Posted on 11/02/2017 5:22:25 AM PDT by marktwain
Is the scarcity of .22 LR ammunition over? In this screenshot from an online ammunition search engine, you can see that .22 LR ammunition prices have dropped below 4 cents a round in some cases.
Federal American Eagle is as low as 3.8 cents per round, the Federal champion 510 round is just under 4 cents a round, and there are several offerings of Aquila Super Extra Standard Velocity from 3.7 cents to 4 cents a round.
The 3.8 cents per round Federal American Eagle ammunition is available at Ammo King. The 3.7 cents per round Aquila Super Extra .22 LR Standard Velocity 40 Gr LRN is at AmmoMen. The Federal 510 Champion .22 Long Rifle Solid 40 Gr LRN high velocity has a 10 box limit at Ammo Fast.
I predicted that LR bulk ammunition would be below 4 cents a round in October, 2017. This verifies the prediction, but all of the above are in 50 round boxs, not bulk packs. Bulk packs should be cheaper because the packaging for 50 round boxes raises the price a bit.
Here is the prediction made on 15 November, 2016, nearly a year ago:
I expect the demand for .22 ammunition to drop when the reality of a Trump administration hits home. The current protests and riots are not helping. Nor are the conspiracy theories about a Trump assassination.
After President Trump is safely inaugurated, and starts to move his legislative agenda, demand will drop and prices will fall.
I expect bulk .22 ammunition to be available for 4 cents a round by October of 2017.
Bulk .22 ammunition is becoming available in stores across the nation. Limits have been taken off
(Excerpt) Read more at ammoland.com ...
I never understood the rationale for the shortage. Varmint hunting for food? I don’t get it.
Walmart is open but i am out of town for a week.
I never understood the rationale for the shortage. Varmint hunting for food? I don’t get it.
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Barter?
joe six pack’s gold
OMG! That’s the problem with our gun culture, people can be murdered for under 4 cents. Why else do places like Chicago have such high murder rates?!! Those bullets should have a $400 per round tax! (with the left over $399.96 funneled to the DNC)
Sorry, just trying to think like a lib.
Twice in 2017 I was able to buy CCI Mini-Mags for $0.07 per round, which was the pre-2008 pricing.
Obama was buying as many rounds as he could to keep them out of the hands of private citizens. In other words, he “created” the shortage, because the factories only have so much capacity. Now that we don’t have the government buying every round, there’s an oversupply as companies maintained their production levels.
I never understood the rationale for the shortage. Varmint hunting for food? I don’t get it.
Total productive capacity in the U.S. was 4 billion rounds a year. If 10 million decided to buy 1,000 rounds, demand just shot up to 10 billion.
It has taken 5 years to produce the ammo, ramp up production to 5-6 billion a year, and meet the demand.
That was hampered by manufactures who only raised prices very, very slowly, so as to not be accused of price gouging.
Middle men purchased as fast as possible and ramped up prices to 4-6 times previous levels.
As soon as .22 ammo was delivered to WalMart it was purchased at the absurd “normal” price. Then the purchaser would take it to a gun show or advertise on line. They were able to quadruple their money.
A classic bubble, which is finally deflating, with the election of President Trump.
” when the reality of a Trump administration hits home” LOL! Hey Dean. There are a LOT of ‘deniers’ out there that will never face that reality. Just ask hildabeast.
Bet it cost more than that to rent that weapon of mass murder the other day in NYC.
Once most people reached their inventory comfort level sale dropped off. Most fellow preppers say a 10K round .22LR inventory is comfortable to pass on to their grandchildren. That’s not the practice or fun plinking rounds inventory though.
What most people don’t grasp about “the law of supply and demand” is that there’s usually a hard limit on supply.
For gasoline, ammo, food, etc, the fluctuations in demand usually remain well within production capacity, so prices adjust smoothly to ease that demand up/down to optimize use of production. Long-term trends are usually predicted, and production capacity (usually very expensive to install) is increased over time to match.
The problem is when demand skyrockets, like with gasoline during approach of a hurricane, or ammo during a bout of “they’re gonna ban it” fears: demand spikes, most people can afford to buy abnormally large quantities, supply runs out, shortage itself sparks increased demand for anything that does become available, cycle continues, ... and production cannot be suitably increased, both because there simply isn’t time/resources (taking years and $millions), and the increased production would only be needed during the brief spike in demand (not worth spending on new production which won’t be needed when supply-v-demand stabilizes again).
For ammo in particular:
- Supply optimizes to meet demand, manufacturing running a little faster than consumption.
- “GUN BAN COMING SOON!!!!#!@!” freaks people out.
- People look at their ammo supply, wallets, and store shelves, and decide “you never know, so might as well buy >10x my usual amount while I can; it will keep and I’ll use it later anyway.”
- Shelves of ammo usually stocked to match supply suddenly run out in 1/10th the usual time. Maybe faster, as a few guys walk in and buy everything for what really isn’t that much for those with sufficient cash/savings to spare.
