January 2014 Stock Competition Entries!

[Joe Blow]

Good morning everyone, and welcome to the January 2014 stock tipping competition!

This month's competition this is proudly sponsored by eToro. As the leader in social trading, eToro provides a simple, transparent and enjoyable way to invest and trade in currencies, commodities and indices online. See who is trading what in real-time, follow the best performing traders and automatically copy what the best traders do. It's the smarter way to trade.

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Could all qualifying entrants please check their entries and entry price and report any errors to me in this thread.

If you entered, but were not included in the competition this month, it is because you didn't meet the qualifying criteria for some reason.

Keep track of the results here: ASF Stock Competition Leaderboard

Feel free to discuss the competition in this thread as the month progresses.

 

[Valued]

Has anyone ever suggested a more realistic competition before? E.g. stock tippers are required to invest at least the minimum parcel of shares to enter? I.e. you must lay down at least $500 on your stock, just to stop people picking wildly speculative and risky stocks? It may have been suggested before and shot down but I think it would make it more interesting. This way the top three both win their trade and get their brokerage paid for + a bit extra and would prove they have some faith in the tip.

Downsides would be that new members/people paper trading would be locked out of the competition or worst, want to participate and lose their money trying to join in.

 

[pixel]

Has anyone ever suggested a more realistic competition before? E.g. stock tippers are required to invest at least the minimum parcel of shares to enter? I.e. you must lay down at least $500 on your stock, just to stop people picking wildly speculative and risky stocks? It may have been suggested before and shot down but I think it would make it more interesting. This way the top three both win their trade and get their brokerage paid for + a bit extra and would prove they have some faith in the tip.

Downsides would be that new members/people paper trading would be locked out of the competition or worst, want to participate and lose their money trying to join in.

There is even more downside:
If you add more restrictive conditions, there will be even fewer participants. I seem to recall times when the maximum number (50, was it?) was reached and the comp closed early. Now we're down to 34 and last month had only 33. Could be the time of year, as November had at least 40.
Rather than making it more difficult, I'd encourage newbies to start posting more, so they get past the minimum requirements; then do some research and join in the fun.

There's nothing stopping anyone investing to their heart's content, putting money where their mouth is. But whether that's on Day One or a little later, and whether they sell on the last day or a little earlier, that should be up to them. Check out my November tip, DYE: I had bought them a little earlier, added during the rise, but sold early on the 28th. Last month's tip, ASL, I held a little longer and only sold early on Friday.

 

[barney]

There is even more downside:
If you add more restrictive conditions, there will be even fewer participants.

Probably right there Pixel, although one idea which I thought might make the competition more realistic without being restrictive is ......

Once each "player" has chosen his particular stock for the month, rather than just owning the stock from the 1st day of the month and accepting the closing price at the end of the month ............ each person is able to choose on what day they buy and sell during the month.

Main problem; it would require more time for the manual input of data for each players buy/sell dates and prices, unless there was some way of doing it automatically in a spread sheet??

If it put too much additional time pressure on Joe and the Mods it would obviously be counter productive of course, but just a thought.

 

[burglar]

Probably right there Pixel, although one idea which I thought might make the competition more realistic ...

If you want more realism, just go trade!!

 

[Valued]

Hmm or how about just an extra box that indicates if the person has real money on it or not. I am not sure what this will accomplish other than bragging rights/showing the person is putting their money where their mouth is and getting recognition for it. This might create a trend of others doing the same without impacting on the competition itself. It could be done on an honour system then too so Joe/mods don't need to go through our screenshots to prove it.

For the record, I have no money on my current tip as of the time of writing.

 

[burglar]

... For the record, I have no money on my current tip as of the time of writing.

Admire your enthusiasm, I do!

But if you want more realism, just go trade!! :


P.S. I always have money on my tips.
P.P.S. How can you use this information?

 

[barney]

If you want more realism, just go trade!!

Burg, I appreciate you are just trying to be flippant, but your suggestion doesn't really help Joe with the issue of increasing participation in his simulated trading competition.

There are a lot of good traders on ASF who never put an entry in the monthly comp ..... I'm pretty sure a little dose of "realism" might entice them to join the party occasionally.

 

[Valued]

Burg, I appreciate you are just trying to be flippant, but your suggestion doesn't really help Joe with the issue of increasing participation in his simulated trading competition.

There are a lot of good traders on ASF who never put an entry in the monthly comp ..... I'm pretty sure a little dose of "realism" might entice them to join the party occasionally.

