Perfect World Gold Trading for Profit Guide

Perfect World Gold Trading for Profit Guide by meshktenye

Making Coins – General Advice

So, now you’ve asked everyone you know how to make coins in Perfect World. Perhaps the easiest way of making coins in Perfect World, and one of the most common (though few people are willing to admit it) is by spending actual hard-earned real world cash. Unfortunately, many of us are either unwilling or unable to use this option. So you have researched other methods. Some have told you to be extremely frugal and pick up every single last drop and coin and to fly instead of teleporting. These are all good suggestions. Some have told you to sell your Dragon Quest Drops to the NPC, Auction House, or to open up a Cat Shop. Again, all good ideas. Others have told you to buy Anniversary packs and either sell the contents or the packs themselves when the sale ends. Or Tokens of Good Luck. Again, all fine ideas. Others will tell you to grind for drops to sell, especially during 2x drop events. Of all of these ideas, grinding is perhaps one of the best. If you haven’t already read the “grinding for money” post, please do so here.

Gold Trading For Cash

I will now explain my method of making cash. And that is the Gold Trading system built into the Auction House. But before you can buy gold you MUST have some coins. Use any of the above methods (with grinding as you primary method) to save up a small nest-egg. Now, the first secret you need to understand is that everything you can buy or sell in Perfect World is based on coins which is ultimately based on gold. In other words, Perfect World is based upon a gold economy. And the Gold Market in Perfect World works essentially the same as the Gold Market in the real world. All of this was intentional on the part of Perfect World. They have given us a wonderful game, but they need to pay the programmers, graphic artists, and other PW staff members. You can use real cash to buy Zen which converts to in-game gold. So in-game gold is Legal Tender, the basis of the PW economy, and the basis of all transactions (sometimes directly, sometimes indirectly).

Buy Low – Sell High

So what does all this actually mean to you? Well, it means that if you understand the Gold Market you can make cash, and lots of it, and sometimes extremely rapidly. When I started gold trading I couldn’t find any guide, other an basic explanation of the Gold Trading interface. So I set out to learn by experience and by asking numerous friends. The basic advice I always got was, “Buy low – sell high”. I hated when friends gave me this advice. I would ask for specific numbers, but none could answer me. Others would say the Gold Market is too volatile, risky or complicated and they avoided it. I was not satisfied with any of these answers and I was determined to understand the Gold Market.

Gold Trading Market Analysis

I started to collect data on various aspects of the Gold Market, and turned it into a chart. To make this easier, I am going to refer to the graphic from the Gold trading website. More specifically, I am going to refer to the two right-most sections entitled, “Price: Sell” and “Price: Buy”. Notice that in the Price: Sell the numbers range from 179,900 to 183,500. In other words, if I owned one gold I would be able to sell it anywhere from 179,900 to 183,500 coins (assuming someone else were willing to buy it from me at those prices).

Also notice in the Price: Buy the numbers range from 173,700 to 176,200. In other words, if I had anywhere from 173,700 coins to 176,200 coins I could buy one gold (again assuming someone were willing to sell me their gold at those prices).

Now, just like in the real world, these prices fluctuate. So, we still don’t yet have an understanding of what “high” and “low” means, but we are getting closer. The terms “high” and “low” are relative terms. They have no set meaning, and that is the problem. You can’t say gold is selling “high” or to buy “low” by merely looking at numbers. To put it another way if one gold is selling for 179,900 to 183,500 coins, that might be “high” or “low” depending on market conditions. For example, if I had previously bought gold for 182,100, then for me gold is low and I do not stand to make much of a profit trying to sell it between 179,900 and 183,500. So for me, gold is not high. However, had I previously bought gold at 125,000, then I would be happy to sell it for between 179,900 and 183,500. So for me I would consider gold as being high while someone else might consider gold as being low.

Gold Trading Market Fluctuation

Again, lets look at the Gold Trading graphic. This time I want to talk about market fluctuation and splits. I want to look at four numbers specifically:

1) The highest Sell price – 183,500
2) The lowest Sell price – 179,900
3) The highest Buy price – 176,200
4) The lowest Buy price – 173,700

Lets subtract the highest Sell price 183,500 from the highest Buy price 176,200 = 7300. This represents what “high” is in the current market and your potential profit in the current market.

Now lets subtract lowest Sell price 179,900 form lowest Buy price 173,700 = 6200. This represents what “low” is in the current market.

Now lets average the two numbers (7300 + 6200)/2 = 6750. This represents our average potential profit.

Now I will tell you from experience that splits like this represent a flat market which is stagnant and not moving. It would be nearly impossible to make money in such a market. If the market looks like this it is time to grind. Fortunately, these numbers do not represent the typical Gold Trading market.

How to Predict and Spot a Good Split

So if the example I gave you is a poor split, then how can you spot good split? My personal opinion is that with a split of 30,000 or more then you can make money. Fortunately, 30,000 splits are relatively common. I really like it when the average is 50,000 or more. And if the split is 75,000 or more you can become seriously wealthy – meaning you can make millions of coins quite rapidly.

