Indeed you can’t eliminate risk but you can manage it.

Firstly to make this work you will need to run a bot that keeps tabs of the renters mtgo accts so this can be automated. Then you assign limits – a new account might be limited to a 10tix transaction which slowly increases as they make good on their promises. Then to ensure buyback you can price the cards slightly above market, say a bloodstained mire has a value of 9tix online, you as rental-shop bot will ask for 11 tix and in a week the buyback gives the renter back 10.7 effectively charging them 0.3tx for the rental.

With the prob. of players not having capital there is no easy counterargument. But any standard player will have to cough up the 200-300 tix for a deck anyway. It just gives them a choice of exposing that 230 tix to the ups and downs or convert it to a fixed cost.

What you’re saying makes sense, but without some way to enforce the buyback transaction, it’s impossible. Impossible with the current client, as far as I can tell.

That system might work for speculators/short-sellers who have extra capital to sink into the whole operation. But for players looking to play Constructed on the cheap, it’s a total nonstarter. And the broke Constructed players are exactly your target market.

The deposit/guaranty system is what needs to be worked out. I’ll be curious to know how and what Sparedeck is doing. Card prices are much higher IRL and they seem do be doing it.
You can also apply more fees to compensate for potential problems.

If these are essential problems to be solved to set a liable rental business on MTGO, the model seems financially doable (at least theoretically).

You make a Repo trade (repurchase agreement).

Sell and buyback at the later date for the cost less rental. As the sell side you build up the reputation to honour the agreement to buyback, and can use an account to deal with the fraction of the tix.

Buyback is not optional, both parties should be bound to wind up the transaction at the agreed date. You do bear the risk of the card spiking and them keeping the card but if the lend out period is short the risk is small and you will ban them from trading with you again.

That’s what I was thinking, without solving the problem of how to make sure you get your cards back, the whole article is intellectually interesting, but not practical…

Obviously a deposit would be a good idea… But how to market it?

I think the main problem stems from security, and having any leverage to get the cards back? With no contracts, leverage, or any official policing they can happily just KEEP your cards without being effectively punished?