Frequently Asked Questions


Here are some guidelines to help you play the game.

Trading View
Adding a contract to the Trading View
Buying or Selling a contract
Working Orders
Filled Orders
P&L Statement - Portfolio Profit/Loss Analysis
Trading View

Once you have registered and logged in, the ‘Trading View’ screen will appear on your desktop. ‘Trading View’ allows you to monitor the price of up to 30 USF contracts before deciding whether or not to add the stock to your portfolio. From here you will be able to select contracts you wish to trade.

A fictitious figure of £25,000 will appear as your bank balance on the ‘Trading View’ screen. If this balance drops below zero, your account will be reset, and you will start again with a fresh balance of £25,000. If at any point during the game you wish to reset your account, simply click on ‘Reset Account’. This will reset all trading history, but will retain the contracts you are monitoring in the ‘Trading View’.

On the top of the ‘Trading View’ table you will see a blank box next to the icon ‘Add’. This allows you to create a new screen, if you are monitoring more than 30 contracts. Simply type in a new name for the screen, and click ‘Add’. To switch between screens simply select the desired screen from the drop down list. Adding a new view will not affect your allocated balance. You may have up to 5 watchlist screens.

The ‘Trading View’ is in the form of a table with various columns. The explanation of terms is detailed below:
 

Contract: Displays the name of the Stock Future selected by you. It also shows the currency, and specific month and year of expiry for the contract.
 

Bid: This is the price at which the market is prepared to buy the contract, ie, if you wish to sell a contract, this is the price you will receive.
 

Offer: This is the price at which the market is prepared to sell the contract, ie, if you wish to buy a contract, this is the price you will pay.
 

The Bid/Offer prices are briefly highlighted Blue(Orange) when the price changes, to reflect an Increase (Decrease) in the price.
 

Trade: Displays the price at which the last trade took place. This refers to the last trade in the actual Stock Futures market.
 
Essentially, Trading View simply allows you to monitor contracts, with no commitment to buy.
 
You must remember that the Trading Simulation Game will only be functional when NYSE Liffe markets are open, since it uses real-time price feeds from the Exchange.

Adding a contract to the Trading View

Click on the ‘Add Stock Future’ icon to add a contract to the Trading View. Stock Futures are currently offered on US and European stocks. To select the country, choose the selection from the drop-down menu and click on ‘search’. The available stocks will now be displayed. Choose the stock you wish to monitor, and you will be presented with the possible delivery months for that contract. Select the delivery month in the same way, and the contract will now be added to the Trading View. The ‘Delivery Month’ is the month in which the contract expires (automatically closing out your position on the Last Trading Day). For more information about the expiry dates and the settlement price (EDSP) – visit www.nyx.com/usf


Buying or Selling a contract

Once you have added contracts to your Trading View, you can monitor the real-time price movements before deciding whether or not to trade. Remember that you buy at the ‘Offer’ price, and sell at the ‘Bid’ price. If you decide you want to trade a contract, then simply click on the ‘Buy’ or ‘Sell’ icon next to the bid & offer price of the contract. The ‘deal ticket’ will now appear giving you a number of alternatives:
 

Contract: This shows the contract you have selected to trade.
 

Price: This is the current bid or offer price of the contract (depending on which you have selected). It is possible to change the price in this box if you are planning to trade a ‘Limit’ or ‘Stop’ order (see below).
 

Volume: The number of contracts that you wish to trade (note that each contract refers to a set number of underlying shares. Italian Stock Futures refer to 1000 underlying shares, whilst the remaining continental European and US Stock Futures refer to 100 underlying shares.
 

Margin: This shows the value of initial margin that will be debited from your account to reflect each trade (note that when trading derivative products, you do not pay the actual price of the contract, but a percentage of it, depending on the risk of the underlying stock). Margins appear on a per contract basis on the ‘deal ticket’. If you decide to buy/sell more than one contract, margins will be calculated accordingly and will be adjusted on the ‘deal ticket’ when you click on ‘tab’ on your keyboard or the ‘buy’ and ‘sell’ icon. For more information on margin requirements please click here.
 

‘BUY’ and ‘SELL’: Click on one of these buttons to process the trade (check that all details are correct before proceeding). You are given the opportunity to change your mind (for example if the price moves against you, then you may wish to sell rather than buy) by clicking 'Cancel'. ‘Market’,‘Limit’,‘Stop’ Orders:
 

A ‘Market’ order will trade immediately at the current market price – once the ‘Buy’ or ‘Sell’ button has been clicked there is no turning back!
 

‘Limit’ orders are used to set a price at which you are prepared to trade. For example if the prices are currently high, you can input a price a bit lower than the current offer, and click the ‘Buy’ button. The order will now move into ‘Working Orders’ and will be executed if the offer price falls to the level entered.
 

‘Stop’ orders enable you to limit losses in your portfolio. This involves entering a price at which to sell your stock if the market moves too much against you. You simply specify the price and volume, select ‘Stop’, and then ‘Sell’. The order will now move to ‘Working Orders’, and will be executed if the price falls to the level entered.

Working Orders

This screen advises you of the trades that are currently being processed. If at any time you have entered a ‘Stop’ or ‘Limit’ order, the details of it will remain in the working orders screen until it has traded, or until you cancel it. To cancel a working order, simply click on the ‘Cancel’ icon next to the order.

Filled Orders

The filled order screen displays all of the trades executed over the last week. This enables you to keep a track on what you have bought and sold and at what prices/volume etc.


P&L Statement - Portfolio Profit/Loss Analysis


 

Here you can keep an eye on whether you are actually making any money! This screen displays the different contracts you have traded, showing volume (a negative volume reflects a short position), average price (the average price of all trades in the contract), the current mid price, and any realised profits/losses or unrealised profits/losses. Realised profits/losses are those that have already been cashed in and added to your balance (ie the contract has expired or has been closed), whilst unrealised profits are open orders, which are affected by any change in the real-time market. To ‘realise’ any unrealised profit, simply make an equal and opposite trade in the same contract, thus closing the position. Your balance will then be adjusted accordingly.

The margin column shows the value that has been debited from your account to cover initial margin. Whenever a contract is closed or has expired the value of this margin will be credited your account (adjusted to reflect any profit or loss).
 

Total P&L is a sum of both realised and unrealised P&L, and thus reflects the overall success on a specific contract. This is the last column in the Portfolio Profit/Loss Analysis table.
 

Bank Balance is the current balance available to open new positions, and reflects any realised profits/losses. It is also adjusted to reflect margin requirements when positions are opened.

 

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