bump

Well, my personal opinion is that all the speculations we can see here are bad and they are not in the spirit of the "prediction exchange." I don't like them but, of course, I don't want to let them destroy my personal points either. So, I usually try to follow or, if some stocks become too wild, drop them temrorarely. Obviously, all this is possible only when I have a chance to follow the developments in time although some anticipations are also possible from time to time.
Usually, the speculators tend to take at some different stock(s)in a couple of days.
Bad; what else can one say here?

$1.25 in 15 minutes isn't bad, and is within the range of what I'd expect because of wave riding. But recently I've noticed stocks will move as much as $1 within a minute.

Folks in ppxchat suspect some players are using auto trading software. We don't have proof yet, but if the trend continues we'll start tracking portfolios to look for people who reliably get every flip at 25 cents or less.

Most of last Friday's flips were "stupid". Many went the wrong way, and in some instances the same stock changed directions 4 times in one day.

Here's a strategy I follow: There is no sense following a flip unless you expect it to move at least $1.25 in the new direction before flipping back. You'll lose any profit you would have made on commissions. If you expect a flip may move between $.75 and $1.25 you might consider selling the position you hold and rebuying it after it corrects.

Traditionally, many experienced players who wave ride correct their positions on stocks that moved the wrong way after the leaderboard updates around 12:30am est.

The reason for this is the stock movement page resets to zero at Midnight est, so it's easier for other players to notice the new (correct direction)

Trades after midnight and before the leaderboard update are likely to result in under or over reporting your worth on the leaderboard update.

Recently, people have started making these corrections (and other flips) earlier to try to beat the crowd. An unfortunate side effect is corrections made earlier may lose momentum and stop moving after midnight.

Visit www.ppxchat.com A great place to meet PPXers and learn strategy.

There is nothing wrong with flipping stocks. Why would people should worry about other people using tracking software is it jealousy? That is how is done in the real market. To stop people from making money is a communist mentality.

grusso7,

Nobody is saying flipping stocks is bad. Tracking software
is OK as well (That's what Turner does over at ppxchat.com does)
Scraping the database with an automatic stock trading bot
is not OK and is a violation of the terms of use of the site.
Collusion between multiple accounts is also forbidden. People
have been banned in the past for such activities. Days like
last Friday make it clear that someone or group is violating
these rules.

Gee you don't suppose it has anything to do with the fact that (although some improvements have been done) admin still has not addressed the basic flaws within the market, which have been pointed out over and over again. Instead they created leagues which no one ever indicated that they wanted (until after it was proposed by admin), and from what I have seen in the forums adds nothing to the game.

I will admit that there have been some improvements such as player review of props, which was very much needed. However I still see that the market is plagued by manipulation, and that stocks still fail to close in a timely manner, and that there is still an error in the way stock price is determined causing most stocks to close way short of the predictive range one would expect to see. In a true predictive market as the closure of a stock comes closer its predictive nature should become more accurate, realistically minutes before a stock closes (where it is going to pay long) you would expect to see the stock trading in the upper 90's in most cases, here we can have a stock remain open for days after the result is known and still be trading in the 60's, which means we either have the stupidest players in the land, or their is a problem with the market.

And for those that don't know me, I've played on and off since near the beginning, and was the first player to throw support behind Taylor when she started. Haven't played in a while but followed events waiting for the market to improve. Finally decided it was time to add some input again. For reference to early discussions there were some threads started by Napking that out lines a lot of the issues with the market and various solutions(not all great but worth discussing).

Still, I don't like these speculations. They undernmind the whole purpose of this "prediction exchange." I come here to see what people who know about some things more than I do think about the probability of such things and their happening, but I see some people who care about their points like if it was some real money instead. I am not the worst of the players here and I do play as well, but I think that there could be more for those who are interested in science. When I know that a certain stock will go up tomorrow morning just because of the inner logic of the trading fluctuations, I am glad that I am a smart guy but it has nothing in common with what people think about the possibility of one or another proposition to be true or falce.

I understand the Admins have enough to do. I'm not asking for anyone to go out and police or watch suspicious players. I just haven't seen anyone talking about this, and thought that wild swings were becoming more prevelent, and really just couldn't understand it. I enjoy playing the game, and am sure we all will know who is "juicing"(nod to A-Rod) and who is not by the weekly percentages.

Speaking about "the weekly percentages," maybe somebody cauld kindly explain it to the poor, stupid, ignorant me what has happened this week and how it is possible to get 238.71% and jump to 3502110 from, correct me if I am mistaken, from something like 1467000? One just does not double something like 1400000 on a week like this one. Or am I missing something? Just curious.

While the PPX is intended to be a predictive market, the way the props are valued and paid actually creates a speculative market similar to stock markets. Because of this, some people may be more concerned with the overall value of their account, and their ranking, rather than actually making a prediction on the outcome of a prop.

One way to "correct" this "flaw" (although it may be too complicated) is to modify how props are valued and payouts are made.

