| 1. Initial Cash Balance |
| The initial cash balance is $100,000 |
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| 2. How To Trade |
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Before making any trades, you must have your team number, password,
and the ticker symbols of the securities you wish to trade.
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| There are two ways to make a trade: |
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| A.Mississippi SMS home page (www.mississippisms.com) |
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Visit the home page to submit trades, review your team's activity,
research stocks, obtain quotes, find ticker symbols, and review your
team's ranking. This is the best way to trade because it is fast,
accurate, and convenient.
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| B. Fax Line Toll-Free: 1-888-275-0969 |
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Your teacher may fax in your trades 24 hours a day. You must send your
trade request in on the fax form provided to your teacher. The form may
be found as a link on the left navigation bar. The fax form can be viewed
and printed using Adobe Acrobat Reader. All information must be filled
in completely with dark ink for your trade to be processed. This includes
your team number, password, your advisor's name, signature, and phone
number, fax number and all information pertaining to your trades.
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Trading Stocks: There are four basic ways to trade
stocks: buy, sell, short sell, and short cover. When buying a stock,
you are taking a "long position" with the hope that the price
per share will increase. When you sell a stock, you close that long
position. Selling short is selling a stock that you don't own (you
actually borrow the stock from the broker) with the hope that you can
later buy the stock back at a lower price. When you buy the stock to
pay back what you borrowed, it is called "covering" your short
position. To buy or short sell a stock, specify how many shares you want,
rather than how much money you wish to spend. You may not be long and
short in the same stock at the same time.
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Trading Mutual Funds: You may buy or sell mutual funds.
Mutual funds are traded in dollar amounts not by number of shares. Mutual
funds must be traded in lots of $500. Like stocks, in order to trade mutual
funds you must have the ticker symbol. All mutual fund ticker symbols are five
letters long ending in "X".
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Trading Bonds: You may buy or sell bonds. Bonds are notoriously
difficult to research. A selection of Corporate Bonds, Treasury Bonds, Strips,
and Bond Mutual Funds is listed on the bond transaction screen. All bonds have a
par value of $1,000. When you buy a bond, you must pay the accrued interest on
the bond. On your statement, the accrued interest and commission are added together.
You cannot short a bond. Portfolios will be evaluated to see whether purchased mutual
funds also contain bonds.
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Trading Commodities: You may buy or sell commodities with the SMS.
Commodities (such as gold, orange juice, and corn) are traded in contracts/units not
by number of shares. Commodities must be traded in whole units.
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| 3. Trading Times and Prices Received: |
Stocks: Trades made via the web page will receive 15-20
minute delayed prices if placed while the market is open (generally 9:30
am to 4:00 pm ET). Trades placed after the market has closed will receive
the next day's open price. Trades made via fax and received by market close
will be executed at that day's closing price. Fax trades received after
market close will receive the next day's closing price.
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Mutual Funds: Mutual funds are always traded at the end
of day price (NAV or net asset value). Trades received before market
close will be placed at the closing price for that day. Trades made after
market close will receive the next day's closing price.
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Bonds: Orders placed via the web page will receive end of
day prices. Orders placed via fax and received by market close will be
executed at that day's closing price. Orders received after market close
will receive the next day's closing price. Since bonds pay interest via
coupons, when you buy bonds in between coupon dates, you must pay accrued
interest. You will earn interest at the coupon rate while you continue to
hold the bond. If you sell your bond during the simulation, you will receive
all that accrued interest.
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Commodities: Trades made via the web page will receive end of
day prices if placed while the market is open (generally 9:30 am to 4:00 pm ET).
Trades placed after the market has closed will receive the next day's closing
price. Trades made via fax and received by market close will be executed at that
day's closing price. Fax trades received after market close will receive the next
day's closing price.
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| 4. Splits and Dividends: |
| All stock splits and all dividend payments over $0.10 will be credited to
your portfolio. Splits that have been credited to your portfolio have the
appearance of a buy or short sell, but the price per share is $0.00. Dividends
will appear in your portfolio with a "DIV" attached to the ticker symbol. In
order to receive a split and/or dividend, a team must have a current open position
in the stock by the Ex-Date (The ex-date is usually two business days before the
record date. It is indicated in newspaper listings with an x.). Splits and dividends
will be posted in accounts by the "Ex-Date."
