Weekly Winners 2020 - 30

An interesting week with few large movements, but a lot of interesting uptrends and developments.

Like every week, just in time for (digital) FNM, I'll now tell you about the cards that will be the talk of the (digital) town tonight!

 

See something interesting in the world of card prices? Be sure to pitch me a tweet: @MTGPeter

 

#1 Ethereal Forager $4.73 (+233.97%)

 

I'm going to be honest with you, straight of the bat. This week it was quite hard to find out the reasons why cards spiked. Some weeks you know exactly what cards spiked and why, other weeks are like this one: a lot of research and digging is needed to find out why cards are trending up. And with our #1 winner, I'm not totally convinced I have found everything to the story. But I'll share everything I could find.

First, let's look at Ethereal Forager and its characteristics. It has delve, it flies and it can return instants and sorceries to your hand. These abilities are interesting and might be useful, even in formats like Legacy and Vintage. The first mention of Ethereal Forager as being a card to look out for was during pre-release of Commander 2020 on MTGFinance forums. But opinions were mixed about the potential of the card. It could fit in Delver decks, but the 4 cards for the return ability is a bit steep, and a 3/3 without other protection could be easy to deal with.

UR Burn and Mono U Delver decks have netted some 5-0 results in Legacy leagues over the past weeks, and these might be the reason for the spike.

Months later we see a few decks in Legacy and Vintage that use Ethereal Forager. You will find an example below. Since there haven't been any major tournaments since it was printed, we don't have a great grasp on the power of certain cards in the different formats. We have the MTGO results, but don't underestimate the power of live coverage during GPs and ProTours. When new cards make a good impression it can propel its price and playrate.

The card does not see a ton of play in EDH, but people do run it in decks commanded by Gavi, Nest Warden. With an EDHRec.com rank of #115 not the most popular commander right now. But we have seen other cards spike because of its cycling ability.

 

#2 Reflecting Pool $33.50 (+39.64%)

 

An (almost) 40% spike is quite a thing for a card that was already around the $23 mark. This week Reflecting Pool gained $10 in value and created a spike for the Tempest printing of the card. Check out the price increase in the other printings too! Those didn't spike, but the uptrend is very visible.

Reflecting Pool is popular in EDH and it sees a little play in Modern too. The land has the potential to be extremely good, but without enough diversity in you mana base you could end up with more of the same. Play it in decks that feature 4 or more colors and you will probably always profit from running Reflecting Pool.

Over the past 2,5 years, more than 12 new commanders were printed that work well with Reflecting Pool. Especially commanders with 4 or 5 color identities (by casting cost or ability) tend to run the land. Demand for the card is increasing and when it concerns a card from an older printing, the stock can dry up and cause the card to spike.

 

#3 Lake of the Dead $70.87 (+41.77%)

 

After a huge spike in 2018 following new Deck Tech, Lake of the Dead fell in price. Back in 2018 there was an organic and speculative buyout of the card, driving it up to a price that could only hold when there would be real demand for it. Turned out: there wasn't. Lake of the Dead would have been a good card to talk about in our 'whatever happened to..' segment. But this week it spiked to a new all time high, so I can cover it here and now.

Lake of the Dead's current spike is probably related to other reserved list cards we have seen trending up since the Corona Crisis. RL cards are the equivalent of 'gold' in the regular economy, people see it as a save investment in times of turmoil.

Something interesting is going on with the card that I have not seen often. Maybe two or three times before in the past years. Lake of the Dead listed as $70 over the past days, following a spike. This is usually caused by a buyout and stores having no cards to sell. The price stabilizes until new stock is available to be sold. Currently, stores have Lake of the Dead in stock, for a price far below that $70 mark. I've seen prices ranging from $40 to $55.

Before you think you are missing out on a great deal, think again! On closer examination, it seems that some store(s) are listing Lake of the Dead for $200, a price that will never be accepted by anyone. Sometimes this interferes with the pricing of a card.

In the end you can safely see and say that Lake of the Dead is seriously trending up, supply is drying up and the market price is on the move as well.

 

Cheap Pickups: Special Edition

Please note: for our 'record low' we consider the price of the card over the past 7 years. Many cards have been even cheaper (a) decade(s) ago. Also note: some cards are still going down, and might be even cheaper pickups next week.

This week the Cheap Pickups gives attention to card we normally don't report on: promo's and other special printings of cards. We see them popping up in our analytics and this week I'm going to report on some of them.

 

Horizon Canopy $69.40 - Record low and trending down

 

Engineered Explosives $68.01 - Record low and trending down

 

Mishra's Factory $34.68 - Record low and stable

 

Mishra's Factory	CardKingdom $34.99	TCGPlayer $34.68
Horizon Canopy	CardKingdom $84.99	TCGPlayer $69.40
Engineered Explosives	CardKingdom $64.99	TCGPlayer $68.01