Valve took a sledgehammer to Counter Strike 2 The Skin Market is in a “minor update” that allows players to trade five common Covert skins for some pretty rare cosmetics for your knives and gloves.
This may not seem like a big deal, in fact it probably sounds like a good way to allow casual players to replace old skins they don't like with something more polished. Here's the rub: Counter Strike 2 skins can be sold on the Steam market, and knife/glove skins have historically sold for serious money.
To understand why, you need to know the main method of earning skins. In Counter Strike 2, players open weapon boxes using skins. These are mostly loot boxes containing weapon skins, and the rarest gold prize you can get from these boxes are knife and glove skins. Different weapon cases contain different variants of knives and gloves, for example, the Prisma 2 case drops a Stiletto knife with a random camouflage on it.
So, before a little update if you wanted Really Cool looking knife, these gun cases had to pay real money and try your luck to get the knife. Alternatively, you can buy the knife you need. For reference, a knife I like, the Stiletto Slaughter, sold on October 9th for around £671.
However, fast forward to today, the same knife sold for just £222. This is due to an update. You can now trade five hidden rare skins for a knife, which suddenly increased the supply of knives on the market, causing knife prices to suddenly drop across the board.
As a result, on a macro level, the entire market capitalization of Counter Strike 2 skins fell by 28.11 percent. According to market analytics website CS2 Price Empire. In other words, that's almost $2 billion in less than a week. That's because Valve has made it easier to purchase certain cosmetic items in its popular game.
So this is a shocking number, but is it a good thing? This of course depends on what position you are in. If you are a casual player with some cool skins and feel like you are missing out on knife skins due to the expensive market surrounding them, this is definitely a great upgrade for you. This isn't so great if you've invested in Counter Strike 2 cosmetics rather than, you know, stocks, a savings account, etc. In fact, it's potentially devastating for people who have chosen to invest some of their wealth in Counter Strike skins over the years.
So give it out to Counter Strike 2 players whose inventory is down about 30% plus, and if you have an old Counter Strike account that you haven't opened in a while, why not download the game again and see if you can get a fancy knife!
