Here is the problem: how to be smarter than the others? Which cards to target for buying / reselling on Sorare? In a market regulated by supply and demand, how to find good deals? And when to resell? This article will only focus on buying, as this is the moment when you are most likely to control the parameters around you.
As for resale, there are probably some very good papers written by traders to explain the best time to resell a financial product. However, I tend to think that the approach would be limited by the particular parameters of soccer: injuries, hype, etc. I tend to think that reselling is a personal process, guided by your own risk appetite and your own answer to this question: get out or continue?
Besides… which cards to target for purchase/resale on Sorare?
The off-season effect
The off-season is one of the best times to do business. In most leagues, the off-season lasts approximately 2 months. Two full months without being able to use these players is an eternity for many players who prefer to resell their players and buy others in other active leagues. This results in an increase in supply at the end of the league, without any particular change in demand. This imbalance leads to a drop in the price of the cards, with each one of the sellers lowering their offer by 0.001 ETH to make their card more attractive.
Under these conditions, favour the beginning of the off-seasons to make deals, prices tend to fall at that time before rising again at the end of the mercato, when some people are in a panic buy situation. Personally, I had the opportunity this year to buy a Lukáš Hradecky at 0.320 ETH at the end of the season before selling him at 0.570 ETH a few days before the German championship resumed. Interesting, isn’t it?
Abusing the ups and downs
Well, let’s be honest, one of the best deals you can make is by taking advantage of another manager’s lack of information. You think that’s cruel, cynical, unethical? You’re absolutely right. But the original goal was to make money, not to make money ethically.
He who has the information, has the power. He who maintains it, holds the world.
Adam Smires
The trick occurs during the off-season, when key players from relegated clubs are transferred. With relegation the price of a player tends to drop quickly because the player will be unusable the next year, as his league is not covered by Sorare. In this interval the player appears with a red cross indicating that his scores will not be taken into account in So5. If you find out that the player is transferred during this period to a club supported by Sorare, it is possible to buy these players at a cheap price from Managers who do not have this information and sell them a few days later at a much higher price.
If you have read my article “Sorare review : How much have I earned after 6 months on the game?“, you could see that I had the opportunity to make a nice 214% capital gain on Vito van Crooij during the 2021 off-season thanks to this method.
Monitor long-term injuries
Another, more risky method, is to bet on players with a long term injury, like a cruciate ligament rupture for example. A player who is injured for a long time will not play anymore, and the value of the card will naturally drop, potentially very low. It is then possible to buy these players at a discount, betting on the fact that they will come back and regain their starting position when they return.
It’s a riskier bet, but if you have confidence in your target players, they can earn you a nice capital gain when they return to the field. You have to be willing to tie up funds on players with no immediate use, with a risk that they might relapse.
As an example, those who made the bet on Gerard Deulofeu in 2021 by buying him at 0.050 ETH during his injury will have had the pleasure of selling him back at double that amount when he returned. Risky, but potentially very profitable.
Search for players in bad shape
The price of the cards obeys the law of supply and demand, which also changes according to the performance of the players. Thus, it is possible to buy players in a bad situation at attractive prices and to sell them some time later when they are back in shape.
As such, I refer you to the excellent article by u/loveanalytics, originally posted on Sorare’s thread on Reddit/ You may find the relayed article here : The Beautiful Data #1: Form is temporary
Invest in substitute goalkeepers
When it comes to profitability, substitute goalkeepers are a great way to make big profits. However, there is a big disadvantage: you are tying up money on players who are useless in So5 and who will probably not earn you anything for a long time. However, when a replacement player becomes a starter, his price skyrockets, and it is not uncommon to make x5 to x10 compared to your initial investment. Lucrative, but constraining.
Finding youngsters
Already mentioned in my article Can you play without money at Sorare ?, youngsters are a great idea, but not without flaws. In practice, we are rarely the only ones to have thought of a good young player. In Sorare, as in real life, potential players are sometimes worth much more than experienced players who are already in their clubs. That is, if the player is available in Sorare. The clubs’ rosters are not exhaustive and some players, especially young players, are not present in the game. Finally, as Sorare is a French product that first exploded in Europe, it is not impossible that you will have difficulties to find affordable youngsters, as the community is probably like you: European, and therefore familiar with the same leagues as you.
Finally, if it is possible to find youngsters, they will have to assume their status and perform sufficiently to tip the balance between supply and demand in your favor to realize a surplus value. Just like the substitute goalkeepers, the potential is there, but it is long term, and without any real guarantee (other than your conviction).
Anticipate collection cards
It is difficult at this stage to evaluate the potential of Sorare cards. It is often much later that this potential is revealed, like video game cartridges or Pokémon cards for example. In this case, we are clearly dealing with a very long term potential, which will go far beyond the So5. Today, it is likely that the few cards of Leo Messi will be sold at a high price considering that they will be edited only for the last years of his career (very few cards will be available) and that the player has a global aura likely to interest the collectors’ market. Needless to say, this will probably require a budget far beyond the scope of this article.
However, it is possible to start a collection of cards that may be worth their weight in gold 20 years from now, but this mode, although potentially very lucrative, is the one that has the most drawbacks if you are in the culture of the moment. Personally, I don’t recommend that you go into the game with this in mind. Your collection may gain potential over the years, but don’t make it a goal!
Now you know which cards to target to make money through buying/reselling on Sorare.
Next week, we will see together HOW to make good deals thanks to the purchase / resale on Sorare.
See you soon,