Or maybe they are so successful they are too rich to bother entering for $100, which also says something

 

[Sdajii]

I usually tip shares I hold (I hold this month's tip TPD), but sometimes choose ultra risky stocks I wouldn't put my money on. As said, requiring people to hold is going to deter newbies as well as everyone else; I probably wouldn't bother if I had to provide evidence of holding, even if I was holding.

Maybe we could say 'no stock held' or 'I'm trading it' or 'long term holder' etc. when we pick our stocks. Some people do that anyway, I sometimes have.

Letting people choose sale dates is tricky, you would have to post at the exact time of sale (otherwise you could sell retrospectively) and Joe would have to check each trade. It would be fun, but it would be pretty complicated and a lot of work.

I think it's pretty good as it is, it's simple enough to be fun and workable.

If you want a more in depth game, play Westpac's stock market game or make some real trades and play the game for real! There's much more potential for profit in the real game.

 

[burglar]

Burg, I appreciate you are just trying to be flippant, but your suggestion doesn't really help Joe with the issue of increasing participation in his simulated trading competition.

There are a lot of good traders on ASF who never put an entry in the monthly comp ..... I'm pretty sure a little dose of "realism" might entice them to join the party occasionally.

hi barney,

I am being flippant because there is nothing wrong with the comp.

The rules have evolved, not only for our sake, but also for Joe's sake.
He has to put in the hard yards.

The prizes are excellent, and free entry, what more could I want?

 

[barney]

hi barney,

I am being flippant because there is nothing wrong with the comp.

The rules have evolved, not only for our sake, but also for Joe's sake.
He has to put in the hard yards.

The prizes are excellent, and free entry, what more could I want?

Nothing there I've disagreed with Burglar ..... My suggestion was based on Pixel's observation of declining numbers participating.

Concern for "Joe's sake" was actually my motivation for offering a possible improvement to the Comp to try and entice more members to play. I recognised some of the possible problems in my original post(bolded below)

Main problem; it would require more time for the manual input of data for each players buy/sell dates and prices, unless there was some way of doing it automatically in a spread sheet??

If it put too much additional time pressure on Joe and the Mods it would obviously be counter productive of course, but just a thought.

Setting up a spread sheet should not be too big a deal, and if Joe wants someone to fill in the data, I'd be happy to help.

I understand what "Valued" was getting at with having skin in the game, but maybe it would be easier to "charge'" an entry fee of say $2 or $3 to play per member ..... Winner takes 2/3rds 2nd takes 1/3 of the pot .... plus whatever sponsorship Joe is able to add.

All this stuff obviously requires more organisation and work, but if numbers are declining, maybe something needs to change??

I'm just throwing ideas in the air. I'd be interested in Joe's opinion. Personally, I'm busy enough trying to figure out how to make money trading Forex, so putting my name down for a "lucky dip" is usually a last minute decision. If on the other hand I had to "pay" to enter and was able to pick when I bought and sold my stock, I would be more inclined to get involved ........ geez you might even get Tech to enter

 

[tinhat]

You could have two or three divisions.

XAO (ASX200)
XSO (ASX300 - ASX100)
All listed Companies

with the current rules applying.

 

[burglar]

... I'm just throwing ideas in the air. ...

Sorry barney,

I was shouting at you, even though I knew you meant well!

 

[barney]

Sorry barney,

I was shouting at you, even though I knew you meant well!

Cheers M8 .... not a problem

 

[burglar]

Hey Joe,

We haven't heard from you regarding this discussion.

Do you have a problem with dwindling numbers?

 

[Joe Blow]

Hey Joe,

We haven't heard from you regarding this discussion.

Do you have a problem with dwindling numbers?

Hi burglar, no I think the dwindling numbers are just a seasonal issue. It's always slow around Christmas and new year and things should pick up as the year progresses.

There may be changes made to the competition at some point but not in the near future. I would just encourage everyone to give the competition a shot in its current form, and we'll see how things go.

I have reduced the minimum post count requirement and if the number of entries don't pick up over the next few months then I may consider reducing it further.

 

[Joe Blow]

Congratulations to Ijustnewit, gerkin02 and trillionaire#1 for taking out the top three places in the January 2014 stock tipping competition!

Ijustnewit finished the month with an impressive 82.35% return with LMB. In second place was gerkin02, whose entry PYM returned a solid 70%. Rounding out the top three for January was trillionaire#1 with AUQ, which finished January with a 48.44% increase in price.

Can Ijustnewit, gerkin02 and trillionaire#1 please contact me via PM regarding their prizes.

Best of luck to all in the February competition!

Here are the final results for January: