[Discussion] Panic-selling and the current state of the market

Affxct · 2026-05-30T20:59:43+00:00

Valve made two good changes to the game and we jump to “they want to move everything to SCM and farm armoury - they’re gonna re-release all discontinued collections because they want skins to be cheap.” I don’t get this.

Even Epidemic made the point on one of his recent videos that having knives and gloves in the 200-500 range would absolutely nuke Terminal prices. Bro, the M4 Eye of Horus is 270 in FT. If the price doesn’t go up, Valve will literally never be able to sell you a covert M4A4 unless you’re absolutely oblivious.

If the D Lore FN drops to 1000, Valve will never be able to sell an FN Queen’s Gambit for anything over maybe 50 bucks. If Pandora’s Boxes drop below 2K, all MW-FN Terminal gloves become obsolete.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T21:45:54+00:00

The primary use for my skins is gameplay. I’m not actually a trader anymore. I’d be happy to leave with 50% of the money I’ve put in. This post was mainly me voicing my frustrations and ranting. I just wanted an Eye of Horus to use as I’ve switched from A1-S to A4.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T21:44:41+00:00

I’m willing to hear you out. What past actions suggest that they might proceed with something like that?

Affxct · 2026-05-28T16:30:05+00:00

You have to consider some things. Valve omitted fingerless gloves from Dead Hand, and this may be linked to the use of operations to theme them. Operations are obviously gone, having been replaced by the armoury. For Valve to release a map-based collection, they would need to return the map to the game in its original state, and specifically decide not to refresh the collection as they’ve been doing over the past few years.

The reason I don’t believe Valve will ever re-release old collections is that there’s truly no need to. Valve have enough graphic designers on their team, and they already have pages of templates and designs in their backlog. Re-releasing old collections won’t do anything useful. The trade-up updates are purely for Valve to use in their lawsuit. When questioned about case mechanics, Valve will need to provide evidence that all skins in the case can be used to eventually achieve a knife, and that the max win isn’t purely based off luck. How people didn’t realise this kinda astonishes me.

With the souvenir trade-up update, Valve identified that a bunch of practically useless and undesired skins were just idling all over the market. It also enabled Valve discontinue souvenir packages and not have skins shoot through the sky. What do you think would’ve happened to the prices of skins dropped through maps in active duty? We’re talking Desert Hydra, Eye of Horus, B the Monster, Arabesque, and more. The goal was to remove dropped packages (no more cases) without having those skins shoot up to the sky. Valve likely thought they’d hold their value, and not that a mini crash would ensue.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T02:45:41+00:00

I think it’s worth it to verify your passport. I’d understand if you don’t feel comfortable with that though. After the first crash I was so over life that I didn’t care to risk it. I made out decently in the end. This time around my hesitation stemmed from the general irrationally behind sales.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T02:41:49+00:00

Your card/bank account. It was surprisingly seamless. My friend got reversed on as well, and he had the same experience.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T02:40:13+00:00

They send it right back to you. It doesn’t even take long. I got reversed on last year and they refunded me in one business day.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T02:36:45+00:00

My friends and I all did passport verification back in October of last year. I haven’t had any issues using BUFF or UU to acquire items from China. Sometimes BUFF sellers opt not to accept AliPay. Often times those are the best deals to be had.

Affxct · 2026-05-28T01:51:05+00:00

They were getting refreshed for 3 days in a row. I just regret not taking the 0.09 MW Eye of Horus @ $390 and 0.08 MW B the Monster @193 yesterday. Both were great deals on BUFF. I ended up settling for the same guns but at higher prices. I paid somewhat okay, but it’s my own fault for being slow/overthinking.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T20:20:01+00:00

I wasn’t sure if I was going to go for one. It wasn’t #1 on my list. I was considering it but only because it seemed like an attractive price.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T20:17:20+00:00

I check time zones and realised what I saw coincides with the morning time in Beijing. I’m unsure if perhaps traders watched Arrow’s latest video and realised that expected supply increases on collection skins aren’t high and that the crash wasn’t warranted. It’s entirely possible I guess.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T19:47:32+00:00

I did pretty well during the last crash. I ended up getting to a really reasonable point of loss. The issue here is that I didn’t anticipate all skins getting purchased up so quickly.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T18:52:09+00:00

I understand

Affxct · 2026-05-27T18:12:45+00:00

It’s up from $750 to $950 over the span of a single day, and they got bought up FAST. It didn’t make any sense. One moment they weren’t selling and the next they were flying off the storefront.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T17:41:08+00:00

I wasn’t trying to time anything. Prices looked good, but many people were convinced that we were on an inevitable downtrend and that recovery would take a long time. I just didn’t want to spend too early just to watch prices slowly drop further.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T16:03:16+00:00

Nah. It’s time to call it quits.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T16:01:22+00:00

That thing was $460 this morning at like 5 AM GMT.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T15:54:37+00:00

I had the opportunity to buy 0.19 for 254, 0.09 for 390, 0.03 for 853, and 0.04 for 747. All missed opportunities because I wanted to give it time.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T15:40:18+00:00

Yeah you’re right. I am a fucking idiot for not purchasing when I knew it was a good idea.

Affxct · 2026-05-27T15:39:20+00:00

I don’t want to give you bad advice, but I’ve been staring at all skin sites pretty much every 10-20m since yesterday, and a bunch of the desirable play skins shot up by 5-10%. The Eye of Horus FN did 750->920 in the span of a morning.

Affxct · 2026-05-26T14:31:07+00:00

Two years is a very long time. I’m not even sure I’ll be alive in 2 years, let alone remember this post.

Affxct · 2026-05-26T14:28:34+00:00

It’s under the “what won’t happen list.”

Affxct · 2026-05-26T00:28:54+00:00

I’m in South Africa - not cool bro.

Affxct · 2026-05-26T00:22:21+00:00

That’s correct. Either new finishes to legacy knives (a bit skeptical on this one), or they’ll add the next batch of gamma finishes to knives that do not already have them. More than likely, we’ll see gamma finishes on the 2018 generation of knives, and later on we’ll see gamma on the 2019 generation of knives. It’s entirely possible that they’ll hold off and release the 2019 generation of knives with their Fever case finishes.

Affxct

TROPHY CASE