Inputs needed: the design direction

[David]

Current design direction:
Banks and the insurance companies will complement the core businesses (production and retails), in a fashion similar to media companies and telecoms.

It will significantly expand the number of financial options you will have in running your business (bonds, time deposits, using funds from your insurance companies for investing into stocks or even your own companies).

On the other hand, it will not be possible to top the most profitable company chart by just running banks and insurance companies alone. And the amount of fun to be had would NOT be great if you only run banks and insurance companies in the game.

UPDATE:
In responses to the poll result, we have introduced a number of new game settings for bank operations, allowing the player to customize the profitability of banks and insurance companies. With the new settings, it's your call to decide whether banks will become hugely profitable financial powerhouses or just play a modest and complementary role in supporting your business expansion.

Please check out the details of the new game settings at https://www.capitalismlab.com/banking-d ... -settings/

[standardplayer]

Current design direction:
Banks and the insurance companies will complement the core businesses (production and retails), in a fashion similar to media companies and telecoms.

It will significantly expand the number of financial options you will have in running your business (bonds, time deposits, using funds from your insurance companies for investing into stocks or even your own companies).

On the other hand, it will not be possible to top the most profitable company chart by just running banks and insurance companies alone. And the amount of fun to be had would NOT be great if you only run banks and insurance companies in the game.

Could you please define what you mean by a compliment to the core businesses (manufacturing and retail)? How big could a bank or insurance company be in the game be in the game? What profit margins would we be looking at?

Bank Design Suggestions:
-Credit/Debit/Charge Card Brand with Interchange Fee Revenue (Earn fee revenue off every retail transaction that customers use your card to purchase)
-Ability to Obtain Mortgage for Players Personal Residences. (20% Down, Monthly Principle and Interest Payments over life of loan)

[David]

Could you please define what you mean by a compliment to the core businesses (manufacturing and retail)?

Being complementary means that it will NOT be a lot of fun if the player is just focused on operating a bank and/or an insurance company without running any production businesses.

How big could a bank or insurance company be in the game be in the game? What profit margins would we be looking at?

We do not have a definite answer on this yet as the dev is still on going. But you may assume that they will be similar to telecoms.

Bank Design Suggestions:
-Credit/Debit/Charge Card Brand with Interchange Fee Revenue (Earn fee revenue off every retail transaction that customers use your card to purchase)
-Ability to Obtain Mortgage for Players Personal Residences. (20% Down, Monthly Principle and Interest Payments over life of loan)

Interesting concepts. Could you provide more details as to how you envision these to be implemented?

[standardplayer]

Bank Design Suggestions:
-Credit/Debit/Charge Card Brand with Interchange Fee Revenue (Earn fee revenue off every retail transaction that customers use your card to purchase)
-Ability to Obtain Mortgage for Players Personal Residences. (20% Down, Monthly Principle and Interest Payments over life of loan)

Interesting concepts. Could you provide more details as to how you envision these to be implemented?

Rough Idea for Credit/Debit/Charge Cards:

• Section of Bank HQ:
o Allows you to create and name a Card Brand (e.g. Visa, MasterCard, American Express)
o Set Card Fee 1.5%-2.5% and Rewards Target 1%-2% of Purchases
o Set an Annual Fee $0-$150/year
o Set an Advertising Budget and See Brand Rating
o See Market Share (Number of Cardholders, Market Share Graph or Pie Chart, etc.)

• Retail Transactions/Fee Example:
o Retail Sales $15 Billion:
-Cards 80% $12 Billion
-Cash 20% $3 Billion
o Market for Card Fees: 1.5%-2.5% Fee x $12 Billion = $180-$300 Million in Fees
o Annual Fees: Population 5 Million
-Upper Class/Luxury Population 1.5 Million x $100-$150/year = $150-$225 Million
-Regular Population 3.5 Million x $25-$50/Year = $87.5-$175 Million

• Market Share/Competition:
o Customers:
-Upper Class/Luxury Population Weighs Brand Recognition Highly willing to pay Large Annual Fee to be part of Exclusive Club (20%-35% of Transactions) (like American Express Premium Cards)
-Regular Population Weighs Rewards Highly Willing to Pay Small Annual Fee (65%-80% of Transactions) (like Visa or other Mass Market Cards)
o Card Selection Effected by:
-Brand Recognition
-Reward Program Competitiveness
-Cost of Annual Fee

