, or check values on cards. Not to ask if Force is a stable investment. Who the hell knows? Will the paper game still be around in five years? Will Magic still be successful? Nobody knows, which is why this whole "investment" thing is BS. They are very common pieces of cardboard.
Most college kids don't have time for jobs. The idea of sitting around in your house analysing some graphs and reading some website content for some quick bucks sounds quite prospective.
Why would most college kids not have time for jobs?
Almost everyone I knew in college either had a job or plenty of time to have a job.
Most college kids don't have time for jobs. The idea of sitting around in your house analysing some graphs and reading some website content for some quick bucks sounds quite prospective.
I'd like to know where you went to college LOL because I almost can't think of a single person that I knew that didn't at least work summers. I got my BS in Chemical Engineering at a good school with a heavy courseload and almost everyone in my class including myself worked, be it in a restaurant, an internship somewhere, working on campus, tutoring etc...
EDIT: Oh yeah, people need to stop "investing" in these cards. Seriously go invest in the real stock market and let the players enjoy some stability in MTG card prices.
I had the exact same thought after seeing "investment" in like 6 different subject titles on market street last night. After thinking about it a bit more though, it makes sense...what else is there to talk about on market street? Maybe we should just have a "The Unofficial Investment Speculation Thread" or something. Maybe it could also have, as requirements for a submission in the investment thread, a discussion regarding the time value of money and opportunity cost of a proposed investment against popular benchmark investment alternatives (treasury yields for the conservative, s&p returns for the 'market'), so it would be more of a discussion with an investment point of view as opposed to 'go up/go down' with no other detailed discussion. This might alleviate a lot of the same, repetitious back-and-forth discussion every single time an investment is discussed, eh?
Also, mtg 'can' be an investment. Two years ago, around this time (10-14-10, so 3 more days!), I joined a couple of mtg forums, including mtgsalvation for the purpose of obtaining and transacting in cards for alternative investment purposes. The financial market (S&P) was around 1160, I had sufficient exposure to traditional investments across a variety accounts and due to some investment restrictions, I wanted to expand into what I deemed an an uncorrelated asset class. I proceeded to accumulate the collection I own today at what I think are decent prices. The S&P is around 1430 today and I have no regrets. Would I recommend anybody else doing the same? No, not unless they understand market friction (buy/sell costs), time value of money (holding costs and YOUR time spent on managing your holdings), opportunity costs (returns vs risk-free, or similar-risk benchmark investment). Anybody utilizing the word 'investment' without at least these basic considerations should be using the word 'speculation' instead
I would argue that older booster boxes with reasonably popular cards in them (casual or tournament demand) are a good investment to make. Also legacy/casual staples, especially ones on the reserved list, are also a good investment, because supply will continue to decrease over time while demand is much more likely to rise, than it is to fall as the playerbase continues to grow. Those are probably your best bets for guaranteed gains in value over time for investments into magic. The rest depends a lot on what decks are popular, and whats going on in each format.
Magic is actually a very liquid (especially for higher valued cards) asset to be able to have, thanks to easy places to offload them like ebay and the like. Sure you have to pay ebay/paypal fees. But if you are buying and holding for a while, and the object doubles in value, then its not a bad way to go with it.
Speculation of what could be good in the future is also a way that some choose to invest into the game. Sometimes, those investments dont pan out, sometimes they do. A lot of times its just a matter of having a good eye for cards when they are first previewed and trying to catch the ones that are being underappreciated.
I'll throw in a perspective of a college-student. I bought a box of Return Ravnica for ~$100 (after shipping) and from that managed to get a good $100-$130 of cards. I keep what I want (Jace, Shocks) and proceed to sell the rest and then buy more-expensive cards that I otherwise would not have been able to get (GoST, Sublime, Other Shocks, etc.).
Because I've already invested the $100 it's a sunk cost I can't recover (well technically I could sell what I got but I also bought it for the purpose of getting cards I needed for Standard).
