Welcome back to the 1 Year, 100 Tix project report.

This month we passed the symbolic mark of 500 Tix, the goal I set at the beginning of the project, with four months to go! Following a seasonal dip triggered by the release of Magic Origins, most prices moved back up, and with them the value of the 100 Tix 1 year account. Modern and Pauper positions were again the number one gainers this month.

This month the unlocked article from my Nine Months of Portfolio Management series is Part 8 – Mismanaging Return to Ravnica Block Positions. In this article I review several positions that didn’t go well. Inadequate expectations, wrong timing and lack of attention can make you miss on profitable specs or even make you lose money. See if what went wrong with my Return to Ravnica block bets can help you with your Khans of Tarkir block specs this year.

More information about the 1 Year, 100 Tix project can be found here:

August and September can be very active months as it is a good time to sell Modern or Pauper positions in order to reinvest in core set and Standard opportunities. Although I was not very active in August this month turned out to be very profitable. Let’s review it here.

August Numbers

A simple look at the graph is enough to tell you that things have been going quite well in August. The value of the “100 Tix 1 Year” account jumped from 348 Tix in July to 501 Tix this month, a 44% increase.

This 44% might only be the third best increase of this project in terms of percentage points but is definitely the best increase in term of Tix–a value of 153 Tix was added to the account. With the exception of the distinct dip corresponding to the release of Magic Origins, the upward trend has been solid and consistent since May.

At the beginning of this project I considered 500 Tix a good final goal. Eight months later this mark is already passed and it seems like there’s still plenty of room to grow.

Summary of the Specs

Here what account looked like by August 31st.

If you compare this to what the account looked like at the end of July you’ll see there are very few differences in the cards, but 50 additional free Tix. Indeed, very little action took place in August but the account is still worth 153 Tix more than four weeks ago.

The release of Magic Origins had pushed prices down all across the board at the end of July. The trend was simply reversed in August and this is why, without many transactions, the account grew spectacularly.

Very nice profits came once again from Pauper positions such as Chittering Rats and Lava Spike. This is not the first time I’ve specced on the rats and with such frequent and high variations it might not be the last one. Small bankrolls should definitely take advantage of these types of price fluctuations to quickly generate extra Tix. Doubling up in price is very common in the realm of Pauper.

Monastery Siege is another bulk spec that did wonders for me in August. I had bought that card back in June at 0.087 Tix per copy. I thought the card had some potential and therefore was undervalued at 0.087 Tix. My bet was simply to wait for Standard to rotate and for prices to slowly rise over the summer. However I could not wait more and pass on selling these at eight times their buying price.

Holding or Selling MM2?

With August down there are only four months left to this project. The account has already reached the highest expectations I had at the beginning of the adventure. Nonetheless there is one last big block of specs to devote my Tix to–Magic Origins positions. The big question now is what to do with my MM2 positions.

As I’m writing these lines I have already sold several of my Modern positions in order to accumulate as many Tix as possible to buy ORI cards. Cards such as Leyline of Sanctity, Mutagenic Growth and Hurkyl’s Recall were easy to sell. They have nearly doubled and these gains are totally within my expectations.

It’s not so easy with card such as Noble Hierarch, Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Spellskite. They merely have increased by 15-20%. Should I sell and move to something else or hold for more profit? Is it going to go up or down from here? The same questions again and always.

A few things will help me decide here. If MM2 positions are, on average, expected to go up from here the release of Battle for Zendikar is probably going to put a halt to the trend, at least for many of them. Prices of uncommons and rares are usually more sensitive to seasonal pressure than mythics. Doubling or tripling is most likely the best outcome I could expect with the MM2 positions I’m currently holding.

Concerning ORI, the price trend is inevitably up for the next two to three months and the release of BFZ won’t affect this. For the most part ORI prices are at their bottom at the moment and the price of many rares and mythics could easily quadruple before the end of the year. Some bulk or near bulk ORI rares could also multiply their price by 10 or even 20 if used after Standard rotation.

The timeline and potential profit of ORI positions clearly offer better outcomes than most of my current MM2 positions. With too much risk, not enough reward and better positions to sink my Tix into, selling all of my MM2 uncommons and rares is the prudent move. I will probably only keep Wilt-Leaf Liege and Eye of Ugin as their current price is still extremely low compared to what they were pre-MM2.

I’m also tempted to keep my MM2 mythics. Mythics are usually less sensitive to price depreciation and cheap mythics such as Iona, Shield of Emeria, Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre and Tezzeret the Seeker feel particularly underpriced to me.

We’ll see in two or three months if these choices pay off.

Thank you for reading and following,

Sylvain

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Sylvain Lehoux Sylvain started playing Mtg in 1998 and played at competitive level for more than 10 years including several GP and 3 PT. When he moved to Atlanta in 2010 for his job he sold all his cards and stopped "playing". In 2011 he turned to Mtg Online and he experimented whether it was possible to successfully speculate on this platform. Two years later and with the help of the QS community his experience has grown tremendously and investing on MTGO has proven to be greatly successful. He is now sharing the knowledge he acquired during his MTGO journey! @Lepongemagique on Twitter More Posts

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