- Shelves are empty.
- The next customers freak out. There’s no ammo. Can’t buy any even though it’s legal and they have money.
- Shipment comes in, the usual small amount needed to keep the shelves full during normal demand.
- This isn’t normal demand.
- Freaked-out customers buy everything they can, which isn’t much. Guys who usually buy $20 of .308 (leaving plenty for others to buy) are perfectly willing to drop $400 on the entire delivery of .308 that just came in (leaving nothing for others to buy). Actual Walmart conversation @ 5AM: “Got any 9mm?” “Shipment of 3000 rounds just came in.” “I’ll take it.” “How many rounds?” “All of it.”
- Manufacturers can’t make enough to match demand.
- At some point, everyone will have either bought enough (I wanted to buy more, but actually I’ve got more than I can shoot without outright wasting it), or the cause for demand ends (Hillary lost).
- Manufacturers aren’t going to double production capacity, a process costing $millions and taking months/years to build, just because of a temporary run on ammo.
- .22LR suffers in particular because it’s so cheap that every “just in case” person finds it easy to buy everything that hits the store shelves.
- Eventually, everyone bought enough, and Trump took office. The fear of gun banning ended, demand waned, and supply finally started to match demand.
My word I’m verbose when starting the day in a quiet house.
Upshot: when supply runs short, and you don’t want to run out of a shelf-stable consumable, and prices are affordable even when several times normal, you buy what you can when you can. Result is a self-sustaining shortage.
What most people don’t grasp about “the law of supply and demand” is that there’s usually a hard limit on supply.
For gasoline, ammo, food, etc, the fluctuations in demand usually remain well within production capacity, so prices adjust smoothly to ease that demand up/down to optimize use of production. Long-term trends are usually predicted, and production capacity (usually very expensive to install) is increased over time to match.
The problem is when demand skyrockets, like with gasoline during approach of a hurricane, or ammo during a bout of “they’re gonna ban it” fears: demand spikes, most people can afford to buy abnormally large quantities, supply runs out, shortage itself sparks increased demand for anything that does become available, cycle continues, ... and production cannot be suitably increased, both because there simply isn’t time/resources (taking years and $millions), and the increased production would only be needed during the brief spike in demand (not worth spending on new production which won’t be needed when supply-v-demand stabilizes again).
For ammo in particular:
- Supply optimizes to meet demand, manufacturing running a little faster than consumption.
- “GUN BAN COMING SOON!!!!#!@!” freaks people out.
- People look at their ammo supply, wallets, and store shelves, and decide “you never know, so might as well buy >10x my usual amount while I can; it will keep and I’ll use it later anyway.”
- Shelves of ammo usually stocked to match supply suddenly run out in 1/10th the usual time. Maybe faster, as a few guys walk in and buy everything for what really isn’t that much for those with sufficient cash/savings to spare.
- Shelves are empty.
- The next customers freak out. There’s no ammo. Can’t buy any even though it’s legal and they have money.
- Shipment comes in, the usual small amount needed to keep the shelves full during normal demand.
- This isn’t normal demand.
- Freaked-out customers buy everything they can, which isn’t much. Guys who usually buy $20 of .308 (leaving plenty for others to buy) are perfectly willing to drop $400 on the entire delivery of .308 that just came in (leaving nothing for others to buy). Actual Walmart conversation @ 5AM: “Got any 9mm?” “Shipment of 3000 rounds just came in.” “I’ll take it.” “How many rounds?” “All of it.”
- Manufacturers can’t make enough to match demand.
- At some point, everyone will have either bought enough (I wanted to buy more, but actually I’ve got more than I can shoot without outright wasting it), or the cause for demand ends (Hillary lost).
- Manufacturers aren’t going to double production capacity, a process costing $millions and taking months/years to build, just because of a temporary run on ammo.
- .22LR suffers in particular because it’s so cheap that every “just in case” person finds it easy to buy everything that hits the store shelves.
- Eventually, everyone bought enough, and Trump took office. The fear of gun banning ended, demand waned, and supply finally started to match demand.
My word I’m verbose when starting the day in a quiet house.
Upshot: when supply runs short, and you don’t want to run out of a shelf-stable consumable, and prices are affordable even when several times normal, you buy what you can when you can. Result is a self-sustaining shortage.
Good summary. Pretty much what happened with .22.
Will have to check - stocked up with several thousand rounds when the shortage was hitting and events have kept me from doing much plinking so I haven’t checked recently.
Agreed.
You explained it well.
Wake me up when a case of Mini Mags is $225 delivered ...
Hoarders. They bought up what they could as soon as it hit stores and then resold it at a higher prices at their own stores. Or just hoarded it.
Thi sis what precipitated the '2 box per customer' rule at Walmart.
Prices are down but walmart still has a 3 box/day limit.
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