| Author |
Message
|
| Trading Simulator |
 Posted: Thu Aug 25, 2005 8:23 pm Post subject: Trading Simulator Version II |
 |
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
Short Version
As of now (Friday, August 26) we have implemented our Order Queue system. Orders may be placed via the trading screen at any time during the day. Orders will only be processed during market hours, on a twenty-minute delayed basis. Your eInvesting$ balance is not adjusted until the order is actually executed. You should check your queue status for any outstanding orders before placing any new orders. We attempt to process orders in the order they were received... if you run out of money, orders will be retried a limited number of times before they will be cancelled.
That's probably enough. If you want more details, read the rest of this post. If not, commence trading and having fun. 
Long Version
We use the free quote server from Yahoo for our trading simulator. These quotes are (up to) twenty minutes delayed. An enterprising person could make trades based on real-time knowledge and use our delayed quotes to make a tidy profit. Users could also make trades based on after-hours news, buying the stock when the market was closed and making a nice profit on the open the next day. The order queue system was developed to prevent both of these issues as well as give us the capability of offering limit trades at a later date.
You may now enter trades any time of the day, any day of the week. Your order will be entered into an order queue. You may cancel your order any time prior to it being executed (closed). You may monitor your order queue using the screen linked at the bottom of any of the trading pages (portfolio, trading history). Eventually we will offer the capability to Edit orders that are still open... this feature will likely be released at the same time we offer Limit orders. There is no scheduled release date for these features at this time.
Orders are processed by the Queue Monitor. This process runs once a minute from 9:50 Eastern to 4:20 Eastern time. Market hours are 9:30 to 4:00 Eastern. The Queue Monitor doesn't start until 9:50 because of the twenty-minute delay, and runs until 4:20 for the same reason. If for any reason the Queue Monitor fails we have a redundant feature that restarts the monitor process every five minutes. Since orders are handled on a twenty-minute delay, your order should never be delayed. Remember that this is only a game... we will make a "best effort" to process trades in an appropriate fashion, but there is no guarantee.
At this time all trades are considered MARKET trades, meaning you cannot specify a limit price for your trade. We intend to add limit trading at some future date. All other restrictions ($2 stocks, no options, no "dot" stocks) are still in place.
Because orders are not processed immediately, your cash balance of eInvesting$ will not decrease when you place the order. For that reason, you could get into an 'overdrawn' condition, where you have more outstanding orders than you have cash to cover. In the real world you can run a margin account (take a loan from your broker). That is a future feature we plan to add. At this time your order will be executed until you run out of cash, and then retried a limited number of times. If you post alot, maybe you'll get enough $$ to complete the order.  If not, your order will be cancelled.
Having one order skipped does not mean all of your orders will be ignored. Suppose that your cash balance is $1000, and your first order is for $1200 and your second is $500 and your third is $550. The first order will be skipped, the second filled (and your cash reduced by $500) and the third order skipped. If you make another post (earning $100) then a minute later your third order will be filled. After a limited number of attempts your first order (for $1000) will be cancelled due to lack of funds.
Cancelled orders are displayed in your order queue. The system assigns a reason for why the order was cancelled.
We hope that these changes will make the game more interesting and realistic. In the next few days we plan to release an update that changes how the overall portfolio return % is calculated. Stay tuned for details. |
|
| Back to top |
|
 |
| MrInvestor |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 1:59 am Post subject: |
|
|
Investing Manager
|
| Very Slick! |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Grimreaper |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 2:22 am Post subject: |
|
|
CFO
|
Nice! so basically with the new system the order you place here gets you the "actual" price your stock is trading for at the time you place your order, at least I think that's what it means so I had better place a small trade sometime today just to make sure  |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Trading Simulator |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 3:44 am Post subject: |
|
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
| Grimreaper wrote: | | Nice! so basically with the new system the order you place here gets you the "actual" price your stock is trading for at the time you place your order, at least I think that's what it means so I had better place a small trade sometime today just to make sure |
In theory, yes. If you see a real-time quote for $12 and our delayed quotes are $10 and you place a sell order, it should sell at or near $12 in about twenty minutes. The timing is not absolutely precise, but it's close. Note that some stocks are only delayed 15 minutes, so your real-time quote and the trade execution may not match.