Often-times people will try to make a quick-buck (pouncing on pre-order play-sets, etc.) hoping they will spike in price because the extra money could be re-invested in more expensive cards that otherwise would have required more cash.
While not profitable long-term or even large-scale, it is a fun hobby that does have it's rewards.
I would argue that older booster boxes with reasonably popular cards in them (casual or tournament demand) are a good investment to make. Also legacy/casual staples, especially ones on the reserved list, are also a good investment, because supply will continue to decrease over time while demand is much more likely to rise, than it is to fall as the playerbase continues to grow. Those are probably your best bets for guaranteed gains in value over time for investments into magic. The rest depends a lot on what decks are popular, and whats going on in each format.
Magic is actually a very liquid (especially for higher valued cards) asset to be able to have, thanks to easy places to offload them like ebay and the like. Sure you have to pay ebay/paypal fees. But if you are buying and holding for a while, and the object doubles in value, then its not a bad way to go with it.
Speculation of what could be good in the future is also a way that some choose to invest into the game. Sometimes, those investments dont pan out, sometimes they do. A lot of times its just a matter of having a good eye for cards when they are first previewed and trying to catch the ones that are being underappreciated.
Sealed boxes were, for the longest time, not really good bets, except for stuff from legends and before.
And if you are buying and holding and [if]it doubles over times, then its awesome[/if]. But then its pretty much gambling right? Which is fun, and I do it, but I guess what irks me is the amount of people who act like Magic cards are stocks or something.
While not profitable long-term or even large-scale, it is a fun hobby that does have it's rewards.
Exactly! There's nothing wrong with being a rewarding hobby, but people picking up stuff like Duals as investments, really?. There's no guarantee they'll continue to rise over the next five years, and yet people speak of them like they are things that will always be worth more money than now.
SCG does it all day long and wins, no reason people can't make a quick buck on the small scale.
They do it because they are the biggest store online, and no matter what Ben Bleweiss says, they are a trend setter. If they weren't, they wouldn't have bothered to ask ark42 to pull the little arrows from their page, would they? Everyone looks to SCG to see what cards are "worth".
SCG does it all day long and wins, no reason people can't make a quick buck on the small scale.
Yeah, because they basically control the market. They could and probably do manipulate the Magic market a little, and they insider trade like crazy. They know Tamiyo's heating up again so they go out and buy up every tamiyo they can find for 15-18 dollars, turn around and list them for 30 on their website before people realize what's going on.
Umm, I do this because if I am successful and do well by getting cheap amounts of cards during speculation and unload them, then I don't need to waste more money getting the cards I want, and I will use less money earned from job.
Yeah, please keep telling us how a low time investment is not worth the easy gain.
If you want to believe it's all luck go ahead, but if you follow basic economy concepts and reasonable advices you can profit quite constantly.
I used to think like that.
It is not a low time investment. Think of the time spent sorting cards, listing cards, answering emails, negotiating prices, posting auctions, keeping up with news, etc, etc.
You can profit, but at ten bucks an hour or whatever, its not worth treating it as an investment, but as a hobby that can pay for itself.
Try keeping track of time taken and money invested in a spreadsheet of sorts. Its not really that good.
It is not a low time investment. Think of the time spent sorting cards, listing cards, answering emails, negotiating prices, posting auctions, keeping up with news, etc, etc.
You can profit, but at ten bucks an hour or whatever, its not worth treating it as an investment, but as a hobby that can pay for itself.
I'll admit your first post came off a little arrogant, but I really agree with you here. I came to play the cards, not invest in them.
I remember my friend preordered a playset of Time Reversal at $15 a pop off SCG after getting so hyped up with all the rumors circulating about the card. He doesn't play U in fact he hates the color. He just bought it because he thought he would double his investment. Want to see how much return he got off his "investment"?
