Re: Stock Market Simulation

From: ataft@infinet.com (Ashley Taft)

Date: Fri, 23 Dec 1994 08:25:33 +0000

Rich Skrenta (skrenta@pbm.com) wrote:
: The problem with traditional stock market picking games is that
: they (randomly) reward a big risk taker.  The fellow who wins is
: someone who bet 100% of his cash on some crazy option that paid
: off, then rolled the winnings over onto another crazy bet.

True...

: Real people who do this lose all of their money.  But if 1000 people
: play a stock picking game, one of them is going to have a gazillion
: percent return and win.  Since fake money doesn't matter, and there's
: only one winner, all the flavors of losing taste the same.

: Perhaps an open-ended game which modeled more than simply buying
: and selling stocks could address this.  You could have risky attempts
: to gain "insider info", which might land you in jail or fined by
: the SEC.  Perhaps every player would have to be a member of one of
: the brokerage houses (player alliances).  Use your Telephone Charm
: rating to wring cold-call money from retirees; build your firm's
: investment capital with a Public Offering; maybe even make a big
: play with money you embezzled (if you won, you could pay it back...)
: Increase your Influence by buying a more expensive suit.

: Yeah, it could be swell...

What about Capital Gains taxes?

Charge a flat 35% tax on all profits gained from a stock, upon the
selling of said stock.

This would take some of the bite out of those runaway profits...

The problem that I see as being The Big One, is that markets are set by
the buyers/sellers...If we were to begin a true market simulation, we
would need a LARGE number of anonymous players.  Anonymity would be
NECESSARY.

Ashley

References

Re: Stock Market Simulation
gl8f@fermi.clas.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Fri, 16 Dec 1994 23:40:24 +0000
Re: Stock Market Simulation
skrenta@pbm.com (Rich Skrenta)
Tue, 20 Dec 1994 12:52:00 +0000