How do I get started?
By signing up to askmarkets, you automatically create an account and are 'awarded' ¥€$10,000 with which you can start trading. Or you can create your own market and invite players to trade.
What is YES?
¥€$ is the official askmarkets virtual currency. As a play-money currency, ¥€$ is valid only inside askmarkets.
What is a market?
Each market represents a question posed by a player to the askmarkets community.
The question could regard an enquiry, the possibility of an event taking place, a question or idea you want predicted.
What are stocks?
The one or more possible outcomes of each market's question are expressed by the stocks traded on this market.
The current price of a stock reflects the probability of this outcome being the right one.
The sum of all the stocks in a market at any time totals 1, respectively 100% probability. So, if one stock's price rises, the prices of all the other stocks in the same market drop.
Can you explain all of this with an example?
The next elections are coming up. There are 4 candidates nominated for the office. I set up a market, entitled as 'Which will be the winner of the next elections?', with 4 stocks available, one for each nominee. Each stock has a starting price of ¥€$0.25.
Some hours after the launch, you check the prices: 'Nominee X' stock is now traded on ¥€$0.45. In other words, the market introduces the current probability of nominee X winning as 45%. But you think that she has greater chances, so you buy some shares of her stock. The market now includes your view; the new price of 'Nominee X' is ¥€$0.48, while all the other stocks are lower.
How do I buy stock?
Once you have identified a market, in which you want to invest, you can buy stock by either entering the amount of money you want to invest or the number of shares you want to buy in the available boxes.
Automatically you will receive information on how many shares you will be able to purchase with the money you want to invest or how much money you will need to invest to buy the specified number of shares. Simultaneously, you will be also able to see how your potential purchase influences the stock's price as its new price will be shown to you in real-time.
You can then make the final decision and confirm the actual transaction.
Note, that you can buy as many shares as you want, the only constraint is the amount of money that you have available for trading.
How do I sell stock?
Selling works in the same way with buying.
Just enter the number of shares you want to cash into the "selling" box. Again you will receive information on the potential impact of your transaction to stock prices.
If you don't own the stock, you can't sell it. No short-selling is possible.
But you can influence a stock's price in other ways. The sum of all the stocks' prices in a market always equals 1 (100%). Consequently, if you think that stock X is overpriced, buying a rival's stock shares will adjust the overpriced stock's price. This way, stock's X price will fall and will more correctly reflect the market's opinion.
How are prices computed?
For each share that you buy, the stock's price goes up. Therefore not all the shares that you buy will be bought at the same price. Each will cost a little bit more than the previous one.
The opposite mechanism works when you sell. Each share that you sell, will be sold at a slightly lower price than the previous one that you sold.
As a result, prices fluctuate according to supply and demand: the more shares are bought, the higher the price - the more people sell their shares, the lower the price will fall.
Is it like parimutuel betting?
Well, could be, if this makes it more clear. But, it is dynamic, meaning that the lower the price when you buy, the higher your payoff. So, play wisely!
Are there any transaction fees?
No. You are free to trade as much and as often as you want.
When does a market close?
Only market makers can close markets. Normally they do that when they consider their question answered.
Trading is then stopped and all money invested in the market is equally shared among those who had invested in the winning stock. The winning stock can be only one in each market.
As a result, if you have invested in a different than the winning stock, you lose all your money, but if you have invested in the winning stock, you will get a share of all the money invested in this particular market. Your share is analogous to the quantity of the stock that you own.
The amount of profit you will 'cash' in depends on the buying price; you'll always make a profit, but, just as in any other market, profits are higher when you get in early and purchase your shares at a low price.
How is my ranking computed?
Your rank depends on your total net worth. Your net worth is the sum of your available cash and your portfolio value. Your portfolio value is equal to the amount of money that you would get if you immediately sell all of your shares. Rankings and net worth are updated hourly.