But obviously WRONG: Take a look at graded Vintage Dual Lands, Alpha and Betas, the potential for the market Bar is HIGH. and if you can find old collectors who sell sets and need money. The potential to make money is there. Thats a Great Investment. I mean PSA10 PSA9 Scrublands Beta go for 1K plus. Thats incredible. THATS an Investment.
There are 10 Internet plus+++ sites who INVESTED there whole business plan on magic cards....reselling buying etc..There not even touching other Card Games. THATS an Investment.
There are Gaming stores and Comic book Stores that INVEST their livelihoods on MAGIC gaming tournaments etc repurchases for 35%+++ of there total sales depening on Magic. THATS an Investment.
And you want me to tell you about the other 100s of BASEBALL cards stores that make their living selling pieces of cardboard?? that there are tons of???
Its a ridculous argument. Go tell all the antique furniture and Book stores and collectibles shops what they do is bad business and stop investing in collectibles, because IKEA makes Chairs and tables too, Ebooks are popular no one will ever buy books again. NO that wont work either, because they enjoy what they do and many other people do and THEY INVESTED time and money into their Hobby.
Too bad you didnt buy a vintage american muscle car instead of a BMW because that might be investing...OH WAIT thats why you bought a BMW.. theres tons of cars....why bother.
I do landscaping. I love my job, I get to be outside all day, hang out with my friends and I get a great pay. I play magic casually but my true love in magic is the financial aspect. I've always had an interest in the stock market and in many ways (not all) magic card prices are in a way like a small stock market. I did try those online pretend stock trading games that go off of real numbers and real information, but the things I was doing weren't what interested me.
When I trade for magic cards there is that certain feeling of obtaining a card that you have hopes will go up, to turn it around into other cards or cash to reinvest in more cards. I like to collect cards plain and simple even if they are expensive ones like duals and such. my perspective is when people are asking if something is a "good investment" I see the scenarios as such:
- people want x card, but it is 50 dollars. based on tournament results, power of the card, and rarity, is it safe to say that 50 dollars is a safe investment? When I say investment, I dont mean people wanting to turn it back around after it goes up 10 dollars. I wouldn't want to put 50 dollars in cash or trade towards a card that is hyped up and is going to fall. thats a legitimate reason enough for me to understand why people ask if x card is a good investment. I dont want to put money or cards into something that is inflated, when a little information from the community can help deter from overspending/overtrading.
Yeah, because they basically control the market. They could and probably do manipulate the Magic market a little, and they insider trade like crazy. They know Tamiyo's heating up again so they go out and buy up every tamiyo they can find for 15-18 dollars, turn around and list them for 30 on their website before people realize what's going on.
Guys, SCG does not, and has never controlled the market. The market is HUGE and SCG may be the largest store online for singles, and one that goes all across the country running their open events and such (which I still think is awesome), but the supply of cards is always vastly larger than anything they ever have control of at any one time. If a deck does well at a tournament and people see the lists and notice a card like tamiyo is in it, and dont have them, they are going to grab them up if they decide they want to build the deck. Multiply this by a good chunk of the playerbase that makes up the standard players (or whatever format we may be talking about with a particular card at the time), and you end up with places being bought out all over the place before the prices are risen and stock is relisted. SCG may take the opportunity to buy some online to restock themselves as needed, but they certainly arent responsible for even a small fraction of ALL of a particular card that may be bought up at any one price spike, or point in time. And sure, SCG can list a card at $30, but you know what, if you can still find them for $20 or so on ebay, then the real market value for those cards is still $20, and while some will choose to value them at SCG's prices (which by the way, while many may choose to price their cards at that (shops and individuals), there are a great deal more that go off of TCGplayer, or Ebay, or other places to value their cards. Now certainly if a card suddenly spikes on SCG, its going to get some people's attention, but that doesnt always equate to an equivalent price spike in the regular secondary market for the card. If SCG really did control the market, then Ebay, TCGplayer, and all of the other online stores would also match their prices changes for cards every time. Which they dont.
