The Republic of Free Cities has launched what is believed to be one of the first active, viable investment funds in Illyriad. The Republic Investment Fund allows players in the game to invest in shares that over time can grow in value, yielding a gold return on their initial investment.
Fund manager Eowen the Short notes in the Fund’s description that it “has been very successful in the past 3 months with the value of the aurum (the name given to shares in the RIF) more than doubling. The original value was 100 gold per aurum and it currently stands at 215.99.”
Initially, the Fund was open to RoFC members only, but due to increasing interest from players outside of the alliance, the Fund will be open to outside investors starting on Sunday the 22nd of May.
Data provided to the Times indicates an upward trend in the value of the aurum:
. . . as well as indications that the value of the Fund’s shares will continue to increase over time:
The Illyriad Times 
it will be interesting to see how this venture fares.
nice work Eowen
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The Republic Investment Fund does not endorse any of the spelling in this article. Using the spellings from this article in important documents is done at user’s own risk.
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Congratulations on finding a new avenue to contribute to your enjoyment the game. Good luck!
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Will the investment fund be publishing accounts so that investors can see how the value of their shares has been calculated? Will these accounts be audited?
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Yes, I think his name is Mr. Ponzi from Arthur Andersen.
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We hire in someone for auditing, he seems like a nice guy. His name is Nick Leeson if you ever want to set up something like this of your own. :p
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If you ever want to know the balance of your own RIF account, you can IGM me and I can send you the info. The value of shares is simply the value of the fund divided by the number of shares issued. For auditing, I am happy to tell someone how I calculate the value of the RIF and then let them sit my account. They can check the value against what I have said it is. If you want, regular dates could be set where I get audited. Maybe every 3 months.
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Who do I talk to to set up an Illy Roth IRA?
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how exactly would you retire in illy?
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Love this twist. Great idea. Are differing funds being considered (IE: high risk & etc.)?
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I hadn’t really thought of different risk levelled funds. I’ll have to look into that, maybe one could be a longer term and therefore lower risk fund where instead of immediately buying and selling a resource, you buy a lot and then sell it off later when the price is much higher.
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The longer you hold an asset the greater the risk, because the greater the uncertainty in the future price.
Illyriad has had some major periods of deflation in the past. There’s no guarantee that the value of a resource will ever be higher than it is today.
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It is also lower risk in that it is immune to short term price fluctuations which have caused the RIF problems ( a couple of weeks of very low growth).
Long term deflation would be a risk however the aim of ths style of fund would be to identify the end of periods of deflation and buy at the end of them with aims to selling after some inflation.
You would also have to be very knowledgable of the factors which effect the markets- is there a war brewing between 2 big alliances, have the devs launched a successful advertising campaign which is bringing in competition and driving down prices etc.
I was not aware that there had been major periods of deflation in the past, thank you for telling me. I did get the impression that we were in one now from a recent talk in GC but was not sure for how long it had been going on or how regularly deflation has occured Would there be a way of accessing any data on prices before 3 months ago, as that is how far back the graphs you can research go?
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For historical prices, contact Brandmeister. He may not divulge the info (or sell it, or whatever), but he no doubt has it.
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thanks
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Prices have steadily dropped for 5 years on most adv res. Even in periods of warfare.
Too much supply and not enough demand. Introduction of faction hubs and the revised production times for t1 troops basically killed the cow, saddle, leather and chain market.
The only way to make money trading adv res is to be a short seller. Or to buy fictional Put Options.
Since both options don’t exist in the illy markets day trading for profits is not very profitable.
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Check the growth document. I have managed to make a decent profit.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VVYyqfx-clKjGZ-g1LYRZOUsaQZq0LN8hZCdrCigVV4/edit?usp=sharing
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I have opened the RIF up early as people started IGMing me about doing it and it seemed logical to start. I am also accepting goods in exchange for aurums. IGM me for an offer if you want to do that.
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How are you planning on issuing new shares??? If you started with 100 only and those were given to your members what shares do you have to sell???? You can’t just make new shares. They have to come from somewhere…..
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There is currently a maximum of 2.5 million aurums in total. Each aurum is not worth a percentage of the RIF, it is worth a set amount based on the exchange rate. As the value of the RIF rises, the exchange rate increases with it so that those who invest now pay the current value of the aurum. This means that I can make new aurums without impacting on the value of the existing aurums. The only reason why there is a maximum is to prevent the RIF from becoming too big for me to handle.
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Also what kind of protections are you affording to you investors… What happens if you decide to quit the game or if RL restricted your play time? What happens if your account gets banned?
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I am not planning to quit the game any time soon but if I were to quit, I would either find someone else to run the RIF or just return everyone’s investments.
At the moment I am doing my A-Levels. If I am able to expand the RIF during a time when I am doing exams then it would take something fairly massive to stop me from having enough play time to run it. If something did occur then I would do the same as if I quit.
If I get banned, I am not sure what would happen but I don’t think I would do anything to cause me to get banned. I would of course attempt to get in touch with the devs to see if they could allow someone to access my account with the purpose of sorting out the RIF.
For less catastrophic events such as the aurum decreasing in value, if it were to decrease in value over 2 consecutive weeks, my aurums would be either completely or partially forfeited to pay off any losses. Currently my aurums are worth 86394771 so there would have to be a substantial decrease for me to have to sell off all of my aurums. Also, the RIF hasn’t lost money yet so I think it is unlikely that that will happen.
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wtf? seriously?
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You are worth 86m… Wow that makes me feel so much better. This is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard of in this game.
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The RIF at maximum capacity would be worth around 540 million currently with a single aurum’s value being 215.99. The value of the aurum would have to drop to 181.6 for me to sell off all of my aurums. That would be a drop of 34.39 gold per aurum in 2 weeks.
However, the RIF is not currently at maximum capacity so the drop would have to be larger than that. As the RIF stands now, the value of the aurum would have to drop to 169.02 for me to have to sell off all of my aurums. That would be a drop of 46.97 in 2 weeks.
The point is not that I have 86 million, it is that I have enough aurums to cover a substantial drop in their value.
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