I personally have been using Updown.com for simulated trading and strategy testing for over a year but I promise to do an unbiased write up about them :). Updown is a free stock market trading simulator and was founded by Michael Reich, Georg Ludviksson and Phuc Truong in early 2007. The company has received numerous investments from angel investor Joachim Schoss and has had well over $1,000,000 injected into it over the past 3 years.
Account Setup:
Initial account registration requires name, email, alias and country. Registration doesn’t end there if you want to earn real money from updown.com. You also need to complete your portfolio with a date of birth and email confirmation. Updown probably needs this extra information because they actually intend on using the data they gather from your virtual trades to create a real hedge fund. Can you feel the pressure? All players start with $1,000,000 in virtual funds to play the stock market.
Buying and Selling:
There are a variety of trading options to choose from. Traders can buy, sell, buy to cover, sell to cover, place a market order, limit order and even a stop order. Limit and stop orders come with a time frame option but only today or 60 days. Trades are not locked in either and can be cancelled as long as they have not filled yet. A simulated commission is charged and depends on how many shares are traded. The first 1000 shares will cost you $10 with each additional share costing 1 cent each. Updown gives you the option to preview your trade before you proceed which is always a safe thing to do. A decent sized chart is provided for stocks that go back a maximum of 10 years but there are no technical analysis tools for those that want them. You can see how you have been performing since you started or set the charts date yourself which is a big plus. There is still no way to view all of your exact trades though which is something all real brokers give you.
Real Rewards:
Community members are rewarded for taking part in updown with real cash. You can earn real money by either beating the market or by making stock recommendations. The current leader has a total return of 9800% and has earned $1700 in real money but has made no stock recommendations. Another member has an 1800% return but has earned $3876 in real rewards because hes made so many stock recommendations.
Community:
If I remember correctly there were a little over 100,000 accounts on updown.com a year ago but I can’t find any updated information. They are getting over 100,000 unique visitors per month so I assume it is safe to say they have around 100,000 active accounts plus a lot more that sit idly. Updown is another community based stock market game where players can create profiles, add friends and write to other traders. Players can also earn real money by making stock picks and/or dominating the monthly $3000 competition. You are able to see the trade’s people are making on stocks by going to the stocks activity. You are unable to see all the trades a member is making by going to their portfolio. This is frustrating when looking at the top members who have over 1000% returns and not being able to see how they did it. The only other trade transparencies you have are written recommendations from other investors which are a lot better than nothing if you are a beginner.
Updown also allows you to view others profiles and some of the pros have written exactly how they do so well in the stock market. For example Josh Moneytaker says "Buy low, sell high, and do it often, daytrading is the strategy that has been working for me lately,take profits when you have them, and cut your losses quickly, reinvest your gains, and you'll see the magic of compound interest."
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