Last Thursday Fenris Creations released the June 2026 monthly economic report for EVE Online. I decided to use the opportunity to look at two of my favorite topics in New Eden: the global PLEX market and the game's money supply. I had a simple premise to examine: does the money supply affect the price of PLEX? Is PLEX still a commodity like in the early years of its existence or have things evolved into something a little more complex? A silly question given that everything in EVE seems to get more complex the more players interact with a game system.
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| The global PLEX market: Q3 2025 to Q2 2026 |
I now have 360 days of overlapping global PLEX market and money supply data to examine, enough to start making some observations. I think I can safely say that the money supply in EVE Online is not affecting the price of PLEX. Not a slam dunk of an observation going into the exercise because the size and growth of the money supply in online games in relation to inflation is not agreed upon by the experts. At least, the experts I wrote about back in 2015. I'm glad that EVE is not going down the path of Gaia Online.
During the past fiscal year ending on 30 June 2026, the money supply increased by 15.8%, from 2.51 quadrillion ISK to 2.91 quadrillion ISK. Starting with the beginning of the global PLEX market on 7 July 2025 the average price of PLEX actually decreased 20.1% by the last day of June 2026.
Clearly the EVE gods sitting on their thrones in Iceland have a lot more power in the New Eden economy than a lot of people want to admit. I'm really not surprised as I cover the cash shop and New Eden store sales that directly influence players' decisions on whether to dip into the PLEX market or not. But I have a couple of ideas to look into. After all, we all know that Adam Smith is out there somewhere in a cloaked Proteus, right?
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