How to get money easily at the start and avoid the grind

When you start the first thing you want to do is get to Second Contact II flashpoint, this is important to get there fast, the faster the better.
You can find this sector on the main highway ring south of Argon prime and as soon as you get there go to the south gate where HoP and ANT will be ripping through each others ships, once there look for loot crates and use your ships cargo Magnet ( button O ) to snag anything that drops, ideally you want the SETA materials :
Damaged Singularity Engine
Flux Capacitor
Programmable Field Array
These items are worth 100k+ each and can drop quite often so prioritise these
Next we want space fly eggs which are illegal but dont worry about that just grab as many as you can as 25 of these gets you space fly caviar once crafted which is 1,000,000+ credits.
So as HoP and ANT destroy each other look for these drops and keep hoovering them up, when it calms down a bit get on the highway and go south ( go to next section )

So youve now left Second contact II flashpoint and you are headed south on the highway, head to Holy Vision, once there stay on the highway and just before it seems you will be leaving the sector you will find the HoP wharf.
Dock at the wharf and go to the trader and sell the SETA parts and craft any space fly caviar (if you have enough) and sell that also, if not hold on to any eggs.
This first haul should net you 1 million depending how long you stayed collecting in Second contact.
With the money equip your ship with 5 Advanced satellites and proceed to pontifexs claim

Get off the highway near the east gate at Pontifexs claim and drop an Advanced satellite as this will help us see drops, Hop and PAR will be killing each other here so start collecting those drops, if its died down in this sector go to the next one Pious mists II and they might be fighting there too it just depends who has the upper hand so drop another Advanced satellite here and check for drops.

Now go north on the highway to True sight and drop an Advanced satellite at the north gate as sometimes ANT pushes HoP into this sector and collect drops if there are none go north in to second contact II flashpoint and drop a satellite here.
Now you can just go back and forth using the highway for faster travel just collecting drops and this will net you several millions depending how much time you want to spend.
Bare in mind this is all time sensitive as the factions will grind each other down until the conflict dies out so get to these drops and farm them.
If you do pick up spacefly eggs remember they are illegal so just dont get scanned, you can always drop a lockbox and get them later if it gets too hot but the police should be occupied with all the combat to bother scanning you.

So there is an abandoned Paranid destroyer deep in Xenon territory which for a seasoned player is easy to get but it does offer a challenge.
Im not going to explain this as its quite involved but its easy to find out how to locate and claim this destroyer which is worth 10 million+ and its just sitting there waiting for you to claim it!
Just google Paranid destroyer Faulty logic VII.

A thread on the official forums showing where some other abandoned ships are and the big paranid destroyer [forum.egosoft.com]

Personally i like to start a mining complex in Neptune, why Neptune?
Neptune puts me in range of plenty of NPC factories that need silicon and lots of it, Neptune is also out of Khaak range well i say that but where we will be mining is which is Oort cloud which is south of Pluto and Pluto is south of Neptune, its ultra safe and a great place to start for beginers.
This mining operation will require you to get a Solid storage and a Dock, just have some miners mine and have other miners trade, you will need a few satellites on potential buyers but that wont take long and can easily be done while the mining complex is being built.
This mining complex can be added too and will make you millions.

The other option is start boarding and pirating, my personal favourite is Nap Fortune VI just north of pious mists II, its a neutral sector with lots of good target traffic.

Going to add some useful links here that i use to help me play the game, all credit to the creators have kept these great information resources going
Rogueys excellent X series website[roguey.co.uk]
This has a good amount of useful information including ships and equipment statistics, faction information and much more.
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X4 Station Calculator [www.x4-game.com]
I find this essential for working out all the modules needed to make my complexes run smoothly, it`s been recently updated for the new DLC.
Dont forget the option to buy the station calculator creator a coffee if you feel it has helped you.
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Quantum Anomaly very useful information and map[/urlThis has a lot of useful information that is presented very well it also had a full universe map showing what deposits can be found in each sector, tips and tricks, ship stats and much more[www.qsna.eu]

Hopefully this guide will help people struggling with early game money.
This was written quickly but i think this is by far the easiest way to get you your first 50 million within the first few in game hours and once you have this cash cushion you can find your own way to play and enjoy this great game.