What's more important, Supply or Demand?

[mintacular]

Originally Posted by hcv123

Not so simple a question or answer, but both are relevant.

1) Textbook economics teaches that Price is determined where supply meets demand. Further there is a concept of "elasticity" of either that looks at the affect on price of a specific item or commodity based on changes in supply or demand. In other words how significantly does price change in response to a spike or decrease in supply or demand. ( To illustrate - In the case of a 1/1 A potential seller can try to "hold out" for any price he wants as he is the only one with the supply - if there are multiple potential buyers they likely know they are competing for a single in supply and the one who is willing to pay the most sets the price. If that 1/1 has no one that cares or wants it - the seller then must entice people by dropping his price as there is no demand and hopes to reach a point where someone will pay him for it) - very oversimplified, but hope it helps.

2) Some factors that are variables that come into play in our hobby world that in theory factor in to the above, but can cause significant variation are; 1) Current owners of cards I would argue have a wide range of prices paid and therefore more or less of a tolerance to sell at a higher or lower price. 2) inefficiency of markets/arbitrage/perceived supply and demand - best by example perhaps - I participate in numerous auctions across a handful of categories - just yesterday I was in a coin and jewelry auction - there was a Rolex watch that sold for $6700 against a house defined $8300-$10600 estimate. Was that a good price? I'm sure the buyer thought it was. A simple google search showed that I could buy the same watch in the same condition from 3 different vendors for about $5600. This is the definition of what I mean by inefficiency of markets. A potential buyer almost always is clueless about the availability of the item they want in all places where it is possibly available - which information would give them the ability to find the best price. There is also a time value and of course the desire factor which are other variables.

Probably already said too much. At the end of the day - buy what you enjoy!

Thank you for this, very insightful