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Sunday 2 June 2019

Month End Update May 2019

At the end of my second month my wealth is 16.1bn isk.  An increase of 5.8bn isk over the month.

I also had to fund a 2.2bn Plex payment, so compared to the prior month's increase of 7.3bn this month my wealth rose 8.0bn before Plex costs.

Not ideal i feel, i had a poor week mid month.

Two things i have learned.

1) I need to visit the game once a day to stay competitive - even if only for 10 minutes

2) I need to keep selling items that sell for 70m isk as well as items that sell for 700m isk.  I cant just rely on the 700m isk items alone.

Also, that is the last time i will talk about wealth before Plex costs.  The monthly Plex bill is a reality and i just need to cover it.  So next month i am looking to beat the 5.8bn increase.

The good news here is that i am comfortably playing one account for free and could happly play 2 accounts easily for free.  That is the aim.



Plex

I don't have any Plex sitting in my hanger right now.  I will start buying a bit of Plex each day until i need to cash it in for extended game play.  That is always the plan - rather than wait until the last day.

Over time, i will build up some surplus Plex to give me some flexibility.


Strategy

Has remained the same.  45 minutes play time each day and a bit more at the weekends . . . . . though i do have a habit of sitting there logged on whilst i do work at my desk.

I currently operate my business with three characters who don't undock.

There is a buyer in Jita who buys from Sell orders and then contracts couriers to transport these items to a seller in Dodixie or a seller in Amarr who put the items up for sale.  This buyer in Jita is also doubling up as a manufacturer - more on that later (though don't hold your breath).

I focus on small cargo items (blueprints, implants and boosters) that sell once every 2 or 3 days and profit margins of over 20%.

Profit margin.  If something costs 80 and i sell it for 100 then the profit margin is (100-80)/100 = 20%.  I.e. it is the profit divided by the sales price.

I find the competition in Dodixie and Amarr in these items is low, slow and rational.

Big picture - i am playing on the fact that people at Dodixie or Amarr do not want to travel 15 or 9 umps to Jita to buy an item for a lower price.  They are willing to pay up to save time (and perhaps the risk).


Identifying items to sell

I use Evemarketer to find items to sell.  More specifically i have built a spreadsheet that pulls down the current selling prices for items in Jita, Amarr and Dodixie so that i can at least have a starting point to investigate further.

I will build this spreadsheet further when i have time to add daily volume into the equation also.  This will complete it and make it much easier for me to identify items to sell.


Dodixie Seller

The main constraint to wealth generation is the amount of ISK i have to deploy.  I am now regularly making over 1.5bn ISK sales per day.

Working backwards, if my wealth has increased by 8.0bn then that indicates daily profits of 270m isk.

My costs are:
1) Courier Fees - i limit those to 1%
2) Broker Fees - 2.68% (i have Broker Level 3, working on that now)
3) Sales Tax - 1.4% (i have Account level 3, working on that now)

Make a few assumptions on cost of items vs sales of items and i basically come to the conclusion i am paying 5% of the sales price as fees.

So my 20% margin target turns to a 15% cash profit in my pocket.

I trained up further in Wholesale and so i can now post a maximum of 129 items for Sale compared to the 72 i have currently up for sale valued at 16.4bn isk.


Amarr Seller

This is new and currently this character has 9 items up for Sale for a total of 3.2bn isk.

He can post up to 65 items right now.

The original plan was to manufacture items near Jita and courier those items to be sold in Amarr.

However, it is taking me longer than expected to get a grip of manufacturing so instead i am buying from Sell orders in Jita and couriering to Amarr to sell.

Early days, i tend to put more than 1 of a type of item up for sale at any one time.

Lets see how it goes.

Costs are a little better than the Dodixie seller given this one has Accountancy at level 4 and Broker Relations at level 4.

The other part of this character is that he is training space flight to fly a covert interceptor into null sec to pick up cheaper blueprints to sell in Amarr and Dodixie.


Right now, i plan to fly a Victorieux Luxury Yacht unless anyone can think of a better cover ops ship to fly around null sec carrying expensive blueprints?  I am not skilled in flight - so anything that can stay cloaked in warp and is not affected by bubbles will do the trick.


Outlook

I am hoping i can do better in June.  The aim has to be for 7bn isk increase in wealth (after paying for Plex).

Aims for June:
1) Continue to expand the Dodixie trader sell orders
2) Plex the account and build up some surplus Plex.
3) Build up the Amarr trading business



Current wealth is 16.1bn ISK made up from:
  • items for sale 19.8bn ISK
  • less a 20% provision 4.0bn ISK*
  • Plex held (0 Plex) 0.0bn ISK
  • items in storage for sale 0.0 ISK
  • ISK in wallet 0.3bn ISK
I don't count assets I use in the course of my business such as ships, fittings etc nor do I add back any expenses such as skills purchased etc.  The wealth I disclose is made up of items that are ISK or are in the process of being converted to ISK.

* I take a 20% provision against the items I am selling.  Eve calculates wealth by adding up the value of the sell orders hence it is possible to increase your wealth by buying an item for 100m ISK and putting a sell order for 120m ISK (in this case your wealth would increase by 20m ISK).  For me, I want my wealth to be calculated at cost.  I know that the value of my sell orders will likely fall over time as I update my orders downwards as competition reduces their prices before my items are sold.  Hence the 20% provision is my best guess as to what the maximum reduction I would need to make to my sell orders as a whole before they are sold.  In an ideal world I would value my sell orders at the value which I bought the items for.

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