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| 5. Securities that can be traded: |
Stocks: You may buy, sell, sell short, and cover a short almost all NYSE
and NASDAQ-AMEX stocks (common and preferred) that are trading at 5.00 or
more. IPOs are usually available the afternoon that the new stock starts
trading on the exchanges. Stock trades may be in any whole number of shares
greater than 25 (i.e., 25 share minimum but you can trade 26 shares or more).
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Mutual Funds: You may buy and sell any of the U.S. Mutual
funds listed, regardless of the price (No 5.00 minimum price as with stocks).
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Bonds: The bond transaction page has a limited set of 103
bonds that participants can choose from. All bonds have a par value of $1,000.
You cannot short a bond.
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Commodities: You may buy and sell commodities. A list of the commodities
available to be traded is listed on the Commodities Order Screen. All commodity trades
must be made in a whole number of contracts/units.
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| 6. Volume and Purchase Restrictions: |
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Throughout the simulation, teams may invest no more than $25,000
in any one stock. For example, if you buy $25,000 in any one stock and the
price increases, you are not required to sell any portion of that stock
to remain at $25,000 .
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You may not buy or short sell stocks trading for under $5.00/share
(no penny stocks).
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The maximum number of shares a team may trade is limited to the actual
volume on the stock that day.
- Mutual funds must be traded in lots of $500.
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All stocks have a 25 share minimum but do not have to
be in multiples of 25 shares per transaction. For example,
you can now buy 26 shares or 157 shares,
but not 24 shares.
- You may not hold a short and a long position in the same stock at the same time.
- Duplicate trades on the same day are not allowed.
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| 7. Ticker Symbols: |
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You need to know the ticker symbol for the security before you can trade
it. Please note that most local newspapers show only the abbreviation of
the company name, not the ticker symbol. The Wall Street Journal and the
web page are two really good sources to help you find the ticker symbols
you need.
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| 8. Commission: |
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A broker's commission is applied to most transactions. The commission
for stock trades is a flat fee of $25.00 on each transaction
regardless of the number of shares. If you sell one stock and buy another
you will be charged two commission fees.
The commission charged for all mutual funds is 1% of the purchase price.
A commission is not charged when selling mutual funds.
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| 9. Margin Requirements: |
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The margin requirement for the simulation is 50%. Initially, this means
that since you are starting with $100,000, you may borrow
another $100,000, making your total buying power $200,000.
You may buy and short sell stocks on margin.
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| 10. Interest Earned: |
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Interest will be earned on all available cash balances and credited at
the close of each day. During the simulation, cash balances will
earn 3% interest, compounded daily.
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| 11. Interest Charged: |
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Interest will be charged on all loan balances and will be debited a
t the close of each day. During the simulation, loan balances will
charge 8% interest.
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| 12. Portfolio Statements: |
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Team activity may be reviewed at
www.mississippisms.com.
Team activity and team rankings are updated every business day on
the web page.
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| 13. Number of Transactions: |
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Each team is limited to 100 transactions during the trading
period. Each buy, sell, short sell or short cover counts as a transaction.
For example, if you buy a stock and sell another stock you will be charged
with 2 transactions.
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| 14. Competition Eligibility: |
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Teams wishing to be eligible to be declared winners must follow this
rule: Teams must make at least 3 trades by the 4th week and maintain at
least 3 stocks in their portfolio for the last half of the trading period.
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| 15. End of the Simulation: |
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You do not need to convert all of your investments to cash on the last
day of the simulation. Your portfolio will be valued at the closing
prices for that day. Official winners of the simulation will be
notified by the Stock-Trak.
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| 16. Disputes and Errors: |
If you and your teacher believe an error has been made in your portfolio,
your teacher may call STOCK-TRAK @ 1-866-SMS-DESK (toll-free) to
discuss the problem. Please review your statements and report any problems right away.
- The management of Stock-Trak, Inc. is not responsible for trades or quote prices that are incomplete, incorrect or not received
- The management of Stock-Trak, Inc. may use various methods (such as time and tape analysis) to resolve disputes.
- The decision made by the management of Stock-Trak, Inc is final.
- Trades that result from cases of stolen passwords, those submitted by a team member without the consent of his or her team mates, and/or trades that result due to human error will not be deleted from accounts.
- The management of Stock-Trak, Inc. has the right to adjust or delete trades that are believed to be incorrect, and the right to terminate any account that they believe may have attempted to exploit, manipulate, or sabotage any part of the SMS trading system and/or web page.
- The management of Stock-Trak, Inc. has the ultimate authority to settle disputes.
- The management of Stock-Trak, Inc.'s liability is limited to the fee paid for the service.
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