After some update, you do not need a ship at a haven in order to trade for resources. Coupled with the fact that you get more food than you pay mats, and more mats than you pay food you can buy food, then mats, then food, then mats until no haven has any offer left. Repeat daily for infinite resources.
One of those should be a bug. Either you need a ship at the haven or you cant flip for profit.
I never noticed that you can flip … I just financed a helios with this and now I feel dirty 
I’m confident that this loophole was unintended and will be plugged in the upcoming patch.
Really ? Interesting. I have seen nobody talking about this and find that confidence quite surprising.
I’m still not quite sure which is unintended - the flipping part or the remote trade part. It seems remote trade was introduced through the new trade window, the haven itself still says that you have to send an aircraft to conduct trade. On the other hand, logistics are instant and so it sortof fits that theme.
Personally I think they should keep the way you can make a profit by trade and require us to use aircrafts again. It adds another layer of economic gameplay that I haven’t even noticed.
Being able to trade “remotely” without an going to the haven. When the trade button was originally introduced, one was required to go the haven to trade. In the last update, it appears that someone toggled a switch that required being at the haven. This, I believe, was not an intended “update”.
Being able to trade materials/tech for food has been in the game since its release. I don’t think the trade values have changed since the release…
Just to make sure there is no misunderstanding. 
I am not talking about the thing where you build food production facilities and then trade the food for tech and mats, I am talking about actually flipping for profit. You do not need to produce any food if you just keep trading with havens. Every trade is a positive business.
roughly:
4 mats = 6 food
4 food = 6 mats
You can only make profits with trading there is never loss.
Yes, this has been the case since the releases. It is interesting though, that most of the havens attacked are ones where the player can trade to get food. Makes me wonder whether this is by design.
So …
Even if they fix remote trade, the best thing to do would be build steal a fast aircraft which single purpose is to fly from haven to haven and simply buy everything. You’d never have to worry about resources.
Hmm … Is that so ?
The whole flipping is certainly not intended and well spotted. But if it’s a mistake with remote trading, rather than using an aircraft - surely once fixed it would require a lot of micromanaging to keep flying about to trade a positive profit? I think simply building a few food plants takes a lot less effort.
But currently as it stands, it’s a huge flaw in the game. I will start trying it out. Getting rich while the world is suffering an apocalypse is quite amusing.
Yeah, probably.
However, food plants are not all that effective. It’s 240 food per month, given the cost it turns a profit after roughly one month. I’m too lazy to do the math but ι’d gauge you can make much more with the trade, or combine both since you need to fly to the havens to sell your food anyways.
Micromanaging vs. endless trade sessions with virtually no effort or time. I would prefer micro managing, I suppose. Better yet, an auto-trading feature where you establish trade between two bases like so many other games. Have a trade ship, escorted or not, to carry out the trading automatically.
And/or have fixed relative values (within a range, perhaps) such that food is always worth the least and material the most with tech in the middle. That seems to be how they value out to me and account for the ability to create food independently at a base. So, 9-11 food = 6-8 tech = 3-5 materials. The range varies by relative supply and demand. So, a base with a lot of food might sell give you 11 food for 4 materials, but another base, if they are short, might only give 9 or refuse to sell at all.
I know we don’t want the game to become Civ, but this is a very simple economy model that does not allow for the exploitation we would see with the F>T>M>F valuing.