If we want participants to make predictions, reward them for the time they hold a prop rather than the value it traded at when they got in. Implementing a multiplier system may work. The earlier you enter a prop on the correct side (long or short) the higher the multiplier, and therefore the higher your payout. This will not eliminate wave riding, but it should create a bias towards the intended predictive nature of the PPX.

As an example, someone who buys a prop (on the opening day) that ends 12 months from now for $50 would receive more funds at settlement than someone who buys the prop two days before settlement for $50. The first person was probably making a prediction, the second person was more likely taking advantage of system shortfalls.

Is this a game, or a business?

Is PopSci using this as entertainment to keep us around?
Or are they selling the data?

If they don't NEED accuracy in the data,
Then stop worring about it, and let us play it however we want. You play your way, I'll play my way.

With most props, the results are KNOWN at the end. There is nothing to predict anymore. So who gives a **** if we screw-up the data at that point.

CRZYCAR for example, was priced at pop$70 at the very end,
when they had actually suceeded. 100%
So how accurate is that? If everyone jums in at the end and drives the price up, that's actually MORE accurate. Ain't it?

To sir-reptitious: This is not about accuracy in there data, this is about people getting together and playing a game, and from what I see someone is cheating. I am not saying that you are, but you sure got really defensive buddy. You say you will play your way? What way is that? How long have you been playing this game?

I am new to this game, but will not be playing for to long if the do not get there act together and do exactly what they say they do in there rules! Do people not realise that all they have to do is THINK you are cheating and you will be gone? I am new and I can tell you right now XFABMAN, with his 238.90% gain in one week, is cheating. When the 2nd best person on the site has a 31%, which is really really good, which means XFABMAN is eather cheating or..... Well, there really is no other way, XFABMAN IS CHEATING!!! I don't care if someone gets mad at me, I am not here to make friends with CHEATORS, I am here to play a game. Please PPX Administrators, I am asking you nicely to look into XFABMAN. I though I found a fun game, herd about this site on several other forums I am a memeber of. I will be sure to let them all know how this turns out, honestly all XFABMAN is trying to do is to rise to the top of the list as fast as he can. I wonder if he is using diferant IP addresses for each of his accounts, would not be to hard to do. I could use my router to do this if I wanted to, but I would not do that, would ruin the fun of the GAME. It says if you pretty much think someone is cheating, that PPX will take action. I am willing to bet XFABMAN is not to bright, 238.90% gain in a week, that would be like walking down the beach on Padre Island during spring break wearing a full ski gear while being sober!!!! How many people here think XFABMAN is cheating!!!! Lets take a vote!!! How many people here think that anyone with a 238.90% gain in one week, which happens to be 207.76% more than the 2nd place guy, did it legitly???

To sir-reptitious: This is not about accuracy in there data, this is about people getting together and playing a game, and from what I see someone is cheating. I am not saying that you are, but you sure got really defensive buddy. You say you will play your way? What way is that? How long have you been playing this game?

I am new to this game, but will not be playing for to long if the do not get there act together and do exactly what they say they do in there rules! Do people not realise that all they have to do is THINK you are cheating and you will be gone? I am new and I can tell you right now XFABMAN, with his 238.90% gain in one week, is cheating. When the 2nd best person on the site has a 31%, which is really really good, which means XFABMAN is eather cheating or..... Well, there really is no other way, XFABMAN IS CHEATING!!! I don't care if someone gets mad at me, I am not here to make friends with CHEATORS, I am here to play a game. Please PPX Administrators, I am asking you nicely to look into XFABMAN. I though I found a fun game, herd about this site on several other forums I am a memeber of. I will be sure to let them all know how this turns out, honestly all XFABMAN is trying to do is to rise to the top of the list as fast as he can. I wonder if he is using diferant IP addresses for each of his accounts, would not be to hard to do. I could use my router to do this if I wanted to, but I would not do that, would ruin the fun of the GAME. It says if you pretty much think someone is cheating, that PPX will take action. I am willing to bet XFABMAN is not to bright, 238.90% gain in a week, that would be like walking down the beach on Padre Island during spring break wearing a full ski gear while being sober!!!! How many people here think XFABMAN is cheating!!!! Lets take a vote!!! How many people here think that anyone with a 238.90% gain in one week, which happens to be 207.76% more than the 2nd place guy, did it legitly???

Sorry bout the double post, for the first time ever my fiber optic service seemed to lag. I really meant what I said, so maybe it is a good thing it posted twice, I guess it will help me when I call all of the cheaters out. Sorry, but someone has to do something, this is screwing up the game for everyone else. I always have this bad habbit of saying what is on my mind, even when I shoud hold back.

Cheating is not measured by how much profit someone else makes.
That is jealousy or envy on your part.
Cheating is manipulating the stock prices.

Some here are complaning about wave-riding and flipping and price fluctuations.
The term "Prediction Market" does not mean "POLL"
You can weigh in on props once, or once a week, like a poll, if that is satisfying.
But someone somewhere decided that simulated stock markets give more useful data, and are more fun.
Wave-riding, flipping, price fluctuations, & greed - are normal, healthy, every-day occurrences on stock markets, real and simulated.
But i suspect PopSci is in it for the entertainment value.