Now then. Ill use recent trends as an example for how investing can be a good thing long term for someone into magic. One may have an opinion that the reserved list legacy staples and the like wont go up any further over time, and that they would be a bad investment. However, past history would seem to show that for the most part, this simply isnt the case. Most of these cards have continued to rise, and look to continue to rise as the playerbase for magic continues to grow. Unless you can see the future, then all we have to work off of is current and past trends.
As for booster boxes. All but a couple of the older booster boxes have appreciated in value over time. Buying in-print sets like shards/conflux/reborn at the current ebay prices at the time ($80/box), would have netted some decent returns based upon current values. The same goes for Zendikar, Worldwake(especially Worldwake), and Rise of the Eldrazi who havent even been out of standard all that long yet. Looking further back, we have Lorwyn, Morningtide, Shadowmoor, and Eventide, all of which have increased a solid amount, or sometimes crazily (see Lorwyn) since their rotation. Heck, outside of a few examples, nearly everything had doubled or more since their rotation. Just like with OOP cards that are on the reserved list, OOP booster boxes, sealed, will never be reprinted, and will only continue to appreciate over time. Some slower than others sure, but they all have appreciated in value. Heck, take Unhinged, or Planechase, or heck, even some old sealed sets from mtgo like Time Spiral, Timeshifted, Planar Chaos, etc etc, those could be gotten for dirt cheap before their cycling from redemption, and now can be sold for double or more their previous buyable prices.
I buy and hold stuff all the time, and have made a good solid amount of money by doing so. You just have to pick your opportunities to buy, and be patient with it, same as any investment, in the stock market or otherwise. Magic in fact works a lot like the stock market, in that prices of cards or other products rise and fall depending on a variety of factors.
If you are looking for a GUARANTEED investment, with a GUARANTEED solid rate of return, then yeah, good luck finding that anywhere these days. Magic is something one can do when they arent working, during their off hours to be able to make some extra money on the side. Its not typically something the average individual is going to do to make their entire living off of, unless they have a business with it.
Too bad you didnt buy a vintage american muscle car instead of a BMW because that might be investing...OH WAIT thats why you bought a BMW.. theres tons of cars....why bother.
Your argument became invalid when you made this personal with the original poster and started to go ALL CAPS RAGE. So what if the original poster bought a BMW? He made no mention of being a collector to sell his car when it became profitable.
And you are making a very wrong assumption about MTG. Primary purpose of MTG is what is: a trading card game. Secondary purpose is collecting or "investing" if you want. What's the primary purpose of a vehicle? To get you from point A to point B in a short period of time. Not everyone wants to spend that much time, effort, and money to "invest" in a vintage vehicle. And frankly most people couldn't care less.
Magic cards are extremely illiquid. Unless you have a large network of buyers, or very high feedback on eBay, you aren't making money. And even if you are, you're clearing what? Low to mid five figures a year? That's an average salary at best, and you are probably putting in way more than 8 hours a day.
Geez, what ever happened to people picking up cards because they wanted to play a good deck, or have fun with their friends?
And please don't tell me how if you had bought 1000 Underground Sea in 2002 you'd have made 90k today. You wouldn't have. You'd have flooded the market and crashed the price.
/end rant.
Don't warn me bro.
For a little perspective, when someone talks about a "huge price jump" in a standard card, they usually mean like $5 or $10. Most college grads with decent jobs make that much money in about 10-20 minutes.
Also, most people who are doing this have a full time job. How many people can say that they are making money on the side through their hobby?
Finally all high eBay ratings are built on one feedback at a time.
Most college kids don't have time for jobs. The idea of sitting around in your house analysing some graphs and reading some website content for some quick bucks sounds quite prospective.
And yes, cards that literally double in value in the span of days could be used for investing purposes if you are a big player.
The bottom line is that people like to 'go infinite' and not spend money on the hobby. I have personally made money over time on MTG. I paid for my wedding and honeymoon on the profits of ebay sales 6 years ago. It is a lot of work, but I personally enjoy it a lot more than grinding the day away at my office job.
