As at the end of August 2022 my wealth is 481bn ISK after paying 6.6bn to upgrade to Omega for another 30 days for three accounts. My Wealth increased by 34bn in August.
Another surprisingly strong month with both sales and profits better vs July despite the rising cost of Plex.
Another month of my wealth increasing by more than 1bn per day after all costs.
Part of the reason was similar to June and July - the item margin i was making was 29% against my normal target of 25%. That is, the difference between the Sales Price and the Cost Price divided by the Sales Price was 25% (buy something in Jita for 750m, sell it in Dodixie for 1bn is therefore 250m profit and 25% item margin).
The other explanation was the overall rise in sales by 12% driven by all my main Trade Hubs seeing better sales and more the offsetting the decline from a very high July level in Dodixie.
I suspect the item margin was again helped by the lower competition over the summer months due to less players being around.
So, summer feels slow but trading is being buoyed by less competition.
In the last 12 months i have made sales of 2.5 trillion isk and profits (after everything including Plex) of 380bn isk having spent 50bn on Plex.
The overall aim of what i do is to increase my wealth by at least 10bn per month. So far i have beaten that in 17 / 24 months i have been running this venture and indeed in all of the last 13 months.
Things i talk about below:
- summary of my activity
- the 1bn daily profit target which i achieved in August, and the required daily sales given the rising cost of plex
- Review of the aims i had for August which were mostly positive
- reminder of how i do this
- manufacturing efforts starting again / dabbling in Planetary Interaction
- Alts in other secondary locations
- normal discussion on Sales in my main trading hubs of Jita, Amarr, Dodixie, Rens, Hek, Sobaseki, Tash-Murkon Prime and a quick review of the alpha alt accounts
- the Outlook and Aims for September
Activity
I continue to come on once a day to update Sell orders and replace items sold. About 30-45 minutes.
Over 95% of my sales and profits still come from Regional Trading.
August felt slow and much less competitive than normal. Some very quiet days and some very busy days. First time i have seen sales of over 20bn isk in one day.
Sales rose 12% to 218bn: in my main trading locations sales were up everywhere except Dodixie and Tash-Murkon; in the alpha accounts sales fell 28% to 13bn driven by a decline in sales in my hopeful locations in Alentene and Arnon.
I am hoping that Alentene and Arnon could combine to make an Omega account - but for now i am focusing on building up Manufacturing.
In Manufacturing i made item profits of 2.1bn isk from sales of 8.3bn isk - the margins are good. From that of course Transaction Tax and Broker Fees need to be taken off.
I made a slow start in Planetary Interaction - just really seeing what it is all about for now.
In all, i did an average of 7.0bn sales per day making 1.3bn isk per day before buying the Plex.
I had a few days where sales were over 10bn in August, and one day where sales were over 20bn isk.
Target 1bn profits per day after all taxes and plex costs
I have been talking about this aim though in the back of my mind i need to be sure i am not merely benefitting from elevated market activity following the changes made last year. I suspect i will be sure if it is a realistic aim by the end of the year.
It was a surprise to me that i achieved the 1bn daily profit target in July and then again in August. I am not sure about September - lets see.
Target daily sales required to achieve 1bn profits per day
In summary, i generally need to make 7.5bn sales per day assuming my item margin is 25%
As the cost of plex rises then my daily sales requirement also rises.
On the new taxation levels to make 30bn ISK per month i would need to cover:
- Plex costs of 3 x 500 x 4.7m = 7.1bn
- Courier costs 2% of sales (i.e. = purchase cost + collateral)
- Broker Listing fees 1.5% of sales
- Broker re-listing fees 0.3% of sales (lets assume all sales changed at least five times per month)
- Transaction Taxes 3.6% of sales
Bottom line is that assuming i make my 25% profit margins then each 1bn of sales creates profits of 164m and these go towards buying Plex for the Omega accounts and whatever is left is reinvested in the business.
So, 30bn increase in wealth means i need to generate 37bn before plex and then given the above taxes and fees that all means sales of 226bn are needed.
