Archive for the ‘Finance’ Category
Trade Safely and Have Fun With FSX!
Tuesday, January 22nd, 2008
Today’s a good time to discuss my absolute favorite Facebook application, FSX, as they just upgraded their services from best to better, and the level of volatility in the stock market makes it a great time for people to play around and test their skills with zero risk. FSX is a fantasy stock market on Facebook where users start with $10,000,000 and get to trade stocks alongside their friends.
Yesterday, FSX announced to its members that it has upgraded its services after a merger with Silicon Valley start-up KaChing. They promise bug fixes, better services, prize giveaways, and some much needed services.
Before yesterday’s overhaul of the service, I had already been a huge fan for quite some time. I like to buy stocks I’m watching on FSX before I do so in real life. It makes it feel like every lost dollar in my FSX portfolio is a dollar saved! It lets you keep track of your portfolio well, and you can chat with other traders on the message board and see what they’re doing.
Now, they’ve added real time trades (no more 15 minute wait); a new, more reliable data provider; they’ve put an end to some cheating schemes (why do people bother?); they’ve added stock watch lists, as well as stock walls for people to chat.
I’m mostly excited for the stock walls. Ideally I would like to see a rating on each stock that says whether people think it will go up and down, and a ranking of that rating based on the accuracy of the guessers. This thing could be a virtual open and free market adviser and I like it!
TD Canada Trust Missed the Memo: “No Practical Apps!”
Sunday, December 30th, 2007TD Canada Trust, one of Canada’s largest banks, has released an application called SPLIT IT GIFT IT. The application basically lets you arrange for your friends to split a gift. It’s a pretty cool idea, I guess… but I suppose nobody told them that people just don’t perform practical activities on Facebook. For the 3 days I’ve been following it, the application has had 0 daily active users.
As for the actual application, it’s about as useful as a pad of paper. You bring in co-gifters and arrange to split the cost of gifts. As far as I can tell, it doesn’t offer some neat-o way to actually pay for the gifts that you’d expect from such a powerful financial institution.
The most the application does is let you keep tabs on your friends who owe you money with “Virtual IOUs”.
I’m glad I don’t work at TD… because I probably would have suggested something similar to this… and 0 users means not even the person who suggested it is using it. Maybe he or she got fired?
Manage a Hedge Fund on Facebook
Tuesday, June 26th, 2007
Want to create and manage your own virtual hedge fund? The Tipping Monkey Hedge Fund Simulator gives you total control over your own mock hedge fund. This is the most robust trading application that I have seen yet. I previously reviewed a stock picker application that is well made but not as robust since it was created by a single developer. It appears as though Tipping Monkey has been around for a while given that they have an existing site and community dedicated to mock hedge fund management. The application allows you to go long or short on stocks, options, mutual funds, and exchange traded funds (ETFs). If you want to learn more about investing or want to test your skill level against others, go grab the Tipping Monkey Hedge Fund simulatory. This will surely become one of the more popular trading applications. The only problem with the application is that there is a registration process to proceed. Aside from that this application is top tier. So check it out and start trading!
Update
Looks like there is a similar application called “Fantasy Stock Exchange.” If you would prefer trying out another branded mock hedge fund, check out the Fantasy Stock Exchange application.
Stock Pick Competition for Facebook Users
Tuesday, June 5th, 2007As a prior Finance club member, I remember playing stock picking games as a useful tool for becoming accustomed to trading stocks. Thanks to Ryan Price, you can now play against your friends and other Facebook members. While there are a few quirks in the system, this seems to be a step in the right direction. If the profile view gets smoothed out, I am willing to bet that this becomes a pretty popular application, especially among finance enthusiasts. If you are into finance or just trading stocks in general, go check out the Stock Pick Competition application.
As a side note, I am noticing a common occurrence on Facebook recently. Not necessarily with the stock pick competition application but in general. Developers have begun adding non-functional applications. I can sympathize given that after launching my own social networking site, I was receiving non-stop complaints from users that were finding bugs. While it is difficult to catch all bugs while developing an applications, all developers should both externally and internally test and iron out as many bugs as possible prior to launching.
