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Sunday 3 October 2021

Month end update - September 2021

As at the end of September 2021 my wealth is 123.8bn ISK after paying 1.3bn to upgrade Omega for another 30 days.  My wealth increased by 23.2bn in September.


This was therefore my best month to date, the prior best being back in March at +15.9bn, and comes on the back of a decent August of +13.6bn.

Sales of 118.3bn were a new record and the first time over 100bn for a month with the new alts at Rens and Hek contributing 18.2bn of sales on an alpha account.  The lower tax rates also helped.


Moving out of Structure Modifications

The decision at the end of July to move out of selling structure modifications due to fierce competition is paying off though still ongoing.

At the end of June my first step was to reduce all the prices of these items on sale in Dodixie and Amarr back down to Jita prices.  That meant writing down this stock by 8bn isk.  I then started to transport them back to Jita for sale.  This is ongoing and i suspect will take a few months to get done.

Mark downs so far (i.e. cutting the price below the price i bought them for) amount to 10bn isk so far.  I suspect i will need to do more though i did none in September.

I have about 15bn isk of these items left to sell.


Activity

I continue to come on once a day to update Sell orders and replace items sold.  About 30-45 minutes.

I focused more on Hek and Rens, using all the Sales slots an alpha account can (17 per alpha account).  They did 18bn of sales which is more than enough to justify spending Plex to create an Omega account, which i did.

In all, i did an average of 2.9bn sales per day.

The goal for 1bn profits per day which will need c7.5bn sales per day looks quite far off.  The lower taxes would technically reduce that 7.5bn requirement but i suspect the tax system will be adjusted back in places soon.


Review of the September aims

1) Plex the account - aim number one all the time - done

2) Move out of Structure Modifications market - ongoing

3) Revisit the Sales strategy - ongoing

4) Increase sales in Dodixie - done

5) Increase sales in Amarr - done

6) Review the Trading character in Rens to determine what best to sell - done

7) Review the Trading character in Hekto determine what best to sell - done



Reminder of my Current Business.

I operate with one omega account (paid for with plex) with three alts and now another (alpha) account with three alts - i am about to make this an Omega account also.

The main alt is a seller in Dodixie and the other alt is a seller in Amarr, two of the main trade hubs in Eve Online.  I am about to more seriously go into Rens and Hek.

The third alt sits in Jita and buys from Sell Orders, has these items couriered to the alts in Dodixie and Amarr who then put them onto these markets for sale.  Similarly, an alt on the other account sits in Jita and similarly supplies the alts in Rens and Hek.

The Jita alt also serves to sell items that i can no longer sell in Dodixie, Amarr, Rens or Hek.  For example, the Jita alt is selling the Structural Modification items.

I focus on slow moving but high margin items.  That keeps me away from fierce competition and i only need to sell an item once every 10 days to make good income.

For this side of my business, lets call it Merchanting or inter-regional trading, i want to generate income of 10bn isk per month after paying to Plex my account.  As i ramp up my Rens and Hek alts i would hope to see this 10bn comfortably beaten.

My business model evolves over time.  As my wealth increases i focus on higher value items.  I had evolved to only buying items in Jita for over 100m isk but this restricted the items i could sell so now i am going back to 70m isk.


End of Scarcity

I will talk about this in a coming post but it is clear to me that mineral values will fall and therefore anything manufactured from minerals will also fall in price.

Therefore, i need to be very careful what i try and sell that can be manufactured from minerals today.  I run the risk of cheaper items being manufactured and undercutting me.


Change in tax rates - temporary and permanent

Another item i will talk about in a coming post but for now i am not changing my strategy of seeking to make 25% margins on the Purchase cost in Jita.  I don't sell items that are price sensitive, if someone wants to buy an item i sell they will likely pay the price i am offering rather than fly over to Jita to get a cheaper price.


Analysis of Trading Profits

In total i made 118.3bn of sales in September which made me item profits of 31.5bn isk.

(item profit is the simply difference between sales done vs costs spent buying products, so before fees and taxes.  Because i don't yet invest i don't make any allowance for items still in stock - in part because i don't track the cost per item spent).

Overall, sales rose by a massive 37% in September to be the best level of sales done since the 90.8bn done in March, and that comes after a decent August where i did sales of 86.4bn.  Part of this will be the fire sale of some of the Structural Modification products which i estimated was around 8bn in August and around 12bn in September.  The profit on these sales is effectively nil.

For these Structural Modification products, i had 42bn of stock on sale which was written down to 34bn in July.  As at the end of August i had 27bn and at the end of September 15bn.

