Market Discussions

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=5500953#post5500953

Doing this with strangers would put his name at risk (it wouldn't stop other people scamming) for little benefit. Also imagine all the effort of having to read all the mails from subcontracting third parties, nobody wants that hassle.

Thanks for the link Elizabeth.

Tupac
I'm not so much proposing the fine details as giving an example of the general concept, and asking could it be done?
In the example above the deposit would always be much large than all of the deals you could 3rd party combined. E.g. 10 bill deposit and max 5 bills in simultaneous 3rd party deals. The deposit would always more than cover if you ran with it all.

The reason you would come to "me" under this scheme is for small deals that the big boys wouldn't touch because it would be too small. e.g. 1 billion. They have a minimum fee and deal size below which they wouldn't even get out of bed for. This would be a way for a smaller person to start at the bottom, but get the initial trust bit kickstarted, and have it tangibly guaranteed.

"I" would charge a %age of the deal value e.g. 1 or 2% for providing the service.

I'm not thinking of doing it myself, I was just floating it as an idea.

I think the devil is in the details.
The thread Elizabeth linked where Chiribba commented was quite enlightening. It seems I'm quite late to the table with the idea, it's not new. Chribba's views are interesting and sound.

To work:
The workload on the root 3rd party would need to be absolutely minimal, none would be preferable.
In the event of a default the root 3rd would need to be revoked and the deposit used to cover any damage.

One problem with keeping the workload minimal for the root 3rd would be keeping track of the contracts covered by the deposit and making sure that approval is not given if an attempt is made to cover contracts worth more than ( say ) 50% of the deposit.

You also can't retroactively change that 50%.
For the sake of a hypothetical example I start offering this service.
I deposit 10Bill + fee with a respected 3rd party and declare a maximum 50% contract cover.
This means I can only cover contracts up to 5bill in total.
I cover a 3rd party service for 3 bill.
So far so good
Then someone else comes along and asks me to cover another 3 bill.
Covering this would take me to 6 bill total and my max is supposed to be 5 bill.
I tell the second party I cant cover it and maintain a deposit double my total contracts.
They say not to worry they are happy for me to go up to 6 bill cover against my 10 bill deposit.
If I were to accept this new contract whilst the second client may be happy I've suddenly retroactively changed the terms for the first contract I accepted. My liquidity and totals contracts to deposit ratio has gone lower than I promised. This would be unacceptable.
Preventing this happening is one of the devil details.

Also to start a new hypothetical case.
New 3rd party business starts up, sets up a nice deposit.
Then goes and signs up loads of 3rd party contracts with no regard for deposit to total contract ratio.
Once they have more in contracts than the deposit they just keep the contract goods and forfeit the deposit for a tidy profit.
Deliberate scam from the get go.


The clients need to be able to check the value of the total contracts for any given 3rd party but not by asking the 3rd party. Which comes back to where we started, at trust :)

If someone could solve some of these issues, there's money to be made :)

Minimal workload on trusted 3rd party source... clearly visible and agreed upon terms by subcontractor and client viewable by all future and present parties....fine print that explains only listed public deals are backed... Obvious and easily viewable subcontractor deposit values...no necessary attention needed from the source 3rd party between subcontractor and client deals, since they will all be publicly posted, and visible by all. Anyone could go back through the thread to search previous deals, their value and if they completed to determine if a sub contractor has reached his insurable limit.

The problem I see is in changing forum posts, but another disclaimer could be added that says if at anytime a post shows "edited" the deal is considered to be broken, if the sub edited a post then the client gets some of the subs trust deposit. Other specifics would ha e to be figured out if the client edits posts. ..... I foresee people offering posting history fact checking services within the thread!

The biggest problem is that people looking to buy/sell Supercaps already trust others with no or terrible reputation due to their own naivete and you want to give people the ability to claim that another trusted third party is securing their third partying. Scammers will exploit this and offer their services to desperate, lazy or slightly less naive people for transactions above their deposited collateral.

If you were a trusted third party, would you want to be associated with such a sitation and have to pick up the pieces when someone runs away with 20b more ISK than you have of theirs?

Darknesss was talking about something like this, but I assumed he would only be using people he personally trusted as he said he would replace anything lost through his associates.