So quityerbitchin. Everybody has their own style of play.

I'm a surffer, I ride the waves.
I've been here 2 weeks. NetWorth pop$283K
I'm a vet of HSX (hollywood stock exchange) where people know how to trade.

Wave-riding IS more profitable.
But it's not cheating, and not "easy".
It has it's own challenges, and in my opinion more fun.
I can play lots of stocks every day, not just the IPOs.

There is a marked difference between wave riding, and creating and or pushing waves, especially with multiple accounts. Now the only way to know for certain if a 230% gain is cheating is to determine what the total profit potential was (someone a long time a go (GMP1948 I think) used to track this information). This allows you to see if there was a glitch in the system that gave more money than was possible, it also allows to see what % of flips some one would have had to make in order to make that kind of profit. If you have someone catching the first wave on all the flips they are most likely flipping then pushing the wave with other accounts. We have seen this happen before.

"There is a marked difference between wave riding, and ..."
That's my point.
This therad started with a complaint about NOTHING.
A mear $1.25 price change.
Then escalated into flipping, wave-riding, and cheating.
As if trading for profit is a "gateway" cheat.
Some folks are taking "prediction exchange" too seriously.
IT'S A GAME.

Sorry this thread did not start out as nothing (by the way please don't type in caps, it annoys everyone). For the first 25 weeks i was here the exchange ran normally, all of a sudden about 3 weeks ago the stock prices on many stocks started to move 3 or 4 dollars in both directions in the same day. I don't care how you think trading is supposed to be played, all i'm saying is the market here is not behaving normally. Now it looks like i have created a monster here so this will be my last post on this subject. Thank you all for your input and opinions on this subject.

Want some more fuel for the fire? I watched the exchange tonight from around midnight to after 3 AM (married guys with lots of kids like this time frame on Saturday nights), and the shit that happened was completely weird.

Between midnight and 1:00 AM, DRYWST, BAILOUT, GAMEQUARTER, and VOLCANO all dropped 1.50 or so. Typically, NOTHING happens on a Saturday on the exchange. There was no news to spur the activity. And there were NO HIGH SCHOOL CLASSES in session at this time.

I think we're seeing two things; first, that there are players acting in concert to move stocks. And second, that those moves are being amplified by easy info which inspires waveriders to pile on and make the price swings more pronounced.

And what has happened of late to make the info more available? The price movement chart on PPXCHAT.

Taylor, I strongly suggest you shut down the feed that allows the PPXCHAT ticker to post stock price moves. Even though the connection between PPXCHAT and the PPX may be authorized, the connection between PPXCHAT and the rest of the world is not. I believe PPXCHAT's site is being used for automated trading.

And by the way... this same crap was happening back in the early days, in the first six months of the exchange. At that time the Rooster (who was later banned) ran a similar site to PPXCHAT with a similar ticker.

He was shut down, and the stupid prop gyrations suddenly stopped as well. Go figure.

This is a predictions exchange, not a reactions exchange like the stock market. There is no need for instantaneous information or up-to-the-minute feeds. The only people who need that kind of information on PPX are cheats.

I don't think that the price movement chart on PPXCHAT can play any role in these changes. They occured almost simultaneously and the chart reflected them when it was already too late.
The move had been planned and organized in advance as all such moves are.
On the contrary, the chart helps those who do not manipulate the stock to see that something wrong begins to occure. It can not, however, be a way of communication between those who manipulate the stock. To shut it down would not help anybody but those who manipulate the stock because it would damage the accounts of those who follow the chart. But once again: THOSE WHO MANIPULATE THE STOCK DO PLAN IN ADVANCE.

arkadi: I don't advocate closing ppx's link down because it is a source of manipulation, and you are correct that their link is not used to start flips by people trying to manipulate the system, however those manipulating the market count on it being there hoping that once they star a wave, those wave riders watching that link will jump on and further push the wave so that those manipulating the market can maximize their profit with far fewer accounts, and it works you can see the discussion when a flip occurs wondering if it is just a blip or will it be enough to make jumping worthwhile.

The point isn't that the PPXCHAT chart is causing, or used by, the people manipulating the stock. The point is that it AMPLIFIES the effect. And frankly, it's a waverider's tool anyway. Anything that makes waveriding easier encourages market volatility.

Again, this whole issue came up quite a while ago, and killing the feed to the page showing the price updates effectively knocked down the weird price swings. You can dicker over your assessments, but this situation has occurred before and the results are known.

WOW, prices changed a WHOLE $1.50?
(sarchasim)
I say again, that is nothing.
What you are discribing, vulgarian, is a more active market than you are used to. Not price fixing or collusion.

I cannot comment on the chart on PPXCHAT. I haven't seen it.
I will not say there are no price fixers.
But, The after midnight activity you discribe sounds normal to me.
Just opportunists, not price fixers.

A little more than 2 weeks ago, PPX placed a bunch of banner ads on HSX (Hollywood Stock eXchange). I signed-up here a few days later. You probably have a bunch of new players with a diffrent style of playing, and perhaps more trading activity than you're used to.