Or, in other words, daily sales of 7.5bn are needed.
Review of the August aims
1) Plex the three omega accounts - aim number one all the time - achieved
2) Hold sales in Dodixie to at least 90% of July - missed, sales fell 28%
3) Hold sales in Amarr to at least 90% of July - achieved
4) Hold sales in Rens to at least 90% of July - achieved
5) Hold sales in Hek to at least 90% of July - achieved
6) Ramp up Sobaseki to at least 90% of July - achieved
7) Ramp up Tush-Murkon Prime to at least 90% of July - missed, sales fell 16%
8) Develop the alpha alts to see which can be upgraded to Omega - missed, moved into manufacturing instead
9) Increase the investment and profits in Manufacturing - achieved
In all, the August aims were mostly achieved, a good month.
Reminder of my Current Business.
For now 95% of what i do is inter-regional trading - buying from Jita to sell elsewhere.
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 profits of 10bn ISK per month after paying to Plex my account. given i now have six Omega alts in Amarr, Dodixie, Rens, Hek, Sobaseki and Tash-Murkon i am hoping that this 10bn aim will be easily achieved.
My business model evolves over time. As my wealth increases i focus on higher value items. Therefore, i try also to stick to the rule of making a minimum of 100m profit per item sold. i.e. if i buy an item for 70m then i aim to sell it for at least 170m isk. This makes sure i don't waste my time on making low absolute profits and so preserves the 45 minute rule.
My main business is operated with three omega accounts (paid for with plex) with nine alts.
The main Trading alts sit in Dodixie, Amarr, Rens and Hek. I have also omega alts in the new Trading locations of Sobaseki (in Lonetrek) and Tash-Murkon Prime (in Tash-Murkon).
The other three alts sit in Jita and buys from Sell Orders, has these items couriered to the alts in Dodixie / Amarr and Rens / Hek and Sobaseki / Tash-Murkon Pime who then put them onto these markets for sale.
The Jita alts also serve to sell items that i can no longer sell in my trading locations Sort of clearance sales.
I also started in December 2021 to place alpha alts in other regions to see how it goes. I just need two of them to demonstrate that they can combine to justify an Omega account. Also, they need to take up very little of my time. So far the Sobesaki and Tash-Murkon alts made the grade and were upgraded in one account.
The other regions so far are: Placid; Verge Vendor; Essence; Citadel and Khanid. And i am in an NPC station in Delve and Outer Ring.
Manufacturing
There is a danger that trading will start to get boring and a grind.
Hence, I have restarted in Manufacturing again.
In July i made sales of 3.5bn and profits (before taxes) of 1.2bn. In August sales rose to 7.5bn and profits to 2.1bn.
I don't do this systematically but rather keep a look out on items i can manufacture and still make a 25% profit margin selling in Jita. So, like trading, i am going for the low volume items.
It is very early days - so lets see how it goes. The first aim is to generate sufficient profit after all costs to plex an Omega account.
Planetary Interaction
I am just experimenting for now, getting to understand it all. SO just have 5 planets in high sec up and running.
Other High Sec Trading Locations
I don't want to spend all my time on Eve doing Regional Trading (buying from one region, mainly Jita, to sell to another) but i do want to see if i can find really low competition but stable revenue streams of trading.
I have 6 other locations up and running and as i wrote in a prior blog post i have upgraded an account containing two of the alts to omega at the end of January.
These two locations: Tash-Murkon Prime and Sobaseki did have a poor February but a much better March and April whilst May was ok also. June was poor but July bounced back nicely. August was back to ok.
Tash-Murkon Prime sales fell from 11.5bn ISK to 9.6bn ISK whilst Sobaseki rose from 13.9bn ISK to 14.9bn ISK given total sales of 24.5bn which i estimate generated profits of 4.0bn ISK which was therefore sufficient to cover the cost of the Plex. That's the base aim in this Omega account.
The alpha trading locations made combined sales of 12.6bn which is down on the July sales 17.6bn.
