Stock Picking (Beat Boho) Contest - V2.0

April rankings will be available in the morning.
 

Attachments

  • contest.jpg
    contest.jpg
    54.5 KB · Views: 7
April:

Current RankPrevious day's rankAccount Value (USD)Today's change in valueOverall%
1. Spudd1$2,151,870.14($7,880.00)115.19%
2. comsecga2$1,902,112.81$38,932.6090.21%
3. kite_rider3$1,721,759.96($14,835.00)72.18%
4. cfahey274$1,230,063.17($11,327.50)23.01%
5. BohoII6$1,209,541.92$2,776.9620.95%
6. covert17$1,207,054.74$385.0020.71%
7. wrd585$1,194,262.14($33,910.00)19.43%
8. DieWurst8$1,168,617.53$2,911.0816.86%
9. easysurfer9$1,120,362.67$296.8612.04%
10. nvestysly10$1,117,216.67$6,287.4011.72%
11. wmc100012$1,090,423.28$18,950.679.04%
12. lbymfreddie11$1,059,707.92($34,685.00)5.97%
13. natetheb13$1,048,589.34($724.56)4.86%
14. RiskyBusinessC214$1,023,778.22$6,000.002.38%
15. t3ztam3nt15$1,001,603.51$31.000.16%
16. guestperson23$1,000,555.01$610.000.06%
17. exnavynuke20$1,000,000.00$0.000.00%
18. jmil0721$1,000,000.00$0.000.00%
19. monitorLizzy19$1,000,000.00$0.000.00%
20. secondcor52117$1,000,000.00$0.000.00%
21. consvgmbl22$1,000,000.00$0.000.00%
22. dixonge18$1,000,000.00$0.000.00%
23. underwrite24$982,670.58($2,604.50)-1.73%
24. ransil16$982,488.19($17,636.25)-1.75%
25. sengsational25$970,373.85($7,879.60)-2.96%
26. lawrencewendall26$919,157.55$12,441.37-8.08%
27. KCScubaSteve27$903,096.74($2,187.34)-9.69%
 
I wouldn't take that monthly summary too seriously. Like everything else in the game, the numbers appear to be hopelessly inaccurate. So far, at least, I haven't seen any evidence that interest payments/charges are reflected in portfolio value. If so, that makes the numbers totally bogus. You would have to make adjustments of tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars to reflect everyone's actual status in the game.
 
As an example of how Investopedia mishandles interest payments on cash during its end of month processing, consider my (DieWurst's) experience in the past few days. On 4/29 I made some trades that caused me to go from a small positive cash balance to a negative balance of -$631,830.55. On May 1, I found an entry in my corporate action history of an interest charge of -$136.63. This charge correctly reflects the interest I should be charged for buying stocks on margin - 29 days of a small positive balance credited at 1%, less one day of a -$631,830.55 balance charged at 8%.

The problem? Investopedia hasn't adjusted my portfolio balance at all. I still have a cash balance of -$631,830.55. This appears to be a universal phenomenon - for example, the players who joined the game just to observe and have never made any trades should be receiving $833.33 per month in interest, but all of their account balances are stuck at $1,000,000. The 1% interest that the game's rules says they should be receiving has never appeared in their accounts.

This is not a small mistake. The cumulative effect on players who employ different amounts of leverage is enormous over the course of a 36 month game. To get a feel for just how big, consider that Spudd currently has a positive cash balance of $1,520,280.14, while Ransil has a negative balance of -$417,870.93. Naturally, trade activity will cause cash balances to fluctuate, but if that kind of differential persisted for an entire month, Spudd should be getting $1,266.90 in interest added to her portfolio, whereas Ransil should have $2,785.81 in subtracted from his portfolio. Unfortunately, that is not happening because of Investopedia's mistake. Over the course of a three year game, this kind of large error can easily compound into the six figure range.

The takeaway for me is that it's foolish not to use leverage when Investopedia is offering a no cost loan to do so. I leveraged my account on Monday only to prove to myself that Investopedia wasn't charging interest on margin accounts, but now that the evidence is in, I plan on maintaining a highly leveraged portfolio for the remainder of the game.

(Note: In theory, Investopedia could still fix its mistake, for example by making an interest adjustment on the final day of the game. Maybe it will, but considering how badly riddled with bugs this simulator is, I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for a fix.)
 
There's no good simulator. ERD50 had the right idea. We need to do this manually. To make it simpler we could set a limit of 10 trades per month and calculate the winner at the end of each month with disclosure of the time of trades, the interest, etc. But if I'd have to do my own calculating, I don't think I'd bother with the contest.
 
Spudd said:
I decided to search and I found a site that seems reasonable. I will sign up and if anyone wants to join me please feel free! Especially Boho, since I named the contest after him.

https://www.howthemarketworks.com/register/152523
Click to expand...

