Bond Issue

[Tauge]

The other day there was a discussion on Discord about increasing the amount you could borrow. This led to a discussion on how this could be best accomplished, not just increasing the amount allowed to be loaned, but also introducing more risk or a different mechanic.

I think a bond issue mechanic could do it. Money will be loaned to the company the same way it is now. An amount of money loaned to the company for a certain calculated interest rate over a known rate of time. This could use the existing code base, to calculate maximum amount allowed to be borrowed, and interest rates.

The repayment of the loan is where the bond issue would be different to a standard loan. I've seen two implementations. In one, interest continues to accrue until maturity/payback date, and on that day, everything, interest and principle is repaid. The other way has the company making interest payments periodically during the life of the bond and on maturity, the principle it's repaid. This would likely require some additional coding work, but might still be able to leverage the existing code base.

Basically, this would give a player a way to borrow more, but at a significantly higher risk.

One more thing to mention. These bonds would not be intended for players to buy and sell. The bonds would be "purchased" by the AI, just like loans are given by the Bank of HQ Country. Functionally, this is just a loan with a different payback method.