Stocktrak Debrief Report Over the course of this semester, students in Finance 354 were given an opportunity to manage a practice portfolio. We were given $1,000,000 and a maximum of 400 trades. We were also able to short sale which allowed the excess of $1,000,000. The types of securities allowed to be traded included stocks, options, futures, bonds, mutual funds, international stocks, and commodities. With the choice of many securities, it seemed overwhelming to decide where to start. The different requirements allowed me to understand each type of security and the level of risk involved in each type. Although there were many swings in the market over the course of three months, I believe my portfolio was overall steady in comparison with
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Stocks are seen as the easiest type of security to understand and follow. At first, I was exposed to the stocks with betas at or near 1, meaning they were mostly part of the indexes that made up the S&P 500 and Nasdaq. With these safer choices, I quickly raised my rankings from 13 to the top 5 for several days. Once I attempted to spread my portfolio to less known stocks, my portfolio decreased in value leading to weeks of low rankings among the class. The next couple of weeks of class led to a greater knowledge in the derivatives markets such as options and futures. With this newly gained information, I started to invest in option on corporations I deemed safe. Putting a large sum of my cash into these options led to a massive gain in my portfolio. I had a few weeks in the top 10 of the class until the election hit, leading to a fall in the assets I was …show more content…
Although there is much more to learn about this market, the introduction and hands on experience in options has lead me to research more on the riskiness of securities. There is also a large cost on the daily reading of securities on the market including the brokerage commission and cost per trade. I must become used to being more passive with the use of a portfolio and not using feelings to consider trading. Taking time to research each company you are investing in is extremely important when creating a diversified
Stocks are seen as the easiest type of security to understand and follow. At first, I was exposed to the stocks with betas at or near 1, meaning they were mostly part of the indexes that made up the S&P 500 and Nasdaq. With these safer choices, I quickly raised my rankings from 13 to the top 5 for several days. Once I attempted to spread my portfolio to less known stocks, my portfolio decreased in value leading to weeks of low rankings among the class. The next couple of weeks of class led to a greater knowledge in the derivatives markets such as options and futures. With this newly gained information, I started to invest in option on corporations I deemed safe. Putting a large sum of my cash into these options led to a massive gain in my portfolio. I had a few weeks in the top 10 of the class until the election hit, leading to a fall in the assets I was …show more content…
Although there is much more to learn about this market, the introduction and hands on experience in options has lead me to research more on the riskiness of securities. There is also a large cost on the daily reading of securities on the market including the brokerage commission and cost per trade. I must become used to being more passive with the use of a portfolio and not using feelings to consider trading. Taking time to research each company you are investing in is extremely important when creating a diversified