Market Discussions

I have two toons and I am fed up of being poor and want to start making some real isk

one toon has some reasonable trading skills- mostly lv4 and high caldari/ caldari navy standings for jita and amarr standings

the other also has decent trade skills and is nearly at a stage where she can build and, invent with decent skills. also high min/ gal standings

They both currently can have about 60 market orders, i will increase it for both as i progress.

I currently have about 2b of stock in a couple of stations that i have acquired through regional buy orders and I will soon move this to a hub to sell a decent profit and this i what i will use to start my trading and manufacturing. Profit % is unknown on what i have done so far- this is why i want to be a bit more professional in what im doing

so on to my questions

from looking on this forum, many big name traders seem to use eve mogul. i will start a trial soon as i get a bit more organised, it seems to me that it is a trading tool. Is there something similar to use for manufacturing? ie material costs in, invention costs, build costs, selling price etc

If i want to trade in Jita, is it more important to have high caldari navy standings or high caldari faction? On one toon i have both but he has high amarr standings but no emperor family for amarr hub- do i need to grind emperor family or is it unnecessary?between my two toons i have over 5 standings for all 4 factions if i want to do interhub trading

Eve mogul seems a great tool for profit tracking but it seems i need to do my research first on what to trade. I was thinking of trying to build my own spreadsheet for this- i haven't worked out what info i will need yet. I know nothing about importing api / crest and using it to get info- is there an idiots guide for how to do this? also i use libre office because i am poor- would a guide to excel also apply to libre office too?

Thoraemond/eve-market-order-broker-fees

That's the fees graph you'll want to reference. You'll want both the npc station corp and the station faction standings to reduce your broker fees.

to be honest, trading at a point where standings are crucial probably isn't the best starting point for a newbie. take it as a nice bonus, but don't rely on it.

There's no profit in manufacturing or invention... well there is a little bit, but it's just not worth the time/effort (+blueprint investment) imo. Too much competition. I tried it for a year or so, but I make more money in a month by just ratting casually.

I did too and finally realized I preferred other ways of making isk in the game than studying spreadsheets and buying materials by the freighter. Heck, I don't even like bookkeeping for my own business. I think there is profit to be made, but mostly by people who have market expertise first, or operate at the corporate level.

Thanks for the replies so far

I have IPH and there still seems to be some decent profits around in T2 manufacturing and I have had some recent success with a few invention runs that I have tried for the first time so I will give it a try. I actually enjoy this side of the game so as long as it makes some money then it is fine by me. I got quite lucky on the last invention run and if the numbers from IPH stack up, it should be a 200m profit from selling the manufactured t2 components over the cost of the raw materials of 1b. that seems ok to me. i have a full set of t2 component bpos for all 4 races all fully researched already.

I need to read Sabriz' previous posts again about using decryptors to see how best i can use them too to boost my profits.

for me it is all about taking small steps to improve the efficiency of what i am doing and being able to correctly track what i have been doing to try and keep on top of it all.

How do manufacturers keep track of what they are doing? trading profit is easy - price sold - price paid - taxes = profit but manufacturing seems to have more to keep on top of- invention costs/ success raw material costs, transport costs, build costs, taxes etc

I've already decided that i will be using public courier contracts for moving big loads- I can't fly freighters and have no real desire to fly one or lose to it to Sabriz and friends ;)

And how many hours per day do you put in for that?

I make a billion in 5-6hrs by ratting (with 3 toons)

Use two metrics: Player attention (in minutes) and account subbed time (in days). For instance, assuming I purchase pre-assembled components, building 81 Interceptors requires 2.1 account subscribed days (production is limiting) and about 15 minutes of my attention, and ties up 1200m capital until they sell.

Ratting and industry can be compared but ratting requires a lot more attention.

On the freighter - that's a high risk transport setup you use...

Depends if you autopilot or not... if you autopilot there's no less risk than there is when afk ratting in nullsec (drone boats)


You shouldn't spend hour long freighter trips afk either though... so I'm not sure what your point is :) How are you not dying to suicide ganks all the time? :p

And all you gotta do for ratting is watch local and when you finished your combat site, recall drones + warp to new anomaly + launch drones + orbit. That's all. Takes me like 5minutes per hour per toon of actual client interaction

Trading is a completely different story of course. You can go afk at any time for as long as you want if all you do is sit in station. But then again, all you have to do to go afk safely while ratting is dock up or warp to safe pos - but yeah, you can't do that at school or work.