And I bought my BMW and put a down payment on my condo with 'profits' from Magic. What's the point? I got lucky on a lot of calls. For example, I had dozens of Grindstones because I liked the card, and then suddenly Painter's Servant comes along. Oh look 1000 dollars. Or Dark Depths, same thing. Or buying a ton of P3K when it was cheap. Or even collecting a playset of Magic because I wanted to have 4 of a card. And then proceeded to get lucky with the Legacy/Modern boom.
Most of it is dumb luck, not an investment. There is no science. There is no analysis. There are very few trends to follow. Cards are hard to move in large (1000+) quantities at once.
Lastly, this forum isn't an investment advice forum, last I checked. Its a forum for people to make sure the trades are even, or check values on cards. Not to ask if Force is a stable investment. Who the hell knows? Will the paper game still be around in five years? Will Magic still be successful? Nobody knows, which is why this whole "investment" thing is BS. They are very common pieces of cardboard.
Says guy with BMW signature on a Magic forum, lol. To each their own, to each their own man.
twitter.com/bccarlso
Speaking of investments, that was a really bad choice. Kind of like investing in Stoneforges @ 25.
The point I'm trying to make is that if you're not running a business of some sort, you're only getting lucky.
Is buying stoneforges for $2.5 right after worldwake considered getting lucky?
Why would most college kids not have time for jobs?
Almost everyone I knew in college either had a job or plenty of time to have a job.
I'd like to know where you went to college LOL because I almost can't think of a single person that I knew that didn't at least work summers. I got my BS in Chemical Engineering at a good school with a heavy courseload and almost everyone in my class including myself worked, be it in a restaurant, an internship somewhere, working on campus, tutoring etc...
EDIT: Oh yeah, people need to stop "investing" in these cards. Seriously go invest in the real stock market and let the players enjoy some stability in MTG card prices.
Also, mtg 'can' be an investment. Two years ago, around this time (10-14-10, so 3 more days!), I joined a couple of mtg forums, including mtgsalvation for the purpose of obtaining and transacting in cards for alternative investment purposes. The financial market (S&P) was around 1160, I had sufficient exposure to traditional investments across a variety accounts and due to some investment restrictions, I wanted to expand into what I deemed an an uncorrelated asset class. I proceeded to accumulate the collection I own today at what I think are decent prices. The S&P is around 1430 today and I have no regrets. Would I recommend anybody else doing the same? No, not unless they understand market friction (buy/sell costs), time value of money (holding costs and YOUR time spent on managing your holdings), opportunity costs (returns vs risk-free, or similar-risk benchmark investment). Anybody utilizing the word 'investment' without at least these basic considerations should be using the word 'speculation' instead
Yes, because you had no way of knowing how good the new equipment would be. Note he bumped only around February, after Mirrodin Besieged was released.
http://blacklotusproject.com/cards/Worldwake/Stoneforge+Mystic/
Magic is actually a very liquid (especially for higher valued cards) asset to be able to have, thanks to easy places to offload them like ebay and the like. Sure you have to pay ebay/paypal fees. But if you are buying and holding for a while, and the object doubles in value, then its not a bad way to go with it.
Speculation of what could be good in the future is also a way that some choose to invest into the game. Sometimes, those investments dont pan out, sometimes they do. A lot of times its just a matter of having a good eye for cards when they are first previewed and trying to catch the ones that are being underappreciated.
Because I've already invested the $100 it's a sunk cost I can't recover (well technically I could sell what I got but I also bought it for the purpose of getting cards I needed for Standard).
Often-times people will try to make a quick-buck (pouncing on pre-order play-sets, etc.) hoping they will spike in price because the extra money could be re-invested in more expensive cards that otherwise would have required more cash.
While not profitable long-term or even large-scale, it is a fun hobby that does have it's rewards.
Sealed boxes were, for the longest time, not really good bets, except for stuff from legends and before.