I was starting to become more comfortable that the locations at Arnon and Alentene could become my next Omega account locations - but i will keep an eye on this whilst i divert my time into Manufacturing and dabbling in Planetary Interaction.
Delve
I want to experiment with selling in null/low Sec. Hence, i have found an NPC station in Delve and started experimenting with items to sell.
It is not going well - sometimes threatens to improve but then fall back again.. In August there was only 1.2bn sales. Over the last nine months there have been 14.1bn sales in total.
I may have to rethink this. Hopeless.
Plex
For now, I buy enough Plex to upgrade to 3 omega accounts per month. At current prices that is 7.1bn ISK per month. I buy enough Plex per month to finance the next month.
The price of plex is rising fast and a noticeable headwind to me increasing my profits.
I also aim to hold enough Plex to see me through some weak trading months. In all i now have 4800 Plex. I added 500 during the month.
I would like to store Plex for a rainy day or unless i take a break. I really need 6 months buffer. So, to cover 3 accounts for 6 months is 9000 Plex required.
But for now i am choosing to reinvest all my profits back into my business rather than into Plex.
I don't have an investment view on Plex - for me, it is the cost of playing the game.
Analysis of Trading Profits
In total i made 218bn ISK of sales in August which made me item profits of 62bn 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 in items other than Plex 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 12% in August which reflects general growth in trading in most trading locations.
The best performing location was Amarr for the first time since February, followed by Dodixie, Rens and Hek.
I would like Sobaseki and Tash-Murkon to see better sales but i need a stronger market first.
Jita, which is where i sell items that won't sell in the Regions i now also sell some Blueprints in. In addition i sell my manufactured items here also. Trade is slow and competitive but rose from 4.6bn to 8.5bn as my Manufacturing activity rose.
I will stop trying to sell Blueprints in Jita - too competitive.
From all these sales i made item profits of 62bn.
This therefore was an item margin of 28.5% (62/218) vs my target of 25%. This is another strong month for margins.
My trading margins had been in the 25-27% range since April 2021 having before that been in the 28-32% range. So August (and June / July) was an outlier to the upside.
There were less players around in August which meant less competition so i was able to charge higher prices and so get higher margins.
Manufacturing sales were 7.5bn, all in Jita, more than doubling from the July 3.5bn.
From this I then need to take a whole series of costs off before i get to my Business profits (and notice how they are more related to Sales rather than costs):
Courier Fees: i aim to pay 2% of sales value to the Courier = 2% x 218= 4.4bn
Sales tax cost me 8.4bn ISk (=3.85% of sales) - the Dodixie, Amarr, Rens, Hek Sobaseki and Tash-Murkon characters are level 5 in Accounting (=sales tax of 3.6%) and of course all the alpha alt accounts are only Level 1 (=sales tax of 8%).
Broker Fees costs me 8.2bn (=3.8% of sales). Now, i can break this down into the initial listing fee of 1.5% (because i am Level 5 Broker Relations on all Omega characters and lets to make the sums easier and include all the alpha alts) and therefore the rest is the cost of changing the price which is 0.30% a shot (i may have that 0.30% completely wrong!).
So, Listing Fee = 1.5% x 218= 3.3bn and so the Relisting Fee = 8.2-3.3 = 4.9bn which is 1.3% of sales. That shows that i do change prices quite often, bias to Amarr.
This takes my 'Business Profits' to 40.7bn ISK for August vs 39.1bn in July. This is what 30-40 minutes a day in August gave me.
So, the post-tax margin is 18.7% (40/218) and so i achieved the 15% target.
The rest of the alpha alts will be high tax payers until i decide which to Omega.
And then from those 'Business Profits' i bought Plex for 7.1bn isk to extend the Omega by 30 days for three accounts.
That, therefore, is the roadmap from making 218bn of sales and seeing my wealth increase by 34bn as a result.
Items i am selling in Dodixie, Amarr, Rens, Hek, Sobaseki and Tash-Murkon
I sell blueprints, skill books, implants and ship equipment.
