Thanks, oldscratch.
Hey, what happened to UncleBeer? He used to be one of the big dogs! I hope the windows on your floor are sealed, UncleBeer.
How do I do it? Well, for one thing I totally ignored my job for a few hours (like 9:30-4?) and did this instead. 
I’ve been using the Yahoo Finance page to see what is moving and then trading thousands of shares of whatever is hot making a few thousand $$'s here and there. I did that a lot and it all adds up. Ironically I made most of the money today from shorting and buying Yahoo shares throughout the day.
Keep in mind this only works for me with funny money. I tried a little of it with real money and it wasn’t pretty.
I’m assuming that no one here is doing this, but what’s to stop a real trader from totally destroying in these games? If one had access to realtime market quotes, you could make a lot of Monopoly money in a game run off of 20-minute delayed information.
You’d have to watch things fairly closely, but you could probably have little trouble doubling your money every day or two.
In our game, there’s not much at stake, but I understand some of the groups on InvestSmart offer prizes.
Should we agree to only get quotes from the same sources?
I used Yahoo because it’s easy to use and I have my email and stuff there already but I’ll try any site or even just the InvestSmart site quotes.
I have to mention that I had problems with the InvestSmart site all day. I kept getting server errors.
I guess sdimbert should decide.
To the question of why pro traders aren’t killing us:
They are - I’m a professional money manager. Anyone want to buy in with me? 
No, really, why would a pro trader waste his time with play money? He’s busy playing with other people’s real money!
To the question of sources of quotes:
When you set up a new game on InvestSmart, one of the options will automatically delay all trades for 20 minutes to avoid the problem of some players having more recent market information.
I chose not to delay trades, and I will tell you why.
Today (as opposed to 10 months or so ago), online stock information comes in two flavors: Real Time and 20 Minutes Delayed.
You can get 20 minuted quotes from Yahoo!, E*Trade, HotBot… Hell, AOL Instant Messenger has a built in ticker with 20 minute information. Any 12 year old can get it.
To get quotes any faster, you still need to pay someone lots of money. This is the situation for people in our game as well as real-life stock market players. So, if someone in this game is willing to pay money for an advantage, let them enjoy it. This will do nothing more then better approximate the perils and “injustices” of real-life trading.
PS - If anyone is discovering (as I did) that this kind of thing is more interesting than they thought, I have two books to reccommend: Dumb Money, an auto-biographical tale by an internet-age day trader and High-Flying Adventures in the Stock Market, in which the author spends a year following the manager of the Delaware Agressive Growth Fund, a successful Mutual Fund. I have recently read both and found both to be facinating.
PS - What to Day Traders call people who use 20-Minute delayed information?
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E*Tards.
You can tell we’re bad if people who are simply earning 4% interest on the cash and never bought any stock are in the Top 5! :rolleyes:
Oh, and what happened to Uncle Beer?!? From challenging for the top spot to last place?!? Ouch!
Yer pal,
Satan
*I HAVE BEEN SMOKE-FREE FOR:
Six months, four days, 18 hours, 44 minutes and 34 seconds.
7511 cigarettes not smoked, saving $938.90.
Extra life with Drain Bead: 3 weeks, 5 days, 1 hour, 55 minutes.
I slept with a moderator!*
Rank# name: net worth: gain/loss: # of trades
1. bafaa 131097.59 31.10 91
2. Satan666 112110.68 12.11 30
3. Silo 107620.29 7.62 10
4. TwistofFate 106655.28 6.66 77
5. oldscratch 102278.18 2.28 34
6. pantom 100989.60 0.99 12
7. zette 100077.80 0.08 0
8. Aglarond 100077.80 0.08 0
9. Ankh_Too 100044.44 0.04 0
10. Kerrigan 99975.89 -0.02 2
11. Omniscient 99774.37 -0.23 4
12. jazzmine 99603.39 -0.40 1
13. DrainBead 99311.78 -0.69 6
14. mamapotomus 99281.44 -0.72 19
15. Modian 99075.16 -0.92 19
16. SqrlCub 98771.04 -1.23 6
17. ShadowKat 98524.37 -1.48 19
18. LazarusLong42 98087.59 -1.91 13
19. EnosStrate 96383.37 -3.62 4
20. Aglarond78 96289.52 -3.71 2
21. tubagirl 96199.25 -3.80 64
22. pldennison 96180.70 -3.82 26
23. Opengrave 96121.20 -3.88 2
24. Scylla 95779.43 -4.22 9
25. Saltire 95388.88 -4.61 36
26. pugluvr 93980.30 -6.02 13
27. LamarMundane 93859.89 -6.14 3
28. Thirsty4 90301.33 -9.70 10
29. CnoteChris 89825.49 -10.17 113
30. UncleBeer 82527.39 -17.47 43
31. sdimbert 82168.71 -17.83 69
Woot, from 21st to 15th. Monday, I’m going to make a killing, so watch out
Don’t pay any attention to me hovering around the bottom of the barrel.