• Revenue and Expenses:
o Revenue:
-1.5%-2.5% of Retail Transactions by Customers
-Annual Fee $0-$150/year per Cardholder ($25-$50/Mass Market, $100-$150/Luxury Card)
o Expenses:
-Rewards of 1%-2% Target for Cash Back or Equivalent Points where 1/3 of people Don't Redeem Rewards so effectively 0.67%-1.34% Expense
-Advertising
-Infrastructure and or Operating Costs: Transaction Processing Data Cost, etc.

Personal Debt:

• General:
o You can only borrow if your Debt Payments are be no more than 25%-35% of previous years CEO Pay and/or Dividends/Interest Income
o If you default on payment because of a lack of cash it will require you to liquidate holdings, borrow additional funds, or declare bankruptcy.
o Possibly Have the Ability to Rent Out Extra Mansions after you have declared one you Primary Residence.

• Mortgage on Personal Residence:
o Build a Home with Option to Finance Purchase with Mortgage
o Ability to Mortgage a Home that has already been built.
o 20%+ Down Payment (in 10% Increments) over 10-15+ Year Mortgage
o Ability to Select Bank to Lend you the funds
o Fixed Mortgage Payment could be Monthly or at Beginning/End of Year to be able to pay with dividends/interest or bonuses.
o Fixed Mortgage Payments would be based on Basic Amortization Table where the majority of Interest is Paid in first few years and the principle balance begins to decline faster they longer you have had the mortgage.

• Personal Loan:
o Loan of up to 50% of Wealth Value reduced by Personal Real Estate Holdings (because of Volatility of Business/Stock Holdings)
o Loan Term of 5-10+ Years
o Loan Payments would be based on Basic Amortization Table or interest only with the principle balance due at the end of the loan. Fixed or Variable Interest Rate.
o Uses: Acquire Additional Shares in Own Company or Other Firm, Finance a Political Campaign, etc.

[David]

Thanks for your inputs. I will forward them to the dev team.

Personally I think the ideas are nice but it seems to me that credit card businesses may behave like telecoms and media companies, which is pretty passive and there isn't a lot that the player can do to change the market shares and the competition landscape.

The bank deposits already function like this. So I am not sure if it is a good idea to add another gameplay layer for credit cards that functions similarly as it may not add much to the gameplay variety.

[David]

For those who voted "I am disappointed that banks and insurance companies are only playing a complementary role. (Please write your suggestions about how you think the design direction should be.)", it will be helpful if you could post here and let us know how you think the design direction should be. Otherwise there is no way we can attempt to improve the design to increase its appeal to cover those who do not like the current design.

[standardplayer]

Thanks for your inputs. I will forward them to the dev team.

Personally I think the ideas are nice but it seems to me that credit card businesses may behave like telecoms and media companies, which is pretty passive and there isn't a lot that the player can do to change the market shares and the competition landscape.

The bank deposits already function like this. So I am not sure if it is a good idea to add another gameplay layer for credit cards that functions similarly as it may not add much to the gameplay variety.

Just throwing out some ideas I know you guys have limited resources so you have to go with what makes sense to you.

[David]

Sounds good.

[zonas]

Unfortunately I don't have a good answer, but I would be a bit disappointed if it's only like telecoms. I would hope it would be more like subsidiaries, where it's not completely out of scope of normal production but it created so much more strategic options in the game. I don't feel like creating telecom company gives me that much strategic advantages, as for example playing around with subsidiaries.

Sorry for not having good complete answer, but I'm excited to see what you guys come up with.

[David]

I would hope it would be more like subsidiaries, where it's not completely out of scope of normal production but it created so much more strategic options in the game.

I believe that banks and insurance companies will create new strategic options, though not to the extent of the Subsidiary DLC.

So it may be fair to say that the Banking DLC is somewhere between the Subsidiary DLC and telecoms in terms of the new strategic options that it offers.

In an effort to avoid releasing the Banking DLC in a state that may disappoint users, we would like to use this thread to facilitate communication with users who think that there needs to be a change in the current design direction. So any inputs are welcome!