Blueprints are making a steady come back - they are lumpy sales and slow, but thats how i like it. They can also be my slowest selling items and the items most likely to go 90 days without being sold. I generally sell one blueprint at a time though i am seeing the odd occasion where someone comes along and buys all the same type out at once.
Mining equipment is slowing as more traders enter this market but is still making decent profits.
Implants are doing ok and tend to be the most competitive - i am slowly expanding into more types and moving up the ISK value curve. I now keep to implants costing over 100m ISK and up to 2bn ISK. They don't sell well but when they do i tend to get a whole family sold at a time. Again, that's how i like it. A billion or so of investment can take 30 days to sell. I am seeing more instances of whole family's of implants being sold at once.
Skill books are a low income generator for me but there are still a few nice sellers. I suspect skills books are now my lowest income generator at present.
Ship Equipment is doing well though the mining equipment sales have clearly slowed as it has become more competitive and demand does not feel as strong anymore. But equipment that related to general PVE/PVP is doing well.
Rigidly sticking to the 25% margin target. Courier fees and taxes now take 9% of that to bring me to a theoretical 16%.
Dodixie Seller character
This remains my main character and makes the most sales in most months.
I have 118bn ISK of Sell Orders on the market over 164 items (so average sales price of 719m)
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 3.6% of the sales price on completed sale vs the normal 8%. The base used to be 5% and i used to be able to get it down to 2.25% - so Sales Tax (Transaction Tax) has gone up.
Broker Relations: Level 5; means i am charged 1.5% to list an item for sale vs the normal 3.0%. The base used to be 5% and i used to be able to get it down to 3% - so the Broker Listing fees have gone down.
Advanced Broker Relations: Level 5; means i can reduce the cost of changing the price of items i already have for sale. With no skill i would be charged 1.5% to change every price. Level 5 has brought this down to 0.30%.
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; increases the number of items i can list by 16 per level
Tycoon Level 3; increases the number of items i can list by 32 per level.
Marketing: Level 3; 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, level 5 wholesale and level 3 Tycoon , i am able to post 241 items for sale (5 + (5x4) + (5x8) + (5x16) + (3x32)). With no Trading skills you can post up to 5 sell orders
Amarr Seller character
This is the most competitive location but the sales and profits remain good.
I have 88bn ISK of Sell Orders on the market over 107 items (so an average sales price of 822m per item).
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 3.6% of the sales price on completed sale vs the normal 8%. The base used to be 5% and i used to be able to get it down to 2.25% - so Sales Tax (Transaction Tax) has gone up.
Broker Relations: Level 5; means i am charged 1.5% to list an item for sale vs the normal 3.0%. The base used to be 5% and i used to be able to get it down to 3% - so the Broker Listing fees have gone down.
Advanced Broker Relations: Level 5; means i can reduce the cost of changing the price of items i already have for sale. With no skill i would be charged 1.5% to change every price. Level 5 has brought this down to 0.30%.
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 4; 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 4, i am able to post 125 items for sale (5 + (4x4) + (5x8) + (4x16).
Rens and Hek characters
I still think of these two locations as really the same - but i am finding they have different dynamics.
In Rens:
I have 77bn ISK of Sell Orders on the market, over 117 items (so an average sales price of 658m).
Accounting: Level 5; means i am charged 3.6% of the sales price on completed sale vs the normal 8%.
Broker Relations: Level 5; means i am charged 1.5% to list an item for sale vs the normal 3.0%.
Advanced Broker Relations: Level 4; means the relist fee is just over 0.3%
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 4; 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 5 Trade, level 5 Retail and level 3 Wholesale, i am able to post 129 items for sale (5 + (5x4) + (5x8) + (4x16)). That is plenty for now but i am still trying to expand the number of items for sale.
In Hek:
I have 70bn ISK of Sell Orders on the market, over 100 items (so an average sales price of 700m).
Accounting: Level 5; means i am charged 3.6% of the sales price on completed sale vs the normal 8%. The base used to be 5% and i used to be able to get it down to 2.25% - so Sales Tax (Transaction Tax) has gone up.
