Time Is Money: Profit off the Titansteel cooldown removal
Time Is Money periodically allows Basil a place to post inane nonsense and market predictions which rarely pan out. Still reading? Don't say I didn't warn you.
As we all read, miners will be able to smelt Titansteel after patch 3.3.3 with no cooldown. What will this mean for you, and how can you make money from this change? Let's start by quickly evaluating the Titansteel production chain.
Saronite Ore is farmed by miners
Saronite Bars are smelted by miners
Titanium Bars are transmuted by alchemists
Titansteel Bars are smelted with an Eternal Fire, Earth, and Shadow
Where in this do we see people mining Titanium Veins and smelting the Titanium Ore? We don't. Since the cooldown was removed from the alchemist's transmute titanium ability, the ore is no longer worth smelting. Saronite is always cheaper.
Titansteel Ripple
Right now, the supply of Titansteel has an artificial limit-- miners can only make one every day. Well, technically every 20 hours, but who's counting. Once this restriction is lifted, we can expect to see a few changes to the supply and demand of all the mats. We can count on people mass-producing Titansteel Bars as soon as they're able to, which means that miners will be buying Titanium Bars in bulk, which will also increase the demand on Saronite.
This increase in supply of Titansteel will lower its price, and that will mean people will buy more of it. If someone was holding off on an expensive BoE, this reduction might put it into their price range. That means that the demand for other items that go into BoE gear will increase. I'm predicting that Primordial Saronite, at the least, will see a spike in demand for a couple of days after the patch, and I bought 9 of them just in case I'm right. For a full list of items that might see a spike in demand, check the "reagent for" tab in Wowhead for Titansteel Bars.
Eternals and Frozen Orbs
Something else to consider with the patch is the demand for eternals we'll be seeing. Right now, Frozen Orbs are going for triple what they did before the patch announcements, and while these can be turned into Eternal Fires, they might be worth more as Frost Lotus, depending on when the recent increase in supply starts having an effect on prices. I have seen people bragging about the massive quantity of these Frozen Orbs they've managed to stockpile, but in the long run, the fact that they're dropped every time someone runs a random heroic is probably more significant.
Too long, didn't read
Long story short, my personal plan for profiting off this change in patch 3.3.3 is to:
Buy Saronite
Transmute it all
Sell as much Titanium as I can to speculators before the patch
Sell as much Titanium as I can to miners after the patch
Buy Primordial Saronite now for resale the day of the patch
Being an auctioneer is like being able to print money. Or gold, as it were. Wait, that doesn't make sense... you can print on gold, but you can't print gold. That would be closer to transmutation? I can transmute titanium, but that's only worth it if the price of saronite is low enough to justify the time spent making it. I need some sort of analogy here. Whatever, I'll figure it out later. Making gold? Periodically, Time Is Money will give you short tips on how to make money.
