Guild Wars 2

Toxsa.2701:

tern.7893:

In the real world, the Internet brought listing fees down to zero or almost zero. And guess what? The world did not end. Instead, transactions moved quickly onto the Web. Markets become more efficient. And more buyers and sellers became satisfied.

What we have in GW2 is a market failure. Lots of high-end goods are stuck simply because the sellers cannot afford or do not want to reprice them due to the exorbitant listing fees. This artificially reduces the supply, keeping prices overly high. The imbalance of power between buyer and seller also forces the latter — as some advise here — to potentially underprice their items by taking the highest buy offer.

If we abolish the listing fees instead, or turn them into into transaction fees, we immediately bring all of these items back onto the market. Sure, you will get sellers repricing every minute until they find the “correct” price. But that’s healthy and exactly what should happen. When prices are high, more sellers will compete. Then as prices decline — sometimes below cost — some sellers will leave the market, so supply falls accordingly. We eventually have what economists call an “equilibrium”.

So no, it’s not a bad thing for listing fees to be removed. For both buyers and sellers, it will make it easier to buy or sell the items you need. For Anet, my guess is that whatever losses in listing fees will be more than made up for by the increase in transactions. Just like in the real world.

Comparing real world to GW2 LOL..

Go check my first post and you’ll see why you make no-sense.
The no-life people will always undercut you by 1 extra copper, and kept on chipping the price down because EVERYONE can now do exactly what you did now.

Also because the seller has no risk of listing the fee, they can completely manipulated the market at their own free will. They can determine some insane price and wouldn’t have to worry about not able to sell out, and could always adjust the price, and the buying has no power to compete the market because now you have total control of market. In short, you want yours sold out and not others, period.

Your real life theory also doesn’t make sense if you look at the bigger picture.

In real life, if you sell something expensive or in large quantity, like a house and stock market, THERE IS A GREAT RISK IN SELLING YOUR GOODS. You could be undercut by inflation or housing preference change. You have to pay for the FIXED cost (Like construction fee, listing fee, promotion, marketing) regardless of how much you sell out your goods, and you have to make sure it makes break-even point after certain quantity of goods are produced.

This point is overstated. I still don’t understand why it’s so bad for people to undercut one another by 1 copper. There is a natural floor to the price of a product (see below), and ultimately the goal is not just to sell a product but to sell it at a profit.

Let’s say you are selling orichalcum plated dowels. Someone comes in to continually undercut you, and eventually sells below cost. What happens?

1. People who need orichalcum inscriptions will buy the dowels instead of buying mithril and orichalcum parts. Demand of orichalcum dowels increases.
2. Sellers of orichalcum dowels will stop making them, and instead sell the mithril and orichalcum components (or use them to make other items). Supply of orichalcum dowels decreases.
3. The net effect is that prices will be under pressure to rise. If you try to manipulate the market by fixing prices below cost, you will incur losses until you give up. And for what? The moment you let prices go up, demand falls and supply increases, and we are back to square one. Only difference is that you are now poorer than before.

So I don’t get the concern over market manipulation.

In the real world, the Internet brought listing fees down to zero or almost zero. And guess what? The world did not end. Instead, transactions moved quickly onto the Web. Markets become more efficient. And more buyers and sellers became satisfied.

What we have in GW2 is a market failure. Lots of high-end goods are stuck simply because the sellers cannot afford or do not want to reprice them due to the exorbitant listing fees. This artificially reduces the supply, keeping prices overly high. The imbalance of power between buyer and seller also forces the latter — as some advise here — to potentially underprice their items by taking the highest buy offer.

If we abolish the listing fees instead, or turn them into into transaction fees, we immediately bring all of these items back onto the market. Sure, you will get sellers repricing every minute until they find the “correct” price. But that’s healthy and exactly what should happen. When prices are high, more sellers will compete. Then as prices decline — sometimes below cost — some sellers will leave the market, so supply falls accordingly. We eventually have what economists call an “equilibrium”.

So no, it’s not a bad thing for listing fees to be removed. For both buyers and sellers, it will make it easier to buy or sell the items you need. For Anet, my guess is that whatever losses in listing fees will be more than made up for by the increase in transactions. Just like in the real world.