Broker Relations: Level 5; means i am charged 1.5% to list an item for sale vs the normal 3.0%. The base used to be 5% and i used to be able to get it down to 3% - so the Broker Listing fees have gone down.
Advanced Broker Relations: Level 5; means i can reduce the cost of changing the price of items i already have for sale. With no skill i would be charged 1.5% to change every price. Level 5 has brought this down to 0.30%.
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 4; 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 5 Trade, level 5 Retail and level 3 Wholesale, i am able to post 129 items for sale (5 + (5x4) + (5x8) + (4x16)). That is plenty for now but i am still trying to expand the number of items for sale.
New(ish) omega alts: Lonetrek, Tash-Murkon
I feel this locations are now in the optimal level range.
In Lonetrek (Sobaseki) I have 44bn ISK of Sell Orders on the market, over 71 items (so an average sales price of 620m).
In Tash-Murkon (Tash-Murkon Prime) I have 77bn ISK of Sell Orders on the market, over 91 items (so an average sales price of 846m).
The Sales in these two locations do more than enough to justify being Omega and the competition is practically zero - though the returns are very low. That is, for total items of 125bn ISK i make sales of 16bn ISK to 30bn ISK.
alpha alts: Essence, Citadel, Khanid, Verge Vendor, Placid and Delve
The only relevant skills i can train are Broker Relations to Level 5 and Trade to Level 3.
Therefore, i can post 17 items for sale and pay Transaction Taxes of 8%, Listing Fees of 2.4% and re-listing fees of 1.2%.
Now, so far there is no competition so no re-listing fees. hence, my costs of sale are the courier fees of 2% + 8% transaction fees + 2.4% Listing fees = 12.4%.
Assuming i stick to my 25% item margin target then my bottom line profit margins are 12.6%. i.e. every 1bn sales generates 126m profits vs 164m for the Omega accounts. That is, 70% of Omega levels. And i am limited to 17 sales slots - so at best they are alts that are trying out to see if they are good enough to be upgraded to Omega!
The two best sellers are Alentene in Verge Vendor and Arnon in Essence. Combined they are doing around 8-11bn ISK of sales but i need 16bn to justify upgrading to Omega. That said, i think i am getting close to giving it a shot.
My next step is to ensure that in each of those Regions i am in the best location.
Courier Contracts
Each night, i get home from work and determine what i need to sell in all the locations.
The time is taken changing prices were necessary (especially Amarr given it is competitive) and then figuring out what to sell with the ISK made from the prior 24 hours sales.
I have a list of items that feature regularly and i add to this list as time goes by. So is a case of checking Jita prices vs current location prices.
It takes a minute to check all the alt accounts.
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 5 to 15bn ISK of items from Jita. Used to be 2-10bn but things are better these days. 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.
Outlook
September will have nine conservative aims - I feel the market is still slow.
1) Plex the three omega accounts - aim number one all the time
2) Hold sales in Dodixie to at least 90% of August
3) Hold sales in Amarr to at least 90% of August
4) Hold sales in Rens to at least 90% of August
5) Hold sales in Hek to at least 90% of August
6) Ramp up Sobaseki to at least 90% of August
7) Ramp up Tush-Murkon Prime to at least 90% of August
8) Increase the investment and profits in Manufacturing
9) Continue to investigate Planetary Interaction
The daily sales in August averaged 7.0bn.
For the 10bn profit target: If i assume i need to make 10bn + 7.1bn income per month (=17.1bn) and i assume i can achieve 15.0% margin then i need to make monthly sales of 106bn and so daily sales of 3.5bn.
So far i have achieved this in December 2020, January, March, April, August, September, October, November, December 2021, January 2022, February 2022, March 2022, April 2022, May 2022, June 2022, July 2022 and August 2022. I started in August 2020.
Current wealth is 481bn ISK made up from:
- Plex held as an investment 23bn ISK
- Items in hanger for sale 4bn ISK
- Buy orders on the market 0bn ISK
- items for sale 548bn ISK
- less a 20% provision 110bn ISK*
- ISK in wallet 16bn 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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