The after midnight "day trading" is common and accepted at HSX. Many people jump on the first thing that moves, hopeing that it will move even more throughout the day, then jump off when they think it stopped moving. It has been that way for 10 years. It's normal, does not hurt the market, nobody thinks twice about it.
I usually play around 5pm, hopeing to catch waves that will last a few days. I am less sucessful than the day traders, but i am comfortable with my style of play.
(at HSX i am worth H$19million = 92%tile)

If you catch price fixers, kill them.
But you are mis-diagnosing groth spurts.
More players = more/wilder activity.

roygbiv wrote:
"...those manipulating the market count on it being there hoping that once they star a wave, those wave riders watching that link will jump on and further push the wave..."

Yes, you are right, of course. I often keep the chart open myself when I am working on my computer. It may alert and make one to go to the site and follow the stock, it's true. An experienced player won't follow each and every stock blindly but people who are new may do.
My point is that this is a secondary problem. Those who manipulate the stock are more important. As to those who follow very closely, they can easily do the same on the site itself. It is possible to address the results but it is better to address the cause of the problem. Sorry for saying something all too obviouse. I agree with your point but I would rather concentrate on the real... may I say "gamblers"?

arkadi the problem is that the way this market is set up is flawed (actually on many levels), unfortunately one of the side effects of it being flawed is that it is fairly easy to manipulate it, and the downside is that once someone starts to manipulate the market the wave riders (who I have no problem with) unknowingly help the manipulator. Sir rep you are hung up on $1.50 change this is more than that, we have had wave riders since the game began, and there is a significant difference between the affect that wave riding has and people manipulating the market. Wave riders themselves don't start flips without reason, they catch waves of moving stock, it is the manipulators who flip and in conjunction with other accounts start a wave and then once it dies flips it back, usually with no information to justify either flip.

Vulgarian,

The logic of your argument is so faulty as to be ridiculous.

You point out the prop movement chart on PPXCHAT as cause or exacerbator of waves. Yet the information on PPXCHAT is ALWAYS delayed by 5 minutes.

What about the "Top Movers" page on PPX itself? This information is REAL-TIME, yet you don't make any mention of it in your argument.

Why not propose removing all sources of information? PPX should make everyone comb through 100+ propositions individually to see if anything has moved, then the market would settle down for sure!

to roygbiv:

Yes, I agree with what you wrote at 5:31. Thank you.
Now, while discussing what to do about manipulators (if anything is to be done) we should be careful not to harm the normal activities on the market. How to balance this?

Sir.reptitious--don't even TRY to school me on PPX--I know the way things work. One stock moving a buck or two is no big deal, but when several of them move in concert after midnight on a weekend, it is VERY notable and suspicious. And maybe there are some new traders who work things a little differently... but if that's the root of it, they're obviously some pretty stupid folks. For example, last night they ran up the price of GOOGROW, which is a laughable short. Google has absolutely NO CHANCE of becoming the biggest company in America... yet here are these yahoos buying it up.

Interesting. Was it manipulation, or stupidity?

And keno25, the "flaws" you point out are nothing of the sort. The PPX top movers page tells you what the props have done for the day, but do not report the direction since the last time the stock moved. So if XYZ is up 3.00 for the day, then reverses and drops 1.00, it simply reports that it is up 2.00 for the day. It doesn't tell you it's on the way down like the chart on PPXCHAT. Instead, it gives you the same information you get looking at your portfolio.

And the fact that PPXCHAT is delayed by 5 minutes means nothing. Waves take place over hours or even an entire trading day.

The fact that some of the weird price swings happen in less than 5 minutes is even more suspicious because of this. Either a lot of people are glued to their PPX screens and trade on a minutes notice, or they're trading in concert.

Arkadi a good start for discussing solutions is the "what are Halts" threads in Tech support thread, which should be near the top. Its not an end all solution but is a good start for discussion.

Guys, I can undestand you want less risk or volatility in the market.
But to expect that there should be NO risk or volatility is naive.
Stop looking for someone to blame.
Volatility is not in itself an indicator of manipulation.
You need better evidence.
If you DO find cheaters, DO NOT "stabelise" the market to keep out the criminals. That does more damage than the cheaters do.

sir-reptitious--This exchange, like any other, has been afflicted by jackasses who feel that "winning" is the only point.

It's not. You don't win anything here.

Most players want to participate in this exchange because they want to test their analysis and understanding of the props, and see how they "stack up" against others.

You can't get any feeling of accomplishment when yokel hucksters play dumbass games with the props and bid up a stupidass stock like GOOGROW.

Any one of us can put together a group to manipulate props, and could even do it on our own, and it would be no big deal. People who do this are not special, or talented, or even very intelligent. In fact, they are quite ordinary.

So you can understand why there's a very negative reaction to any perceived manipulation. Serious players research the props, form opinions, and hang more than a few virtual dollars on their stakes.

