In the early stages of the panic over a possible ban on standard capacity magazines, people were shutting down websites because they were getting slammed with so many orders.  When it finally became clear that there wasn't going to be a ban, prices dipped, but now they seem to be trending upwards again.

I bought some extra mags during the panic, not out of need but for my collection.  I bought some slab-side Russians and some regular Russian AK mags.  The regular ones were blocked to 15-round capacity but that is easily fixed.  I thought about selling them to some folks in Colorado due to their limit on capacity and the fact that a few of them were sloppily refinished and I didn't want to mess with refinishing them myself, but now with current prices I'm reluctant to part with them.

Did milsurp mag prices take a general jump after the ban on stuff from Russia?  Is it because there are many more people getting into the AK game?  A combination of those two factors plus others?

I think it is a combination of factors.

The ban on Russian imports has created a mild panic-even though the majority of surplus mags we see are not Russian.  The fact is the Russian situation has shown that with the stroke of a pen, supplies of materials can be cut off.  Those that aren't already stocked up are trying to do so now.

Surplus mags seem to come either in a trickle, or in large waves.  I think we are currently in "trickle" mode, so the supply is lower and prices are remaining higher.

I think it's simply a matter of availability. If you want good quality used milsurp, SGAmmo has them at $8 all day. Whenever a new shipment of unissued milsurp mags comes in, prices for those mags decrease. When they're gobbled-up, prices go back up. Used, mixed-origin mags, however, have stayed pretty steady at $8-10. Obviously, that's more than they fetched 20 years ago, but still a hell of a lot less than 3 years ago.

I think $8 is quite fair but I have no reference point.

I'm sure this will get locked soon, you can't even think about buying or selling anything in this forum.

IMHO, buy mags you need at a price point your comfortable with.

Based on that advice I will!

these are the salad days of magazines, but as many as you can now, they'll never be lower.

The SG ammo mags are a great deal, surprised they are still around.

Went from 7 to 4 since my order, a minute ago!  I'm in!

They were commonly $30 + during the AWB . all you need to do is remember that .

Oh, I have for AR mags and working on my stock of AK mags.

One thing that SHOULD have some influence on the market is that there are at least three US companies producing decent AK mags these days. Magpul, US Palm and even Tapco. Yea, I know not all of those are "tier 1" but for what they cost for a brand new mag you can't bitch a lot and honestly I've never had a problem with any of them even USED Tapco's that I bought for $4 apiece for range mags.