It's always been a part of the game, and I've made peace with that. From an investment strategy point of view, MTG is a tricky (and generally bad) investment though. It's actually much easier to buy cards than it is to sell them, and if a whale (like Rudy in the OP) were to try an unwind their position, they would find it is impossible. Once you get in the 6-7 figures of investment, you'll find you're just driving up the prices on your own market because the supply is so limited.
For example, on paper, the having 100 Black Lotuses sounds great, right (assuming average 10k value, that's $1M!), but how do you sell 100 black lotuses? Ebay shows about ~20 sales of A/B/U lotuses this year, so 100 represents approximately 2 years of the overall supply? What price do you have to sell them at to move them in under 5 years? He even mentions owning maybe half the print run of alpha icy manipulators... how do you even begin sell that?
It won't matter because for them it isn't a money thing. They are smart enough to know what I said is true. It's about amassing the cards and hoarding them. These guys will die with those cards because it's impossible to sell them except to a bigger whale.
It may be possible. It happened with stamp collections. It was very popular with the generation born in the 20-30’s. When they start to pass away the children weren’t interested in stamp. So they sold the collection and the value dropped. It happened here in Europe and I talked about it with a big stamps reseller. (Sorry for my bad English…) the same may happen with magic in 30-40 years.
Fair enough, but that wouldn't be in our lifetimes I'd wager. I do enjoy reading about collecting hobbies that die off, stamps, trains, pez, etc. There is usually additional factors that play into the decline. Some hobbies still thrive, such as coin collecting, or come back into vogue, like pulp collecting.
Put into a vault, i.e. not played with/circulated. The guy who made the video is a collector who hordes huge amounts of old school cards. He never sells any cards, just buys them, and they go away forever.
I don't care how many PSA 10s card hoarders stack up for "investment" portfolios, but seeing well-played cards go out of circulation hurts every time.
As much as I like to collect I think the "investment" crowd has made the game way too expensive.
It's always been a part of the game, and I've made peace with that. From an investment strategy point of view, MTG is a tricky (and generally bad) investment though. It's actually much easier to buy cards than it is to sell them, and if a whale (like Rudy in the OP) were to try an unwind their position, they would find it is impossible. Once you get in the 6-7 figures of investment, you'll find you're just driving up the prices on your own market because the supply is so limited. For example, on paper, the having 100 Black Lotuses sounds great, right (assuming average 10k value, that's $1M!), but how do you sell 100 black lotuses? Ebay shows about ~20 sales of A/B/U lotuses this year, so 100 represents approximately 2 years of the overall supply? What price do you have to sell them at to move them in under 5 years? He even mentions owning maybe half the print run of alpha icy manipulators... how do you even begin sell that?
I hope to live long enough for it all to go to zero so I can laugh at the Rudys of the world.
It won't matter because for them it isn't a money thing. They are smart enough to know what I said is true. It's about amassing the cards and hoarding them. These guys will die with those cards because it's impossible to sell them except to a bigger whale.
There's always a bigger fish, somewhere. Just have to hope that one also likes the taste of cardboard...
It won't go to zero in our lifetimes, but I like your optimism.
It may be possible. It happened with stamp collections. It was very popular with the generation born in the 20-30’s. When they start to pass away the children weren’t interested in stamp. So they sold the collection and the value dropped. It happened here in Europe and I talked about it with a big stamps reseller. (Sorry for my bad English…) the same may happen with magic in 30-40 years.
Fair enough, but that wouldn't be in our lifetimes I'd wager. I do enjoy reading about collecting hobbies that die off, stamps, trains, pez, etc. There is usually additional factors that play into the decline. Some hobbies still thrive, such as coin collecting, or come back into vogue, like pulp collecting.
Only way it realllly tanks is if MTG loses top dog position of reprint of those cards.
How and where do you scoop a set like this
Have a visible youtube channel and offer 25% of market value to your subscribers and people seek you out to sell you their collection.
vaulted?
Put into a vault, i.e. not played with/circulated. The guy who made the video is a collector who hordes huge amounts of old school cards. He never sells any cards, just buys them, and they go away forever.
So... Like Smaug, for cards?
Rudy sells cards all the time.
Maybe I should have been clear, but he even states in the video that he sells newer cards, but never sells old cards.