Three Barometers for the Magic: the Gathering Market
What’s the best way to figure out if Magic: the Gathering, as a whole, is trending up or down? If you were to tell me that Magic card prices are going up, or going down, how would you determine that? If you wanted to get more specific about it - say, Reserve List singles vs non-Reserve List singles vs sealed product - how would you tell then? What are the best, simplest, one-shot indicators for Magic’s market? Well folks, that’s what we’re looking at today.
Revised Dual Lands
The Revised dual lands are the best possible indicator for the price of vintage Magic cards, full stop. To understand why, we first need to understand who wants these things in the first place. The answer is: everyone. The perfect blend of scarce and playable, the demand for the dual lands (and as such, their price) is influenced by both of Magic’s buying groups – players and collectors.
On the players end, we primarily have Legacy and Commander to thank, with lesser attention to be paid to Vintage. Paper Legacy tournaments have declined substantially in recent years, but those players didn’t abandon Magic completely. Instead, a substantial uptick in competitive Commander has renewed the spotlight on dual lands, rejuvenating player-based demand for these cards.
On the collectors end, dual lands serve as a bedrock for investable Magic. These cards have been with us as long as the game has, and as such have earned a substantial degree of nostalgia and notoriety - two factors which push prices high for any collectible, regardless of game function.
The collective desire between these two groups means that price movements reflect sentiments for the whole of Magic’s purchasing base, rather than only one or the other. If these start to spike, odds are that so too will the rest of vintage Magic. Players will move to pick up the rest of the playable Reserve List staples, such as
Magic’s Newest Standard Singles - 30 Days Post-Release
This second group is a little less straightforward, so bear with me for a moment as we dig through it.
The first 30 days of any Magic release are always a tumultuous time. Overhyped cards crash, hidden gems are uncovered, and all the while cards tumble from their prerelease price highs. All of these are normal and anticipatable phenomena, but it’s that last one - the tumbling from prerelease highs - which actually contains a lot more information about the Magic market then you might think. Let’s break it down.
First, the prerelease price. A higher prerelease price doesn’t just mean people are increasingly excited about the card (although that’s certainly the case), rather it also means that the market anticipates players having the purchasing power to actually go out and buy those listings. A single isolated $50 prerelease card is normal, but if several of them crop up, then it doesn’t simply mean the set is full of broken cards - it means that the floor for Magic prices has risen.
This is the first test for any new set - how many cards can drag the floor with them as their prerelease prices set the ceiling. The next, most crucial part of this barometer however is settled over the 30 days to follow, when we’ll next check in as to how those cards’ prices fared in the interim. If all of them fell – as they often do – then that’s not a bad thing, it’s simply a normal story. It’s the measure of the aggregate fall, be it 10%, 20%, or even 50%, that tells you where the market itself is going.
If most cards in the newest set fell 20%, as did the set before that, but the set released at the same time last year fell 30%, along with its predecessor, then that’s as good a tell as any that player purchasing power is heating up.
New singles might not attract the same financial investment as dual lands do when it comes to collectors – purchasing these is far more of a player’s game – but they are nonetheless a crucial indicator for Magic regardless. Paying attention to the health of the new-card secondary market will clue you in on the decisions of Magic’s broader player base, and financial strength there is as important as financial strength anywhere else.
Collector Booster Box Prices
This last one is a bit of a mix between our first two categories, not because it tells us similar information to either, but because it again reveals information about both of our primary groups of spenders - players and collectors.
When it comes to Collector Booster Box prices, there are two key things to pay attention to: order momentum, and the actual price. I stress this because, when it comes to dual lands or Standard singles, we’re really just looking at the price of cards, not how many are selling.
Order momentum data (something you can view via the “Latest Sales” section on TCGPlayer) helps to clue us in on the purpose beyond a purchase. Large cluster purchases are usually done by stores or collectors looking to up their positions, while a small stream of individual purchases primarily reflects player-based demand. If one outweighs the other, then this can be a signal as to which side, players or collectors, are more interested in a product at that point. If you really want to dig into it, I recommend also bringing up the sales data for Display Cases of any given set, as it provides a wonderful comparison. Looking at the comparison data for Ravnica Remastered, for example, we can see that there is a steady demand for individual Collector Boxes, but an infrequent purchase history for Display Cases.
Next, onto the prices themselves. I like to look at Collector Box prices in two windows - 30 days post release, and then periodically starting around six months after release. The 30 day window correlates with the pricing discovery of singles, as we discussed earlier, and is a key indicator for how the product is doing as an individual item. Waiting six months and then putting it in comparison against similar products provides a better look at the market as a whole, as now it serves as a settled asset. This isn’t to say that it’s a dead asset, rather it means that the turbulence of release has dissipated.
Wrap Up
I hope this article has served as a helpful reference when it comes to checking in with the Magic market. Price cycles can take years to fully form and settle, so looking at Magic across all three asset classes is an excellent way to stay up to date without missing out on much. Just make sure to check a couple items within each category - you never know when things can go wild for a day.
Further Reading:
Is Standard Relevant to Magic Card Prices Again?
Shocklands and the Ramifications of Staple Reprints in Magic
Harvey McGuinness
Harvey McGuinness is a student at Johns Hopkins University who has been playing Magic since the release of Return to Ravnica. After spending a few years in the Legacy arena bouncing between Miracles and other blue-white control shells, he now spends his time enjoying Magic through CEDH games and understanding the finance perspective. He also writes for the Commander's Herald.