Market Report - Company upgrades effect the Index

Day 1,630, 04:06 • Published in USA Canada • by Wilhem Klink

We here at the 1600 Index knew this was coming. The last 44% upgrade was back on 22 March - 26 March. At that point the Index was looking at the eCandian market rather than eUSA, but the concepts are similar. Six weeks ago, gold shot up 5% on the first day of the sale and took it 9 days to return to pre-sale levels. Needless to say, today gold jumped 6% on the first day of the sale, knocking the 1600 Au Index for a loop. But the market report first.

Raw materials maintain pricing holding the Raw Material Index at 60.

Weakness in food prices, especially in the high-end (Q5 & Q6) push the Food Index down .65 to 82.94 surrendering all the gains from yesterday.

Weapons likewise give up their gains from Day 1629 with Q6 dropping from its 14-day high to a 10-day low leading the fall. The Weapons Index drops .29 to 81.89

Wages continue their recent run, pushing the Wage Index to 92.2 (which is 92.2% of the wage level on Day 1600). Wages have improved 13.3% over the last 10 days.

Gold spikes 6% to push the Gold Index to 126.51, a 10-day high for it as well.

The graph:


And a closer look at the less-depressing last 10 days:



The 1600 AU Index
Based off of the amount of gold a player could earn in a year by working at market wage, selling 20 weapons, 200 food (both Q6) and 1750 raw materials (split 50/50 food/weapons) the 1600 AU Index gets hammered as the spike in gold on the news of 44% company upgrade coupled with general weakness in prices makes buying gold by selling products all that more tough. The Gold Index drops nearly 19 points to 284.15. On Day 1600 a player working at market wage, selling 20 Q6 tanks and 200 Q6 food could have bought 451 gold over the course of a year (at Day 1600's prices). Doing the same at today's prices nets 284 gold, down 37%.

The ugly truth:


And a closer look at the ugliness:


Moving Averages

For those unfamiliar with a "moving average", in the following charts, The blue line represents the market price at 3:00 eRep time. The red line in the 5-day moving average (average of the last 5-days) of market prices. What that tells us is whether prices are trending downward (the market price is below the moving average) or trending higher (the market price is above the moving average).

High-end today (Q5 & Q6)
Weapons step off first



and then Q6



Both seems to want to raise their price.
A look at the change in prices day over day:


Not quite moving in unison, but price move close. Interesting to note that Q5s tend to drop deeper, at least in the first few weeks after the prices started their free-fall.

Food graphs!


Nice steady decline for Q5.
And then the Etch-A-Sketch that is Q6 food



And the day over day percentage change in high-end food.


Only serves to reinforce the movement in Q6 prices.
And the bonus graphs are raw materials,although the reader will see a lot of level lines as of recent.





Note: prices are reflective of a percentage of Day 1600's price (Hence the "1600 Index"). In other words if an index is quoted at 88, that days price is 88% of the price on Day 1600.

Methodology on prices: prices are taken at 3:00 eRep time. The price is the average price of buying 1,000 Raw materials, 500 Food, 100 weapons (at each quality level), and 8 gold, plus the market wage less any fraction of cc (so 240, rather than 240.1). All qualities are standardized to Q1 (per hit or per health).

Sic transit gloria mundi