The people who play this exchange understand physics, geology, meteorology, tech trends, marketing, business, biology, video games, auto trends, space and exploration, the internet, and on and on.

People who manipulate the exchange don't know crap, and play the exchange for... uh... I can't imagine what.

They aren't showing they are smarter. Anybody could do what they do.

They aren't showing they're better. They aren't.

They aren't showing they're more clever. They aren't.

So understand that PPX players resent and loudly argue against anything that smacks of manipulation for a very simple reason; those that play manipulative games are not simply cheaters, they violate everything that this exchange is about.

PPX is about predicting the future, not about "making the top (fill in a number)."

how dare you accuse rooster of being a cheater he was a good active person on the forums he made the site using data that was completely legal for all the players Its not his fault that only the top people used it

and don't get all idealist about PPX simple facts

1. Its a game but hell we are all capatialists here in america we win by any means nessisary

2 even with 1 the market has yet to be inaccuite about anything explain that in your problems with it

3 google has turned from a basement company in 10 years to one that has its very own navy what can you say will it be in 10 more

4 wave riders are a nessisary thing to PPX like lactic acid is too muscles suck it up

5 just because you where "the first person to support taylor" you get to talk down to us is a crack as is

6 you can't know PPX if you ever do leave and go into the stock market come back in 6 months and thank me for this

roygbiv wrote (03/01/09 at 11:21 pm):
"...a good start for discussing solutions is the "what are Halts" threads in Tech support thread..."

Yes, you had a very interesting discussion there. I feel sorry about the fact that I missed it at that time. Thank you for having directed me there. I read it with great interest.

Titian: I liked Rooster a lot, but the fact of the matter is that he was punished for cheating, along with songbird, Mvail was also punished (and he was my favorite person in here), there was one other that was punished can't remember his name claimed to be a doctor, making 6 figures but lived next to a trailer park and had to share his computer. Now I don't know if any or all of them cheated or not, but they were punished for cheating and collusion, so you can cut the how dare you routine. Also remember that Rooster's and Mvail's scrappers slowed the system down to an absolute crawl, and is one of the reasons that PPX has allowed for a formal link used by PPX chat (and PPXbroker before).

That aside Rooster and Mvail were two of the more informed players here and had a fair understanding of how the market worked, and even while claiming to be innocent themselves, understood how easy it would be to manipulate and cheat the market. In fact the two of them in conjunction with gpm1948, tried a number of times to demonstrate that cheating was occurring, and finally gave up because people refused to see it.

Titian you wrote "2 even with 1 the market has yet to be inaccuite about anything explain that in your problems with it"

I could understand this if you had just started, but you have been around for a while, but this market is so far from being predictive it's almost funny. Lets start with GOOGLE trading at $100.25 like a month before it closed short, and that when it closed short it was still trading around $90 I believe. Lets look at the number of stocks that have closed 20 or more points away from $0.00 for shorts or $100. for longs. Lets talk about the number of stocks that have been left open for days after they should have been closed but still were only trading around $60, meaning that even after an event has occurred, and before trading is halted the market still only showed a 60% chance of the event happening, for days afterward.

I do agree wave riders are necessary, and I don't have a problem with wave riders, I do have a problem with people starting and pushing waves. I also understand the difference between riding a wave, and creating and pushing a wave. We can discuss this in depth if you want.

As for being the first to support Taylor, and talking down to you, they are not related.I brought up my support for Taylor, because I also said when I threw support behind her that if I found that things were slipping to where they were I would point it out, also wanted to give a bunch of the new names I have seen some point of reference that I have been here for sometime, and not someone new. If you feel I'm talking down to you I apologize, that is not my intent. I have voiced my opinions when I have found things I liked as well as when I find things I disliked, and I will defend either, but I also believe that most people have the right to express their opinions.

You also said "1. Its a game but hell we are all capatialists here in america we win by any means nessisary "

Which I take it to mean that you believe that cheating is alright, and that no rules are needed, which means that everyone should just open 10-20 accounts and drive the market how ever they see fit, because capitalism says its ok.

Just to round out the critique of Titian's rant;

"3 google has turned from a basement company in 10 years to one that has its very own navy what can you say will it be in 10 more"

But Google has to become bigger than Walmart (which had 12 billion a year in profit, compared to Google's 1 billion and change), not to mention General Electric's 11 billion, Exxon Mobil's 40 billion, etc. And Google's been taking a dive the last few quarters; it's profit in the 4th quarter of 2008 took a big 67% dive from the previous year's numbers.

To satisfy the prop (GOOGROW) it has to become maybe 30 times bigger by the end of next year. That's just not going to happen.

"4 wave riders are a nessisary thing to PPX like lactic acid is too muscles suck it up"

Lactic acid is a waste product of muscle exertion. I don't think this was the comparison you were looking for...