I had let these items become too much of my sales book and so was exposed to the risk of a competitor coming in.  Lesson noted.

Dodixie sales were up 21% to 48bn and Amarr sales were up 1% to 36bn.  Dodixie therefore hit a new record whilst Amarr is still plodding along at a respectable 36bn vs the March 2021 record of 45bn.

Rens did 10bn and Hek did 8bn.  That was a good showing for what were done via an alpha account and created more than enough isk to justify moving up to an Omega account by spending 1.3bn isk.

I also invested 2.8bn into 1000 Plex - i want to build up a stock of Plex for a rainy day if i hit tough times and need to Omega the accounts.

From these sales i made item profits of 31.5bn.

This therefore was an item margin of 26.6% (31.5/118.3) vs my target of 25%.  So, my margins remain on track.  This is calculated after the 2.8bn spent on the Plex, so they margins would have been better.

Since September 2020 the item margin range had been 28% to 32% up to April 2021 but since then as been in the 25-27% range.  Nothing to be concerned about and if the tax changes stay permanent i may seek to reduce that margin target down to 20%.

From this I then need to take a whole series of costs off before i get to my Business profits:

Courier Fees: i aim to pay 2% of sales value to the Courier = 2% x 118.3= 2.4bn

Sales tax cost me 1.5bn ISk (=1.3% of sales) - the Dodixie and Amarr characters are level 5 in Accounting, the Rens and Hek characters and level 0 and so their sales at full tax rate pushed the average rate higher.  However, the new temporary reduction in Sales Tax is helping.

Broker Fees costs me 3.1bn (=2.6% of sales).  Now, i can break this down into the initial listing fee of 1.0% (because i am Level 5 Broker Relations on both main characters and lets to make the sums easier exclude the Rens and Hek sellers for now) and therefore the rest is the cost of changing the price which is 0.16% a shot (i may have that 0.16% completely wrong!).

So, Listing Fee = 1.0% x 118.3 = 1.2bn and so the Relisting Fee = 3.1-1.2 = 1.9bn which is 1.62% of sales.

This takes my 'Business Profits' to 24.5bn isk for September vs 16.9bn in August.  This is what 20-30 minutes a day in September gave me.

So, the post-tax margin is 20.7% (24.5/118.3) which is the highest level i have achieved.  Very much helped by the tax changes.

Fees and Taxes used to take 12.0% off my margins but in August they only too 5.5% off and in September 5.9% - some of this will reverse at some point.

And then from those 'Business Profits' i buy Plex for 1.3bn isk to extend the Omega by 30 days.  This will now be twice as much as i will Omega both my accounts going forwards at an estimated cost of 2.8bn per month.

That, therefore, is the roadmap from making 118.3bn of sales and seeing my wealth increase by 23.2bn as a result.


Items i am selling in Dodixie, Amarr, Rens and Hek

I sell blueprints, skill books, implants and ship equipment.  Blueprints are making a come back - this may be because of school holidays and / or the end of scarcity coming.  That said the market remains slow so there are not many competitors.

Implants are still doing ok - i am still expanding into more types and moving up the isk value curve.  I now only focus on implants to sell for at least 150m isk.  This is a slow but nice market for me.  Can be competitive at times.

Skill books are a low income generator for me but there are still a few nice sellers.

Ship Equipment has slowed down recently, supply had really dried up in Jita.  Did better in September as Jita started to re-stock.

Rigidly sticking to the 25% margin target.  Courier fees and taxes used to take a whopping 12% of that but now only 5-6%.  If the tax changes stay permanent then i may reduce this 25% margin target 


Dodixie Seller character (Tax rates quoted below not adjusted for recent changes)

This remains my main character and has regained its slot as the largest seller.

I have now trained all the relevant skills to Level 5.

The skills relevant to Trading that i have are:

Accounting: Level 5; means i am charged 2.25% of the sales price on completed sale vs the normal 5%.  Currently, with the tax changes this is 1.125%.

Broker Relations: Level 5; means i am charged 3.49% to list an item for sale.  Currently, with the tax changes this is 1.0%.

Advanced Broker Relations: Level 5; means i can reduce the cost of changing the price of items i already have for sale. I decided by train this rather than go all for Plex.  With no skill i would be charged 1.89% to change every price.  Level 5 has brought this down to 0.94%.  Currently, with the tax changes this is 0.16%.

Trade: Level 5; increases the number of items i can list for sale by 4 per level.