I’m simply visiting for now so when I make my big move I’ll be more humbled by the fact that I’ve come from rags to riches.
Wow, NASDAQ up well over 200 today. Whew!
Let’s see, do I want a Porsche or a Jaguar?
Home Depot, Yahoo, DoubleClick, Motorola…
The list of total disasters this week was pretty amazing. From the looks of the rankings, it appears that no one allowed themselves to get caught in the worst of it. Fills me with admiration. (The fact I’m in sixth has nothing to do with this good feeling, of course.)
Wow, I’m doing much better than I thought I would. Less than a 2% loss.
I just registered, can I still play?
Goose, welcome to the game.
Did they tell you about the sign-up fee? You can just send that to me. (Check out the rankings… I need it!)
Heh. Nearly in the basement. That’s what happens when you don’t diversify kiddies. I’ll be back. You watch. Owens-Corning’ll be $7.50 by the end of the year. A mere 500% increase over my purchase price.
**bafaa** 131141.29 31.14 91
**Satan666** 112957.95 12.96 30
**Silo** 109688.75 9.69 15
**oldscratch** 105846.40 5.85 35
**TwistofFate** 105326.21 5.33 77
**pantom** 102435.87 2.44 18
**mamapotomus** 100726.70 0.73 22
**ShadowKat** 100125.21 0.13 19
**zette ** 100111.16 0.11 0
**Aglarond** 100111.16 0.11 0
**Ankh_Too** 100077.79 0.08 0
**Goose** 100022.22 0.02 0
**Kerrigan** 100002.67 0.00 2
**beakerxf** 99661.43 -0.34 12
**DrainBead** 99552.81 -0.45 6
**Omniscient** 99466.63 -0.53 5
**jazzmine** 99354.14 -0.65 1
**EnosStrate** 97503.35 -2.50 4
**LazarusLong42** 97372.07 -2.63 13
**Modian** 97231.42 -2.77 19
**Opengrave** 97027.33 -2.97 2
**pldennison** 96782.71 -3.22 26
**tubagirl** 96183.85 -3.82 64
**Scylla** 95870.53 -4.13 9
**Saltire** 95393.52 -4.61 40
**Aglarond78** 94654.38 -5.35 2
**LamarMundane** 91889.38 -8.11 3
**pugluvr** 91387.14 -8.61 13
**SqrlCub** 90509.68 -9.49 6
**Thirsty4** 87437.03 -12.56 10
**sdimbert** 83946.32 -12.56 10
**UncleBeer** 81810.23 -12.56 10
**CnoteChris** 80554.22 -12.56 10
[Kim Darby Voice]
I’m ahead of a Mod! I’m ahead of a Mod!
[/Kim Darby Voice]
BTW, I will be very impressed if anyone gets the Kim Darby reference…
Kim Darby- ‘Miri’ Star Trek Production 12, 10/27/66, Stardate 2713.5. Synopsis- One of the older children, Miri (Kim Darby), falls in love with Kirk and tries to help him with the other children until she begins to see Yeoman Rand as a rival for the captain’s affections. Stung, Miri helps Jahn, one of the boys, to lead the children in a campaign to harass the U.S.S. Enterprise crew members. When Kirk tries to reason with the children, he is badly beaten.
Interesting connotation your trying to make there sdimbert.
Or maybe you meant her acting philosophy she proudly procaims- Kim Darby-
Go get ‘em Unclebeer!
I’ll let you two duke it out as I continue to perfect my day-trading strategy!!
Come on Chris, anyone can use a search engine.
What is the significance of the voice?
BTW, you look good down there! 
I find it interesting that the two players with the highest number of trades are on the top and bottom of the rankings. Not sure what it means, but it’s interesting.
Scylla is moving up in the rankings. Scylla has made some key changes to his invest policy. These are shrewd cunning mauevers that will leave you all in the dust!