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=405798

There's no short cut solution that's as good as the real thing, but nobody sensible is going to trust newcomers without a lot of history due to the massive number of scams that populate the Sell Orders forum.

How many people, that you don't personally know, are there that would would trust to third party a Titan sale for you? There's 10 offering various third party services in the first five pages at the moment. Imagine how it'd look if they could deposit 20b with Chribba and say 'Guaranteed by Chribba for trades up to 20b'.

Instead of saying it wont work, 3rd parties wont give up their rep, blah blah blah..... Lets assume they would, assume its an insurance company idea, and punch holes in it to make it better, like: How could it be scammed

Proper posting procedures, as stated above, were not performed properly. Neither trade is insured. Next!

So Trusted Third PartyX then returns the 100b to the Legit 3rd Party because they no longer want their now-tarnished name associated with them, or do they keep the ISK and say tough luck to all scammed parties? You can add all the clauses you want, but a few of those happening and people won't want to use even Trusted Third PartyX. Third party's entire business revolves around there being no such trust issues and just one can ruin you.

Have you ever heard of F90OEX? (http://evewho.com/pilot/F90OEX) Find out why nobody uses him as a third party today.

I am a glass empty kind of person .

Seriously - an idea that would require sticking to some as yet undefined set of rules and procedures to make it work and you come up with "what if they don't stick to the rules?" Isn't that true of everything? Pointless.

Anyway I think Sabriz has the best critique of the general concept above.
Because the activity is guaranteed or insured ( yep I like that ) by the deposit, would any trust be earned.
Ironically the better the fine details and procedure was worked out, AND PEOPLE WOULD NEED TO STICK TO THEM ( thank you ), the bigger Sabriz's question gets.

I think it could generate trust over time. Here's my reasoning why.
Using MD loan and bond requests etc... as an example.
There is one "test" that exists currently that isn't really explicitly stated but in my opinion is quite an important test applied to requests for money.
It's the attitude test.
Someone makes a loan request and faces the usual picking apart of their idea to see where it falls short. Sometimes this can be quite harsh.
One of two things then happens, they respond in a friendly manner, act mature and try and address those concerns. Maybe post some information they forgot, or take on board the criticisms and change their application to reflect this feedback.
The other thing that can happen is they get in a huff, react badly, get defensive or aggressive.
Needless to say the second course of action sets off alarm bells, and all the usual investors are put off by this bad behaviour.

If you send any length of time reading the MD forums you will see this factor making a lot of difference in requests. Especially if the amount is small. Behave well and people are much more likely to take a punt.

Demonstrators of good behaviour in a load request:
Realistic request, shows understanding of how the loan request process works.
Good understanding, shows research and effort.
Good attitude, again shows understanding that you are asking other people for something.
Deals with criticism and feedback positively, indicator of likely future behaviour.

I feel this judgement by behaviour is quite important within the Eve community. How does someone handle themselves when things go a bit bad. It's taken as an indicator of how they are likely to behave when things go much worse.

If you accept most of the above as true then I think a person who kickstarted their trust with this general concept could earn genuine trust during their dealings by a public display of good behaviour whilst doing business.
There would probably be plenty of opportunities. Some deals for which you are the 3rd party will go wrong. You will then have to take on the duties of a 3rd party in trying to resolve the issue.
Inevitably scammers will look for weaknesses and try and exploit you or your clients.
The best scam attempts will probably come from both parties colluding together against the 3rd party to try and make a claim against the 3rd parties deposit.
There will be plenty of opportunity for people to see just how you handle yourself, and to form opinions about what kind of business you are running by your actions.
I think over time it will be possible to build trust by starting off with this method.

e.g. what's your deposit to cover ratio?
Some might choose a deposit twice their combined deal coverage thus generating lots of trust that they want to offer the best coverage and peace of mind to their clients. Some others might choose 1:1 or even lower than 1:1 which would be more profitable, but be far less reassuring to the clients.
A successful 3rd party after a period might increase their deposit to be able to take more contracts on board whilst maintaining the same deposit ratio. Surely a good sign of a very trustworthy 3rd party?

Although the deposit is intended to kickstart the trust process, I do believe it would be possible to build real trust on top through good business practices.