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What drives pressure?

In the last post, I showed the relationship between pressure and idea price change, assuming no ideas are sitting on the market at drop time. The three pressure factors are:

• D1 - Downward force 1
• D2 - Downward force 2
• U - Upward force

D1 is simply the ratio between total idea market value and total player wealth. It is relatively stable, and currently sits around 0.45.

D2 and U are a bit more complex, as you can see in the chart below:



U appears to be directly related to the drop ratio, which is the average of the previous 10 drops divided by the number of ideas existing. D2 also shows that relationship, but it is much less clear -- there is another factor I haven't yet discovered.

What moves idea prices?

Here's a sample from a few industries I track, taken over about a 3-day period:



As you can see, the relationship between price change and pressure factors is linear, with approximately 0.1*(U - D1 - D2) determining the magnitude of the change. In other words, if U is 0.9, D1 is 0.4, and D2 is 0.4, then price will increase by 1% on the next drop, as long as there are no ideas sitting on the market.

Current Status

Pre-Apprentice Position
7/30
Cash B$ 0.954 trillion
Ideas B$ 1.37 trillion
Invested B$ 2.769 trillion

8/30 (just before starting apprenticeship)
Cash B$ 2.26 trillion (136% growth, primarily funded by chip sales)
Ideas B$ 1.80 trillion (31% growth)
Invested B$ 2.97 trillion (7.3% growth, limited by non-premium status)

One of the key ideas here is that one must bet big to win big. To achieve that, large positions (> B$ 500B) in a few industries are required.

8/30 (after starting)
Cash B$ 0.66 trillion
Ideas B$ 6.40 trillion
Invested B$ 0

9/6 (1 week)
Cash B$ 0.76 trillion (15% growth)
Ideas B$ 8.68 trillion (35.6% growth - already beating my previous month and just getting started)

9/13 (2 weeks)
Cash B$ 0.34 trillion (-50% )
Ideas B$ 11.43 trillion (78.5% growth - more than double previous month)

9/20 (3 weeks)
Cash B$ 0.796 trillion (20% )
Ideas B$ 12.69 trillion (98.3% growth - more than triple previous month)

9/27 (4 weeks)
Cash B$ 1.465 trillion (122% )
Ideas B$ 11.32 trillion (76.9% growth - slipped due to attacks on several industries)

10/5 (5 weeks)
Cash B$ 1.416 trillion (115% )
Ideas B$ 13.39 trillion (109% growth - recovering from attacks)