VirtualTrader is FREE to play. If you are not already a member, fill out the sign up form and start trading. Within 5 minutes you can start building your own portfolio.
Goal
Master the Market. Trade as many securities as you like and try to achieve the highest return of all players! Buy low and sell high. Sounds easy, doesn’t it?
Portfolios
When your portfolio is created £100,000 in virtual cash will be deposited into your account. A portfolio can be set to public (visible to other users) or private (not visible to others). Go to the Administration section to change this setting. You may create as many portfolios as you like, but only one competition portfolio! This means you will be excluded from the competition if you are playing with more than one portfolio.
Leagues
You can take part in an existing league or create your own. You could for instance set up a league for your friends, family or coworkers. Leagues marked as "public" are open for anyone to join. To join a "private" league, you will need a password which can obtained from the person who set up the league.
Ranking
The ranking shows portfolios listed according to their relative performance: the current value is compared to the value at the beginning of the month or the moment you registered for the prize league. We do not reset you portfolio when the competition ends and do not take the absolute amount and performance into account.
Verification
Winners are subject to verification by VirtualTrader. In other words: cheating does not pay off in this competition.
Short positions, 200% margin
"Going Short" means selling shares you do not actually own. This enables you to take advantage of a fall in price, rather than a price increase. When you go short, the shares are lent to you and to close the transaction you have to eventually buy them. This leads to a gain if the price you buy the shares at is lower than the price you "went short" (borrowed them) at.
A short position will be displayed in your portfolio as a negative amount of shares. The money you will need to buy these shares is "reserved", plus an extra 100% to cover a possible rise in the share price. This means this money cannot be spent during the time you hold the short position. You are liable for any dividend payments that may be due during this period. You cannot have unlimited short positions. Short selling is only possible in stocks with an average effective volume of at least 1.5 million per day. Your total short position cannot exceed your net worth.
25% Rule
You are not allowed to invest more than 25% of the total value of your portfolio in one stock, which forces you to diversify your positions.
Interest
Interest is calculated at the end of the week and is fixed at the EURIBOR rate (the standard European interbank rate).
Transaction costs
Transaction costs are calculated as follows: a basic fee of £ 10.00 plus 0.15% of the transaction value, with a minimum of £12.50 and a maximum of £ 175.00 per transaction.
Maximum of 15 transactions per day
The number of transactions in a competition portfolio is limited to 15 per day. In your own private portfolios you can conduct as many transactions as you like.
Order execution
Order execution takes place against real prices and volumes. In other words: your order will be executed if a transaction takes place on the actual exchange. Orders may be executed in partial orders in case supply does not meet demand. The actual volume determines when your order will be executed.
It is not possible to place two orders for one security at the same time.
Limits
When you buy or sell shares you are able to supply a limit price. Approximately every minute your transaction will be processed to see if the share price falls within the limit price you specified. If so, the trade proceeds. If not, the trade fails at the end of the trading day unless you placed a 20-day order.
Dividend
Dividend payments will be added on your virtual bank account. If you have a short position you are liable for any dividend payments that may be due. In case you seem to be missing dividend payments please send an email to support@virtualtrader.co.uk.
Portfolio value
Your portfolio's value is calculated using the price for the latest transaction on the stock market, with a delay of 15 minutes.
Corporate actions
If a company is involved in a consolidation, capital reorganization, scheme of arrangement, bonus issue, capital issue, or reduction of capital, this will be applied to your portfolio automatically. In case of a demerger you will automatically receive shares of the new company in your portfolio. In the case of rights issues we automatically assume you do not take up the rights that are being offered.
Liability
Virtual Trader cannot be held liable for damages resulting from system failures. Technical problems will be solved as soon as possible, and should they have affected portfolios, faults will be corrected to the best of our abilities. This means a portfolio can be reset or transactions can be cancelled.
Prize awarding
Currently we don't have an active prize competition and it's all for the honour.
Top 5 winners – once every six months
Participants in the competition can win one of the top 5 prizes once every six months. Should you win a prize this month, you are excluded from being awarded a prize in the following five months.
If you did not find an answer to your question, please send an email to support@virtualtrader.co.uk. Do not forget to mention the name of your portfolio.
Questions will be attended to a soon as possible, but always within three business days.
Do not forget to read the FAQ