Retail: Level 5; increases the number of items i can list for sale by 8 per level

Wholesale: Level 5 (increased by two levels in January); increases the number of items i can list by 16 per level

Marketing: Level 3 (increased by one level in January); this allows me to set up Sell Orders in stations other than the one i am in; it also allowed me to look to increase my Contracting skills which i will need to sell my BPO copies from invention

Given the level 5 Trade, level 5 Retail and level 5 wholesale, i am able to post 145 items for sale (5 + (5x4) + (5x8) + (5x16)).  With no Trading skills you can post up to 5 sell orders

I may have to train Tycoon which will give me an additional 32 slots per level.


Amarr Seller character (Tax rates quoted below not adjusted for recent changes)

I have now trained all the relevant skills to Level 5.

The skills relevant to Trading that i have are:

Accounting: Level 5; means i am charged 2.25% of the sales price on completed sale vs the normal 5%.  Currently, with the tax changes this is 1.125%.

Broker Relations: Level 5; means i am charged 3.49% to list an item for sale.  Currently, with the tax changes this is 1.0%.

Advanced Broker Relations: Level 5; means i can reduce the cost of changing the price of items i already have for sale. I decided by train this rather than go all for Plex.  With no skill i would be charged 1.89% to change every price.  Level 5 has brought this down to 0.94%.  Currently, with the tax changes this is 0.16%.

Trade: Level 4; increases the number of items i can list for sale by 4 per level.

Retail: Level 5; increases the number of items i can list for sale by 8 per level

Wholesale: Level 2; increases the number of items i can list by 16 per level

Marketing: Level 2; this allows me to set up Sell Orders in stations other than the one i am in; i don't use this really

Given the level 4 Trade, level 5 Retail and Wholesale Level 2, i am able to post 93 items for sale (5 + (4x4) + (5x8) + (2x16).

This market is much more competitive so it is harder to find items to make a good sale - but is still very profitable.


Rens and Hek characters

I want to see if i can make some decent sales in these trade hubs.  I don't want to target much but if i could get to post plex profits of say 3bn isk per month for minimal work then that would be ideal.

I restocked in September and the outcome was positive.  Therefore, at the start of October i upgraded this account to Omega and started to train the characters to be get to the level of the Dodixie and Amarr characters.


Courier Contracts

Each night, i get home from work and determine what i need to sell in Dodixie and Amarr, and now Rens and Hek.  I tend to focus on one location per night unless i need to courier over 1.5bn isk of items to both locations.  So Dodixie one night, Amarr the next.  Keeps my time on Eve to a manageable 45 minutes which includes looking for potential new items to sell.

To look up prices in Eve I am using Eve Tycoon which seems to have more of the latest items in its market browser.  I used to use evemarketer but i just got used to Eve Tycoon.

Each night i courier about 2 to 8bn isk of items from Jita.  The total cargo volume is 10-250m3 per shipment.  So small but valuable items.  But this allows the couriers to use small, fast ships with much less chance of being ganked.  So there is always someone willing to pick up the contract quickly.

I pay a generous 1.5 to 2.0% of collateral as fees.  I am more interested in getting my items onto the market quickly than penny pinching on distribution costs.




Nothing, yet, todo with my Eve Business ventures but just noting that in December i set up a website site eveeconomy.com which takes the monthly economic data provided by CCP and visualises it in chart form.

Loads of charts and more i can add.

I need to work out how to render the charts faster - right now they are accessed from a google drive given that is the way i have worked out how to update multiple charts at once quickly.

Let me know what you think and what else i should add.



Outlook

October will have seven aims:

1) Plex both the accounts - aim number one all the time

2) Move out of Structure Modifications market

3) Increase sales in Dodixie

4) Increase sales in Amarr

6) Increase sales in Rens

7) Increase sales in Hek
 
The daily sales in September averaged 2.8bn.

If i assume i need to make 10bn + 2.8bn income per month (=12.8bn) and i assume i can achieve 15.0% margin then i need to make monthly sales of 85bn and so daily sales of 2.8bn.

So far i have achieved this in December, January, March, April, August and now September.


Current wealth is 123.8bn ISK made up from:
  • Plex held as an investment 2.8bn ISK
  • Items in hanger for sale 1.2bn ISK
  • Buy orders on the market 0.0bn ISK
  • items for sale 133.8bn ISK
  • less a 20% provision 26.8bn ISK*
  • ISK in wallet 12.7bn ISK

When i add up my wealth, 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 or are used to generate isk that can be readily resold back onto the market.  Any ships or skills or fittings etc i buy are counted as expenses in that month.

* 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.