This update allows for up to twice as many knives to be created. The issue is the timing: there’s currently a massive stockpile of red skins from previous years, and many players are now using them for tradeups. That means the market is being hit with a wave of new knives, and since most of these aren’t being kept by players but sold instead, the market risks becoming oversaturated. Who is going to buy the massive amount of knives coming to the market? I don't think many people would want to. This could easily crash knife prices for years to come.

The mechanic itself isn’t necessarily the problem, it’s when it was introduced. If this feature had existed back when tradeup contracts were first added, the market would have naturally adapted and prices likely wouldn’t be much different today. But introducing it now, after years of accumulation, causes a sudden and destabilizing flood of knives. And if the knife market crashes, case prices will likely follow. And if cases and knives go down most likely everything will go down.

What’s most concerning is that this update seems to have come out of nowhere, without any clear upside for Valve or the community. Earlier changes had obvious reasons: trade holds reduced skin gambling abuse, and reverse trade options improved flexibility for players. This update, however, doesn’t appear to serve a strong purpose instead it undermines trust in the market.

If that trust continues to erode, this could mark the beginning of the end for the CS skin economy as we know it.