And if you are buying and holding and [if]it doubles over times, then its awesome[/if]. But then its pretty much gambling right? Which is fun, and I do it, but I guess what irks me is the amount of people who act like Magic cards are stocks or something.
Exactly! There's nothing wrong with being a rewarding hobby, but people picking up stuff like Duals as investments, really?. There's no guarantee they'll continue to rise over the next five years, and yet people speak of them like they are things that will always be worth more money than now.
They do it because they are the biggest store online, and no matter what Ben Bleweiss says, they are a trend setter. If they weren't, they wouldn't have bothered to ask ark42 to pull the little arrows from their page, would they? Everyone looks to SCG to see what cards are "worth".
Yeah, because they basically control the market. They could and probably do manipulate the Magic market a little, and they insider trade like crazy. They know Tamiyo's heating up again so they go out and buy up every tamiyo they can find for 15-18 dollars, turn around and list them for 30 on their website before people realize what's going on.
EDH: Xenagos, God of Revels.
I used to think like that.
It is not a low time investment. Think of the time spent sorting cards, listing cards, answering emails, negotiating prices, posting auctions, keeping up with news, etc, etc.
You can profit, but at ten bucks an hour or whatever, its not worth treating it as an investment, but as a hobby that can pay for itself.
Try keeping track of time taken and money invested in a spreadsheet of sorts. Its not really that good.
I'll admit your first post came off a little arrogant, but I really agree with you here. I came to play the cards, not invest in them.
I remember my friend preordered a playset of Time Reversal at $15 a pop off SCG after getting so hyped up with all the rumors circulating about the card. He doesn't play U in fact he hates the color. He just bought it because he thought he would double his investment. Want to see how much return he got off his "investment"?
Credit to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the Avatar & Miraculous Recovery for the Banner.
My 540 Card Cube (WIP)
But obviously WRONG: Take a look at graded Vintage Dual Lands, Alpha and Betas, the potential for the market Bar is HIGH. and if you can find old collectors who sell sets and need money. The potential to make money is there. Thats a Great Investment. I mean PSA10 PSA9 Scrublands Beta go for 1K plus. Thats incredible. THATS an Investment.
There are 10 Internet plus+++ sites who INVESTED there whole business plan on magic cards....reselling buying etc..There not even touching other Card Games. THATS an Investment.
There are Gaming stores and Comic book Stores that INVEST their livelihoods on MAGIC gaming tournaments etc repurchases for 35%+++ of there total sales depening on Magic. THATS an Investment.
And you want me to tell you about the other 100s of BASEBALL cards stores that make their living selling pieces of cardboard?? that there are tons of???
Its a ridculous argument. Go tell all the antique furniture and Book stores and collectibles shops what they do is bad business and stop investing in collectibles, because IKEA makes Chairs and tables too, Ebooks are popular no one will ever buy books again. NO that wont work either, because they enjoy what they do and many other people do and THEY INVESTED time and money into their Hobby.
Too bad you didnt buy a vintage american muscle car instead of a BMW because that might be investing...OH WAIT thats why you bought a BMW.. theres tons of cars....why bother.
When I trade for magic cards there is that certain feeling of obtaining a card that you have hopes will go up, to turn it around into other cards or cash to reinvest in more cards. I like to collect cards plain and simple even if they are expensive ones like duals and such. my perspective is when people are asking if something is a "good investment" I see the scenarios as such:
- people want x card, but it is 50 dollars. based on tournament results, power of the card, and rarity, is it safe to say that 50 dollars is a safe investment? When I say investment, I dont mean people wanting to turn it back around after it goes up 10 dollars. I wouldn't want to put 50 dollars in cash or trade towards a card that is hyped up and is going to fall. thats a legitimate reason enough for me to understand why people ask if x card is a good investment. I dont want to put money or cards into something that is inflated, when a little information from the community can help deter from overspending/overtrading.
