30 in 30: Opportunity Cost

30 in 30 is a series of 30 investing and trading tips, 1 posted each day over the course of September leading up to the FIFA 21 release in October. Below is a list of the tips we have seen already.

  1. TOTW Investing
  2. OOP TOTW Golds
  3. SBC Gems
  4. Perfect Positions
  5. Frequent Acronyms
  6. EA Tax
  7. ROI Potential
  8. MM Investing
  9. High Traffic Times
  10. Promo Investing
  11. Icons and WL Rewards
  12. Quick Sell Values
  13. Live Cards
  14. Two Birds One Stone
  15. Chief’s Buy Price
  16. Listing for Lazies
  17. New Filters
  18. UCL MM
  19. Price Ranges
  20. FUTBIN Indexes
  21. Best of CBP
  22. Opportunity Cost

It happens every year. The web app drops, people pack someone with value, and they ask themselves, “When should I sell ___?”. Bad news. There isn’t an easy answer to that, and in order to choose the best course of action it is important to understand one concept: opportunity cost.

Opportunity cost – the loss of potential gain from other alternatives when one alternative is chosen.

Let’s take an example. You pack Messi on the official FIFA 21 release day (October 9th). When you pack him, he is worth 900k. You decide to wait until the next weekend to sell as you anticipate the market to go up in value. On October 16th, he is 1.1 million. You are happy that you made an extra 200k, but you didn’t take into consideration opportunity cost from holding Messi rather than putting the coins in other investments.

Historically, OTW gold cards the safest and most profitable investment early on (see FIFA 18, FIFA 19, and FIFA 20). Rather than holding onto your Messi for that 22% return, a better option would be to sell him and use those coins to reinvest in players that could offer you a better ROI as OTW gold cards typically have returns higher than 22%.

Determining the correct course of action after packing a player isn’t always easy. Understanding opportunity cost can help you make the right choice. And, as always, you can comment on the website if you are ever unsure.

Cheers,
Chief