I thought the same thing. They should have some value, not a lot maybe, but something.
I think they will at some point, just now the 'core' part of the game is getting dev time, fingers crossed though.
From what i've managed to glean from my data, everyone gets 'First Finders Payout' - As for making money, there are systems that pay as much as 150k and are great to look at too!