Guys, SCG does not, and has never controlled the market. The market is HUGE and SCG may be the largest store online for singles, and one that goes all across the country running their open events and such (which I still think is awesome), but the supply of cards is always vastly larger than anything they ever have control of at any one time. If a deck does well at a tournament and people see the lists and notice a card like tamiyo is in it, and dont have them, they are going to grab them up if they decide they want to build the deck. Multiply this by a good chunk of the playerbase that makes up the standard players (or whatever format we may be talking about with a particular card at the time), and you end up with places being bought out all over the place before the prices are risen and stock is relisted. SCG may take the opportunity to buy some online to restock themselves as needed, but they certainly arent responsible for even a small fraction of ALL of a particular card that may be bought up at any one price spike, or point in time. And sure, SCG can list a card at $30, but you know what, if you can still find them for $20 or so on ebay, then the real market value for those cards is still $20, and while some will choose to value them at SCG's prices (which by the way, while many may choose to price their cards at that (shops and individuals), there are a great deal more that go off of TCGplayer, or Ebay, or other places to value their cards. Now certainly if a card suddenly spikes on SCG, its going to get some people's attention, but that doesnt always equate to an equivalent price spike in the regular secondary market for the card. If SCG really did control the market, then Ebay, TCGplayer, and all of the other online stores would also match their prices changes for cards every time. Which they dont.
Now then. Ill use recent trends as an example for how investing can be a good thing long term for someone into magic. One may have an opinion that the reserved list legacy staples and the like wont go up any further over time, and that they would be a bad investment. However, past history would seem to show that for the most part, this simply isnt the case. Most of these cards have continued to rise, and look to continue to rise as the playerbase for magic continues to grow. Unless you can see the future, then all we have to work off of is current and past trends.
As for booster boxes. All but a couple of the older booster boxes have appreciated in value over time. Buying in-print sets like shards/conflux/reborn at the current ebay prices at the time ($80/box), would have netted some decent returns based upon current values. The same goes for Zendikar, Worldwake(especially Worldwake), and Rise of the Eldrazi who havent even been out of standard all that long yet. Looking further back, we have Lorwyn, Morningtide, Shadowmoor, and Eventide, all of which have increased a solid amount, or sometimes crazily (see Lorwyn) since their rotation. Heck, outside of a few examples, nearly everything had doubled or more since their rotation. Just like with OOP cards that are on the reserved list, OOP booster boxes, sealed, will never be reprinted, and will only continue to appreciate over time. Some slower than others sure, but they all have appreciated in value. Heck, take Unhinged, or Planechase, or heck, even some old sealed sets from mtgo like Time Spiral, Timeshifted, Planar Chaos, etc etc, those could be gotten for dirt cheap before their cycling from redemption, and now can be sold for double or more their previous buyable prices.
I buy and hold stuff all the time, and have made a good solid amount of money by doing so. You just have to pick your opportunities to buy, and be patient with it, same as any investment, in the stock market or otherwise. Magic in fact works a lot like the stock market, in that prices of cards or other products rise and fall depending on a variety of factors.
If you are looking for a GUARANTEED investment, with a GUARANTEED solid rate of return, then yeah, good luck finding that anywhere these days. Magic is something one can do when they arent working, during their off hours to be able to make some extra money on the side. Its not typically something the average individual is going to do to make their entire living off of, unless they have a business with it.
Your argument became invalid when you made this personal with the original poster and started to go ALL CAPS RAGE. So what if the original poster bought a BMW? He made no mention of being a collector to sell his car when it became profitable.
And you are making a very wrong assumption about MTG. Primary purpose of MTG is what is: a trading card game. Secondary purpose is collecting or "investing" if you want. What's the primary purpose of a vehicle? To get you from point A to point B in a short period of time. Not everyone wants to spend that much time, effort, and money to "invest" in a vintage vehicle. And frankly most people couldn't care less.
Credit to Heroes of the Plane Studios for the Avatar & Miraculous Recovery for the Banner.
My 540 Card Cube (WIP)