But to do this you must create a chart/graph and document on a daily basis all of the high and low numbers, and the splits I have mentioned. Good splits can happen very quickly and stop just as quickly. And you need to be able to take advantage of them when the happen. You need to have about 500k in coins and/or at least one gold available at all times. Whenever you are in a town that has an auctioneer, just make a quick stop by the auctioneer to check the Gold Trading Market. If there is at least 30,000 average split, then take advantage of it.

EDIT: 5/28/2010 When you do your chart the only two Gold Trading numbers you need to follow are the lowest Sell price and the highest Buy price. If there is a split of 30,000 then it is time to start trading. Further you should track what prices you buy at and what prices you sell at – and don’t forget to included the PWI Gold Market fee involved.

When Do Good Splits Happen?

Here are some general observations:

1) When the split is increasing, gold is going up in value
2) When the split is decreasing, gold is going down in value
3) The split will go up in relation to events – therefore it is a good time to buy gold at the beginning of an event
4) Sell your gold before the split starts to shrink (don’t get too greedy) – 5 days after the start of the event is a good time to sell your gold
5) Since PW is a Gold Economy, it is always better to buy gold than event items (such as Anniversary Packs, or Coral)
*6) There are fees involved with Gold Trading as the following post by Darksylph clearly points out, “…your fee to buy gold is coin only. The fee to sell gold is in silver. Basically if you have 20 gold, you can only sell 19 of that on the Auction cause you need 1 last gold to cover the fee in silver. Like was said above 1 gold = 100 silver. Its just your pennies. As was posted above, if you have 1 gold and something (like selling gold fee, or buying from boutique) costs 40 silver, you’d be left with 60 silver left over, without having had silver in the 1st place. Same as if you buy a 40 cent stick of gum and pay with a dollar bill, the cashier will give you 60 cents change, even tho you didn’t have pennies/nickels/dimes/quarters in the 1st place.”

Because of these fees if this is your first time Gold Trading to avoid buying Zen with real $$$ you would need to have about 660,000 coins (or whatever amount is necessary to buy 2 gold). Watch the market over a few weeks and observe how it fluctuates so you know that your original purchase is a good investment. You will need to grind, farm mats/herbs, sell at your Cat Shop,manufacture wine or any number of other methods of making enough coins to start Gold Trading.

* Thank you Illusiva for pointing out this omission in my original post.

Playing the Gold Market

Now that you understand the basics of the Gold Trading Market I want to show you some of the possibilities. What I am going to detail here is a series of Gold/coin trades I made in a single 2 hour period. What follows may not be typical for you and I cant make any promises. All I know is that I have made many similar transactions with similar results by following my method. Admittedly, this was my very best day ever Gold Trading. However, I have made many millions of coins many other days doing exactly as follows. This particular date was February 10, 2010. Notice that i was trading when the average split was about 130,000:

1) Buy 1 gold at 330000 coins **
2) Sell 1 gold at 4650000 coins
3) Buy 1 gold at 332000 coins
4) Sell 1 gold at 480000 coins
5) Buy 1 gold at 330000 coins
6) Sell 1 gold at 450000 coins
7) Buy 1 gold at 350000 coins
8) Sell 1 gold at 520000 coins
9) Buy 2 gold at 350000 coins (WOOT – up to 2 gold now)
10) Sell 2 gold at 530000 coins
11) Buy 2 gold at 390000 coins
12) Sell 2 gold at 560000 coins
13) Buy 4 gold at 350000 coins
14) Sell 4 gold at 530000 coins
15) Buy 5 gold at 370000 coins
16) Sell 5 gold at 520000 coins
17) Buy 7 gold at 380000 coins
18) Sell 7 gold at 510000 coins
19) Buy 10 gold at 360000 coins (I still have 180000 coins profit that is not enough to buy another gold)
20) Sell 10 gold at 510000 coins = 5100000 coins + 180000 – 330000 (original investment)* = 4980000 profit

*I had incorrectly said my original investment was 333,000 when in reality it was 330,000. I have adjusted my math to reflect this error.

** If you don’t already have some gold, you will actually have to start off by buying 2 gold, due to the handling fee. In this case, my first transaction would have cost 660,000 coins.

Not bad, I started with 330,000 coins and turned it into 4,980,000 coins in about 2 hours time or a profit of 4,980,000 coins. I would buy, and then immediately sell, and then immediately buy again. Also realize that I often had buy and sell bids going at exactly the same time. This method does not work in a flat gold market. You have to be observant, you have to chart the prices on a daily basis, you have to be willing to watch for splits. Now, I will admit that was my best day ever. I typically make about 1 to 3 million. While I do chart the market every day, I do not play the market every day. I can’t promise you will achieve the same results, but at least you will be able to go into the Gold Trading market with some basic knowledge on your side.