A Look At The Active ISK Delta In June 2024

Another fiscal quarter is in the books as CCP published EVE Online's monthly economic report for June 2024 on Friday. After a one month hiatus in order to publish a series of posts on the Equinox patch notes, I'm back to look at the Active ISK Delta.

The Active ISK Delta is the net effect on the New Eden monetary supply of players leaving and returning to the game. The Active ISK Delta also includes any reductions due to any and all GM actions. In June, 14.8 trillion ISK actually poured into the economy from the movement of players into and out of the game. The change turned the Active ISK Delta from the 7th largest ISK sink in May (4.7 trillion ISK, tied with skill books) to the 6th biggest ISK faucet (behind Sansha Incursion payouts of 16.8 trillion ISK) last month.

The positive Active ISK Delta at this point in EVE's Second Expansion Era is expected. In 3 of the 4 expansion launch months since November 2022 the measure has increased the supply of ISK in the New Eden economy. While far below the mark set for the Havok expansion, year-over-year the Active ISK Delta went from a 34.2 trillion ISK decline in June 2023 to a 14.7 trillion ISK increase in June 2024.

Looking at the Active ISK Delta by quarter, the measure declined from 14.2 trillion ISK in the second quarter of 2023 to -14.4 trillion in the second quarter of this year. Equinox marks the first launch quarter since Q4 2022 with a negative Active ISK Delta. If the measure is a reliable indicator of player sentiment, null sec players weren't as thrilled to see Equinox as low sec residents were to try out Viridian and Havok.

Null sec is a place I spend as little time as possible in, so I don't know what player sentiment is in null sec. Is EVE hitting an upper limit on former players curious about the game and willing to return? Are the changes just unappealing to null sec players? I'm beginning to think the latter given what Wilhelm is posting. Putting together my monthly Dotlan data post I wasn't as confident about what I wrote as I usually do. The numbers looked okay, but I just had a feeling something wasn't quite right.

I'm still not quite sure what to think, so I'll have to wait for additional data to roll in, because I think the numbers can swing either way in the third quarter.