Key Highlights
- Valve introduced a “knife crafting” system, letting players trade five Covert skins for a knife or gloves, bypassing random case openings.
- The update triggered a market shock, with knife and glove values plunging by as much as 50% due to reduced rarity.
- In response, prices for Covert (red) quality skins, now essential for crafting, have skyrocketed by approximately 30%.
- A crucial catch: all knives and gloves created through this new system are currently untradable and cannot be sold on the Steam Market.
Market Upended by New Crafting System
Valve has released a monumental update for Counter-Strike 2 (CS2), sending shockwaves through the multi-million dollar skin economy with the introduction of a new trade-up contract for knives and gloves. This “knife crafting” feature fundamentally alters how players obtain the game’s most coveted items.
The system allows players to trade in five Covert (red) quality weapon skins from the same collection to craft either a knife or a pair of gloves. This provides a direct path to acquiring items that were previously locked behind the luck-based system of opening cases, drastically changing their accessibility and rarity.
A Tale of Two Markets: Price Swings
The economic fallout was immediate and severe, creating a volatile and unpredictable trading environment. The market split into two clear trends.
Covert Skins Skyrocket in Value
The prices for Covert-quality weapon skins, now seen as essential crafting materials, surged dramatically. Items like the AK-47 | Nightwish and AWP | Chromatic Aberration saw their values soar as players and traders rushed to acquire them for the new trade-up contracts. Within 24 hours of the update, popular Covert skins experienced an average price increase of around 30%.
- A Minimal Wear AK-47 | Nightwish jumped approximately 29.7% to $135.
- A Factory New Glock-18 | Gold Toof rose 28.2% to $120.
Knife and Glove Prices Plummet
Conversely, the value of existing knives and gloves experienced a sharp and immediate decline. With their exclusivity diminished, prices for many popular items dropped between 20% and over 50%.
- A Factory New Karambit | Doppler fell 32% to around $740.
- A Factory New Butterfly Knife | Fade dropped 28% to $690.
- A Well-Worn Navaja Knife | Crimson Web crashed by a staggering 53% to just $95.
The Big Catch: Crafted Items Are Untradable
In a critical move, Valve has made all knives and gloves obtained through these new trade-up contracts untradable. They also cannot be sold on the Steam market. It remains unclear whether this is a temporary measure to stabilize the market or a permanent feature. This restriction prevents a flood of newly crafted items but adds a significant layer of complexity for traders, impacting the long-term value of crafting.
A New Era for the CS2 Economy
This CS2 trade update is set to permanently reshape the landscape of skin trading. Covert skins have now effectively become a new tier of currency, valued for their crafting potential rather than just their appearance. While the increased access to knives may be a welcome change for casual players, it has undeniably devalued the massive inventories held by long-time collectors and high-volume traders. The future of the CS2 skin economy remains uncertain as the community adapts to its new reality.