I lost confidence in even the most promising looking simulators. This Investopedia will be the last one I try unless an actual brokerage decides to create one.
 
Boho said:
I lost confidence in even the most promising looking simulators. This Investopedia will be the last one I try unless an actual brokerage decides to create one.
Click to expand...

I'm starting the BoHO! BoHO! BoHO! chant in hopes you'll join Spudd's contest so we can see the Boho Shuffle there too :).
 
Last edited:
In case I wasn't clear, I'm not doing howthemarketworks.
 
I found that although I could scrape all players trades, I couldn't scrape corporate actions, except my own. But I forged ahead. But when people were getting stock for free, and it was undetectable, I gave up. I'm not sure I'll invest the time in another game.
 
FWIW, I'm still playing this. I have $86,632.69 cash that I'll probably use on Monday for an index fund once the S&P drops to a certain point, like around .7%. I'll probably end up getting it cheaper than that.
 
Boho said:
FWIW, I'm still playing this. I have $86,632.69 cash that I'll probably use on Monday for an index fund once the S&P drops to a certain point, like around .7%. I'll probably end up getting it cheaper than that.
Click to expand...

FYI - I won't end the Beat Boho v2.0 contest early but will just let that run til the end.
 
I've been hating Musk for a long time and finally made a feel-good short of TSLA to reward myself for recent gains.
 
I'm at $1,202,621.44. If my calculations are correct, since the start of the contest that's a 20.26% gain for me compared to a 21.82% gain by the S&P. I'm now holding all index funds, mostly S&P, and $829.29 cash. If I keep this position I'd be an average of .52% per year behind the S&P by the end of the contest, with the first year being behind, the second being equal, and the last being ahead. I'm going to try beating it though.
 
Boho said:
I'm at $1,202,621.44. If my calculations are correct, since the start of the contest that's a 20.26% gain for me compared to a 21.82% gain by the S&P. I'm now holding all index funds, mostly S&P, and $829.29 cash. If I keep this position I'd be an average of .52% per year behind the S&P by the end of the contest, with the first year being behind, the second being equal, and the last being ahead. I'm going to try beating it though.
Click to expand...

Would you show your work/source please? I believe that your calculations on the S&P are not correct.

-ERD50
 
ERD50 said:
Would you show your work/source please? I believe that your calculations on the S&P are not correct.

-ERD50
Click to expand...

From stockcharts.com, but I guess I didn't include 2 years of dividends. What's the correct gain for the S&P then?
 

Attachments

  • contest.jpg
    contest.jpg
    76.8 KB · Views: 6
Boho said:
From stockcharts.com, but I guess I didn't include 2 years of dividends. What's the correct gain for the S&P then?
Click to expand...

Looks like if you select a 'predefined sector', it just gives the NAV.

I assume your url was:

https://stockcharts.com/freecharts/perf.php?$SPX

But when I select SPY, it gives actual total return (performance, including reinvested divs):

https://stockcharts.com/freecharts/perf.php?SPY

It shows 26.89% total return, and nunun's value should reflect that if he hasn't been taken out of the contest due to non-activity. You still have a lot of catching up to do.

-ERD50
 
ERD50 said:
It shows 26.89% total return, and nunun's value should reflect that if he hasn't been taken out of the contest due to non-activity. You still have a lot of catching up to do.
Click to expand...

It's even worse than that. Boho not only got the index performance wrong, but he gives his own portfolio value from the Investopedia rankings page. I went into some detail earlier this month explaining why the Investopedia rankings are hopelessly inaccurate. If Boho took the trouble to make an accurate calculation of his performance, he would be even farther behind the indexes.
 
karluk said:
If Boho took the trouble to make an accurate calculation of his performance, he would be even farther behind the indexes.
Click to expand...

Because I didn't pay interest on my three or so shorts? I didn't hold them too long. If you'd like to estimate the right account value, I'll go along with that.
 
Boho said:
Because I didn't pay interest on my three or so shorts? I didn't hold them too long. If you'd like to estimate the right account value, I'll go along with that.
Click to expand...
Boho, I know that you've been using significant leverage for many months now. In fact, it's the primary reason I think you've improved as an investor over the course of the game - instead of taking crazy fliers on stocks of companies you know absolutely nothing about, you've recently stuck mostly to index investing and have used the very valid strategy of increasing expected return by increasing risk through the use of leverage. It's not your fault that Investopedia has messed up leverage by failing to charge interest on margin accounts.

If you really want to let us know how you're doing, it's well within your power. Just post screen shots of your corporate action history. As far as I know, all of the interest charges are posted there - they just haven't been subtracted from your portfolio value.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

easysurfer
Stocking Picking Contest - v3.0
2 3
Replies
66
Views
6K
ERD50
E
easysurfer
Stock Picking ("Beat Boho") Contest
8 9 10
Replies
235
Views
22K
Fermion
F

Latest posts

Back
Top Bottom