Trading Competition a success

The team of three beat out 16 other teams of students from around the region to win a generous cash prize for themselves as well as an iPad for their school's economics department. Students from Herschel Grammar School in Slough and Ousedale in Milton Keynes were second and third place respectively.

The competition was a simulated trading session based on specific scenarios that were generated by the competition organisers. It was run entirely on the ICTrader trading platform which was co-created by 7city and the ICMA Centre. Students traded a variety of US stocks in real time with the prices of the stocks evolving rapidly in connection with the scenarios, so while realistic, the news that the competitors saw on their screens, and the relevant price changes that occurred were not a result of what was happening in the real markets on the day. Some of the companies traded included Google, Apple, Bank of America, Delta Airlines, Domino's Pizza, Coca Cola, General Dynamics, Phillip Morris and Verizon.

The competition was run across two rounds, one where students made as many deals as they could against simulated counter parties (investment banks and individual or institutional clients) and the second where they dealt with each other as if they were part of a stock market trading pit. Each team was awarded points for their performance in each section of the competition with a maximum of 18 points available to the best placed team. The winning team was those who gained the highest points across both rounds of the competition. The winners from The Willink School were very impressive, being consistently at the top of the leaderboard throughout the day.

The competition proved to be a highly energetic and stimulating day and already we have schools lining up to come back and make more great trades in the 2013 competition.