I just noticed how few stocks move on any given day.
Only 7 stocks moved today.
If people jump on the first thing that moves, Of Course they are all gonna jump on the same 7 stocks.
Is this collusion, coincidence, or inevitable?
(inevitable, i think)

Vulgarian:
You are being Pompous.
I say again, It is not a poll, survay or sports betting site.
It is designed as a stock market.
Please excuse us if some of us play it like a stock market.
Please stop asking for changes to prevent us from playing it like a stock market.
Our style of play does not prevent you from playing it your way.
Short-term fluctuations may worry you, but do not realy hamper lohg-term play.

titian:
Google has a navy?

SIR-REPTITIOUS-"Cheating is not measured by how much profit someone else makes. That is jealousy or envy on your part. Cheating is manipulating the stock prices." Totally inaccurate and unsupported statement by sir-repTITious.

OK, maybe if you had even an average intelligence you would of read my whole post correctly. I never once said you were cheating, unless you're XFABMAN, I even said that in my statement to you. I was simply asking what your method of playing was, but your so defensive (yet again) that it seems like you assumed I was. After further review of the site I see now that XFABMAN's impossible gain was cheating or a glitch. [I know this because it is a mathematical calculation based on all the shares available using a formula considering to fact what shares closed that week (SEEDS) and using such figures from weekly high's and low's and XFABMAN's $$$ amount to calculate highest REALISTIC(keyword here) possible gain of 34.033333% repeating through Steiner's Theorem and or Kirkman's Theorem]
If several stocks closed that week for higher amounts and such then sure, it may be possible but a very long shot, but this did not happen. I would like to think it is a just a glitch. You seem to be a grumpy rude person that enjoys arguing with people here. You have not mad a single statement since mine that is not disputatious or contentious. I expect more out of you because of your unrefined character and complexion. At least if you are going to banter people or be facetious to them you need to learn to spell. "(sarchasim)" Did you mean sarcasm or did you really mean sarchasm which really is not a word either except more so used in a Zen like phrase??? If you are going to be an a$$ then at least learn how to do it right.

As for wave-riding, I agree with ROYGBIV here 100%. This is a normal part of stock trading and will always be, however I also believe that before a wave is started there should be a decent reason for this occurrence other than just trying to drive up or down the price of a share for you own gain. This is wrong, and should people be caught doing this they should be banned for life.

I also have to agree with ROYGBIV and VULGARIAN for most of there other statements as well, they both seem to making the most sense. Also you two both also understand the purpose of this website more-so than so many of the others here. I also support Taylor, and realize she has a whole lot on her plate here with only a small staff to handle it. I have talked to her in a couple of emails lately and she really seems to be trying to do what is right for the best interest and intent of the PPX site. She has a hard job and I commend on her on a job well done so far and predict much improvement for the site to come for people like us who do this purely for the fun of gaining knowledge of current and futuristic events while still seeing just how we stack up against others here in our research and wisdom.

Quote from Sir-reptitious "I'm a surffer, I ride the waves.
I've been here 2 weeks. NetWorth pop$283K
I'm a vet of HSX (hollywood stock exchange) where people know how to trade."

You know, I am really proud of you, that is soooo good. I bet you are a big man to your mommy now huh??? Sorry, almost threw up, just cannot keep going with all the crap that is coming out my mouth here!!! Big deal buddy, I am completely new to stock trading games and guess what my net worth is not even 6 days after joining??? Without cheating or wave riding too might I add, I now have a net worth of just over $321K, and in 2 weeks I will probably be at around $400K maybe more, so keep trying to look bad, because you are good at it.

Sir-reptitious--I'm not being pompous, I'm making arguments based on the stated purpose of this exchange. This is from PopSci's "About" page in the introduction to the POPULAR SCIENCE PREDICTIONS EXCHANGE;

"Welcome to PPX - where people interested in science and technology compete against each other in predicting the future... But it's not just a game: the real value of an online predictive market like this is that as more and more people play, the predictions being made become more and more accurate..."

How does this get served by a bunch of people chasing price swings up and down like a bunch of puppies after a ball?

No one said short term price swings are bad. They're going to happen when something changes the liklihood of a prop proving out. But when the price swings occur for no good reason other than some yahoos playing footsie on their trades and others piling on, it runs completely against the exhange's stated purpose.

Exactly what I have been trying to say, that is what I was hoping for when I joined but it just seems to not be the case with some of these "Yahoos playing footsie" (Fell out of my chair laughing at that one).

To Sir-reptitious: If you do not believe my claim to how much money I have mad in 6 days just look who is in 6th place for weekly trading right now!!! I did this by simply doing some research and being smart enough not to have to cheat. I hope to move up even higher, but it is not a big deal if I don't. I am just excited to make it to 6th out of over 20,000 plus traders here, it is an honor...LOL

I meant MADE instead of MAD, I have been awake for over 24 hours working on my company, I hope to launch the website for it in a few weeks. It is just a local thing, but it still is keeping me busy. I am a mobile mechanic right now, I got laid off from my job as Sr. Site manager for a Nevada Biodiesel refinery early last year due to this insane economy and our production cost tripling had something to do with it as well. I miss that job, really I just miss the money, but something great about power too. I had over 30 employees and was the highest ranking guy on site, my boss was over at the corporate office most of the time and rarely visited the plant. Not to bad for a mechanic that never finished collage???