At some point we'll have limit orders too, and you can have more control over the price used to buy / sell your holdings. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Grimreaper |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 3:54 am Post subject: |
|
|
CFO
|
Well lemme say this right now then Mr. TS, you are doin one helluva job!  |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Trading Simulator |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 4:03 am Post subject: |
|
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
| MrInvestor wrote: | | Very Slick! |
And congratulations to MrInvestor! As the first completed trade via the new Order Queue system, you receive an eInvestion$ donation from the Trading Simulator to cover the costs of your trade. Including commission. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Grimreaper |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 4:11 am Post subject: |
|
|
CFO
|
| I noticed the trade doesn't get posted until it is completed I guess, I just bought 100 WPTE to test out da system, I'll let ya know how close ya gots ta da price it was trading at when I bought it |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Grimreaper |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 4:29 am Post subject: |
|
|
CFO
|
| Well, off by a tad, but I let da price stay static at 12.40 a few seconds before I put in my buy, it was trading at 12.40 at the time, I got 12.45, but as I said it was holding a steady bid/axed at 12.36/12.45, so maybe the next trade was at 12.45. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Trading Simulator |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 4:45 am Post subject: |
|
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
| Grimreaper wrote: | | I noticed the trade doesn't get posted until it is completed I guess, I just bought 100 WPTE to test out da system, I'll let ya know how close ya gots ta da price it was trading at when I bought it |
That's correct. You can use the new Order Queue page to view the orders that have not yet been processed. If the order is open, you can even cancel it if you like. There is an Edit option that will be implemented once we get Limit orders working.
| Grimreaper wrote: | | Well, off by a tad, but I let da price stay static at 12.40 a few seconds before I put in my buy, it was trading at 12.40 at the time, I got 12.45, but as I said it was holding a steady bid/axed at 12.36/12.45, so maybe the next trade was at 12.45. |
It all depends on what Yahoo reports as the "quote". If they are reporting the BID you'll get the trade at one level, if they're reporting the ASK then you'll get the other. If they're reporting the last actual trade, then I presume at the time your quote was checked the last trade was at that amount. I really haven't investigated exactly what Yahoo uses. If you're looking at a thinly traded stock, there may not be any trades, so they would have to report BID or ASK instead. But I'm not absolutely certain.
Regarding the timing... the queue monitor goes to sleep for 60 seconds after processing available open orders. So the 20 minute delay is not an absolutely precise value. I can guarantee that you will have at least a 20 minute delay, and possibly up to a minute more. That should be precise enough for game trading. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Trading Simulator |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 4:52 am Post subject: |
|
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
| FYI, I'm going to kill the queue monitor in a few minutes to test the automatic restart process. There may be a few extra minutes of delay in order processing until the replacement queue monitor comes online. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
 |
| Trading Simulator |
| Posted: Fri Aug 26, 2005 5:15 am Post subject: |
|
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
| Trading Simulator wrote: | | FYI, I'm going to kill the queue monitor in a few minutes to test the automatic restart process. There may be a few extra minutes of delay in order processing until the replacement queue monitor comes online. |
The auto-restart process worked great. There did not appear to be any orders in the queue at that time, so nothing got delayed more than it should have because of the test. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| barloy |
| Posted: Wed Dec 28, 2005 4:36 pm Post subject: cost |
|
|
Investing Sr. Associate
|
| how much does it cost to buy and sell in the sim and when do they have to be paid for or just when you sell when you sell i think |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
| Dave Rathbun |
| Posted: Wed Dec 28, 2005 7:57 pm Post subject: |
|
|
CFO
|
| You pay e$10 commission on every trade, buy or sell. If you don't have the e$ in your account to cover the buy, it won't go through. |
|
| Back to top |
|
|
|
|
stock market game on the web. At eInvesting you compete for monthly cash prizes while you interact, make virtual dollars, purchase items, and trade in the realistic stock market simulator. We make investing FUN!