It's very unlikely XFABMAN cheated unless he found a way to break into the database and add money directly to his portfolio. There simply wasn't enough movement in the market for anyone to make $2,000,000 or more in a week.

More than likely, he had a "glitch" where the system sold a lot more shares of a stock than he owned and credited it to his account. I once ended up losing a bunch of money because the system glitched and bought several thousand shares of a stock. I never got credited for it.

What got Vulgarian on the manipulation tangent was last Saturday night when 8 stocks flipped. The two he's focusing on were wrong way flips. But four were corrections. They stopped moving the wrong way. Two were for stocks where it's not clear how they'll pay out.

People who don't have large portfolios who want to be competitive periodically need to sell off stocks to free up cash. The logical ones to sell are stocks that aren't moving. This can trigger a flip. The two wrong way flips that night hadn't moved in days. I think one had been stagnant for weeks.

Vulgarian's proposed solution to this problem is to shut down the most accurate source of information on what's happening with the PPX market.

When Taylor first asked for people to suggest improvements, I suggested the idea of color coding stocks to show the current direction. The reason for this was to make the market MORE stable. Unfortunately, the developers apparently didn't understand and wrote it to show how the stock was doing for the day.

For a made up illustration: Pretend WINGNUT is a stock that moved UP $2 today and then flipped DOWN and moved 50 cents so it's currently up $1.50 for the day.

If someone is looking for stocks to buy, and does research on the PPX stock pages, they'll see it in green, and up $1.50 for the day. The won't know it last moved down.

So if they buy it long, it could trigger the stock to flip back up.

The PPXCHAT chart would show them it was up $1.50 for the day but was currently moving down.

Why would Vulgarian want to shut down this source of readily available accurate information?

Visit www.ppxchat.com A great place to meet PPXers and learn strategy.

msholdenct:
You are probably right about XFABMAN, but a glitch is all the more reason admins should be looking into it to see what happened.
selling in and of its self almost never causes a flip, because buying and selling (as is shorting and covering) are weighted differently, Lets say it requires 10000 shares being bought or covered to cause a stock change in price, you would have to sell or cover more than 10000 shares to cause it to flip. A combination of selling or covering in conjunction with buying or shorting the opposite makes for quicker flips and pushes the direction.

meant 10000 shares bought or shorted (not bought and covered.)

Vulgarian PPXchat isn't the problem, their a great bunch of players, and they are more than willing to share ideas. And while their scrapper could be used to cheat, I doubt any of them do (at least those in the core group)and although their scraper most likely helps push waves that are already in process, it is not needed to start a wave. Nor do I believe that shutting down ppxchat would end manipulation, or cheating in fact it might make picking up on such activity harder by allowing stock movement to be more hidden. The solution is changes in the marketplace, which even when evidence has been strongly shown to indicate cheating, collusion, and manipulation admin is reluctant to investigate, or to do anything about, because they know that the results would show that they need to correct flaws that are inherent to the system, which means a lot of work, and of course admitting that they were in error to begin with.

New name idea for this thread “Childish Witch Hunt”.
I see a lot of witch hunting here as well as name calling and putdown then turn around and brag about the same thing. The few people that seem to be trying to put forth real points on the subject are being largely drowned by name calling and finger pointing BS.

The only thing this thread is getting done is sewing strife, Stop acting kids.

have to agree with Darkvoid there.

I know people like the Rooster did testing way back when and reported selling and covering have less weight than shorting or buying, but I've also seen people in the chat room apologize after the fact because they caused a flip or two when they got out of positions to free up cash.

Only 36 people have large enough portfolios to own every stock. If a dozen people free up cash over a period of a couple of days that's apt to be enough to cause a flip.

You used to be able to see this happen by looking at the "accounts holding" chart for individual stocks, but unfortunately last time I checked the charts still didn't accept dates in 2009.

A number of times I'd see a stock would stop moving, and the number of accounts holding would go down a little each day until the stock flipped. Then it would go back up again.

Visit www.ppxchat.com A great place to meet PPXers and learn strategy.

msholdenct: I was one of those testing way back when, but the confirmation was actually given to us by Yog, I think it went by most people, most likely because back then there were so many posts each day it was hard to keep up, I also don't think a lot of people under stood the significance. One person flipping might have been the last trade needed to cause a change, but was not the only trade needed. if the magic number for a change is 10,000 shares and I trade 1,000 shares and the price changes or flips direction it just means that there already was at least 9,000 shares traded prior to my transaction. Or if it was due to selling off only and not flipping the weighted amount of selling was enough in conjunction with other trades to push it over.

Now what would really be useful is to figure out what the magic number is for a value or direction change. And I strongly suspect that it is a formula and not a set number, meaning that it varies, most likely in relation to the number of shares outstanding.

I never paid much attention to the accounts holding, because I didn't think it showed number held long vs held short, which if this is correct if I flipped from long to short the number holding wouldn't change. If it does show the number holding long vs holding short then that would in fact be very useful information.

vulgarian
Your post on - 03/03/09 at 1:56 am - sounded pompus to me. You assume you know peoples motives, and yours are more nobel.
It's a game, are motives relevant?

"How does this get served by a bunch of people chasing price swings up and down like a bunch of puppies after a ball?"
I do not know. But apperantly it does serve their purpose.
Because PopSci and others keep building "predictive markets" fashioned after stock exchanges.
And chasing price swings is what stock traders DO.

"No one said short term price swings are bad."
Well if you didn't, Colchowy did:
"Well, my personal opinion is that all the speculations we can see here are bad ..."
I think others did too, but i'm too lazy to re-read the whole thread looking for quotes.

Actually i think we agree on most points.

Look, I said what I said, and I will not change any of it. I am sorry for calling that guy a cheater, after further looking into the site I see that glitches are common here. This is not a good thing. And yes, I did get a little out of control, but Sir-reptitious was just plan rude to me for no reason so yes I am guilty of being a little childish. He is not so perfect either, and I only said what I did about my position here to show him how stupid it look, not to brag. I am here for fun, and to see how I stack up against everyone else. If I drop to 2000th place tomorrow, I don't care, it was fun doing it. I do not believe people who purposely start a wave the wrong way to profit are seeing the true intent of the sight and should be banned. It is expected to sell shares to transfer money into another stock that is moving, if it is what you believe is going to happen based on some valid reason. As for Sir-Reptitious starting a thread to say my posts are abusive and offensive??? Come on, some of the name calling and trash talking that other people said in here is way more offensive than anything I said, but no one else is crying. He need to grow up, and if he can't take it then do not dish it out!!! Like I said I do apoligize to he guy I called a cheater, but that is it.

Does anyone else here think i insulted them?
Does anyone think i am trying to cause a fight?
(rather than just defend my position)

Hey All,

I've just read the first five or so posts-- will get to the rest and respond-- but I want to let you know that I got an email about stocks acting weird, with specifics, and I've got our developers looking into those that were pointed out. I'll let you know what they come up with.

Also-- we do not sell the data from PPX. We don't sell your names, emails, anything-- we just maintain the application (and it's pricey for us!) for your entertainment and b.c we think it;s cool. We want to make it really work, and we want to improve it-- that takes some time, so thanks for all of your help.

Third, just because you ask for something doesn;t mean you'll get it. It does mean I'll bring it up and evaluate it with the dev side and with the powers-that-be here. And Roy, we made a whole slew of improvements in direct response to user requests before the leagues went live. We didn't make the leagues in response to user request-- we made them because we thought they'd be cool, especially for people who may not be interested in PPX otherwise, but who want to bet on something with their family members, friends, etc (like people who maintain football pools or whatever)... The leagues are also a good resource for teachers, so they can bring real world science discussions (and exposure to all of you-- hahahaha) into their classrooms. We think big.

Anyway, please send me emails about specific stocks that are acting weird, or traders who you suspect might be cheating. Or anything. I'll put whatever you've requested on my to-do list for the day, and get back to you personally.

xo,

Taylor
taylor.hengen@bonniercorp.com

So, is GOOGROW jumping today because of stupidity or manipulation? Well, Google did make the news today... it's ranked 150 on the newly released fortune 500.

But since GOOGROW says that Google has to grow into the largest company in America according to Fortune, then GOGROW should be falling like a rock.

Is some bunch of ninnies playing circle-jerk with their trades, or are there just more stupid people than usual today?

Sorry, correction, Google is 117. There is no way it's rank can rise to number one by December 31, 2010... unless Walmart and Exxon decide to close shop. And a hundred other larger companies.

HERE WE GO AGAIN.

What the hell do you care?

DO you hear me complaining?
I just lost P$3000
I had 1000 shares short, and it went up $3.
But i play for the short-term, So thems the brakes.

You shorted at IPO, and it will cash-out as $zero.
So i ask again: what do you care what it does between IPO and cashout?
It ain't your business how other folks play.
Get off my back.

What the hell is that all about?

Facts are facts. The Fortune 500 ranks companies by their revenue. The top companies, Walmart and Exxon, have revenues of over $400,000,000,000. Google showed a nice increase since the previous list, up around 8 billion to around $21,000,000,000 on this list.

That's a nice jump, but a far cry from anything that will reach the $400 billion mark. Google does not have a product, service, or anything that will boost them to that mark. Even if they came out with a top-selling cell phone, started running their own cell phone company, and capture 100% of the internet advertising, they still won't make it happen.

"Get off my back."

How does someone posting facts about a stock have anything to do with you? No one mentioned your name. You need to chill - not everything is about you.

We've been here a lot longer than you so we DO care how people play this game. We want a fair game with no cheating. Is that too much to ask? Let us post facts and opinions about the stocks without fear of harassment.

It wasn't posting facts that pisses me off. it was this statement:
"Is some bunch of ninnies playing circle-jerk with their trades, or are there just more stupid people than usual today?"

Let folks PLAY THE GAME without fear of harassment.
No rules were broken that i can see.