Welcome Professors/Instructors/Teachers/Investment Groups/Individual Traders:

Thank you for your interest in STOCK-TRAK Portfolio Simulations. We are now in our 15th year of providing custom stock market simulations to the education market--by "education market" we mean colleges, high schools, middle schools, investment clubs, brokers in training, corporate education courses and any other group of individuals the want to learn more about the markets in the U.S. and worldwide.

STOCK-TRAK is the most comprehensive investment simulation on the internet and the easiest to implement into any Finance, Economics, or Investments class. We are the only simulation available that features trading of:

• U.S., Canadian, European, Asian, Australian, & Latin American stocks,
• U.S., Canadian, and European options/warrants,
• U.S., Canadian, and European futures,
• U.S. mutual funds,
• U.S., Canadian, and European corporate and government bonds
• The markets/exchanges covered include: NYSE, NASDAQ, AMEX, CBOE, CME, CBOT, NYMEX, Toronto, Montreal, London, Euronext (Amsterdam, Brussels, Lisbon, Paris), Euronext Liffe, Deutsche Borse, Xetra, Zurich, Spain, Tokyo, Korea, Hong Kong, KL, Singapore, New Zealand, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Brazil etc (coverage in some of the markets is limited to the most active issues).

While we have seen many competitors come and go, we have succeeded by consistently providing a valuable, reliable, and realistic trading simulation at a reasonable price to students and other individuals wanting to learn more about the markets or test a strategy. In addition, we provide a toll-free phone number to users in North America and excellent e-mail support to our users worldwide to quickly answers any questions our users may have. This customer service allows the professors/instructors to concentrate on concepts and leaves the STOCK-TRAK customer service to answer all trivial questions about ticker symbols, dividends, splits, etc.

Each year we strive to improve our service, and we listen to what our valuable professors/instructors tell us. We attend the U.S. (national and regional), Canadian, European, Latin American and Asian finance conferences and many of the regional finance meetings so that we can hear first-hand comments and criticisms. Our ability to respond to the demands of the market has allowed us to grow consistently even in turbulent times. If you are new to STOCK-TRAK, give us a try and find out what you and your students are missing.

The very first step is to develop a specific trading assignment. We suggest developing a one-page STOCK-TRAK project that specifies what exactly you want the students to do with their account. Don't just say here is $500,000 now go trade! What is the overall goal? What type of trades do you want your students to make or not make? How will you grade or evaluate their trading progress? Are they judged against each other or against the market? For more help on this, read on.

We have constructed this page to give professors/instructors a brief idea on how to implement STOCK-TRAK into their classroom and how to get started. Keep in mind that if you have any questions that are not addressed on this web page contact us immediately on our Professor Help-Line at 678-475-0766 Monday-Friday from 9:30 am to 5:30 pm ET.

After you have an idea of how your are going to use STOCK-TRAK in class and how many people you expect in your class, it is time to register with STOCK-TRAK to let us know you want to use it.

1. Fill out the on-line Professor/Instructor Sign-Up Sheet. Since we customize the trading period to each professor/instructor, you will need to specify the start and stop date of the trading period for your class, as well as the initial cash balance. Generally you should allow two weeks of classes before your trading period starts, and have the trading period end a week or two before your last class.

2. If you requested hard copy registration forms hand them out to each person or team in your class. Their account number will be on the bottom right of the registration form. If you have requested our Express Registration service, you will receive your students account numbers via email. Pass out a unique account number to each student or student team and encourage them to print out a copy of the rules themselves from the web page.

3. Instruct your students to go to STOCK-TRAK's web site, click on the "Open Account" link on the left column, and register/activate their account number. Upon registering they will be asked to choose a password, and then they will be asked to proceed to a secure credit card screen to make their payment. If students do not have a credit card, then they can mail us a check (they must write their account number on the check) and we will open the account once the check is received.

If you have requested us to invoice you or your university, then you must return the list of account numbers to us with a 4 digit password and the student name for each account (an Excel sheet would be perfect). We will then open all of the accounts for you and fax back in invoice once they are opened. Your students do NOT need to go to the web page to register if they are not paying for the account themselves.

4. Review the STOCK-TRAK rules with your students, especially when the markets are open, what price they will be receiving and encourage them to get started right away. Many students seem shy at first, but once they make their first trade they see how easy it is.

5. Remind your students that they must have the ticker symbols to trade stocks, options, and mutual funds. Stock ticker symbols can be obtained from our web page at the "Symbol Lookup" link in the right hand side of our home page. Ticker symbols are not needed to trade futures, bonds, spot contracts, and international stocks, as a pre-selected list of each is listed in their respective trading pits.

6. Discuss any specific investment objectives or class assignments with your students. The best way to develop this assignment is to review your textbook and look at which week you expect to cover stocks, mutual funds, bonds, optons, futures, international stocks. Develop trades for each week based on the topic you are covering in your textbook and lectures. If you are talking about it or the students are reading about it, then they need to be trading it if you expect them to really learn about it! Don't be afraid to cover the chapters of your textbook out of sequence to maximize the benefit of STOCK-TRAK (cover options and futures sooner so the students can trade these). If this is your first time using STOCK-TRAK we recommend you do something like the following:

• Create a one page assignment for your students that says "Suppose you inherited $500,000 and in order to keep the money you must do the following transactions over the next 12 week trading period.
• In week one design an asset allocation mix that is appropriate for your age (If you are a 20 year old student you can keep 60% stocks (some mix of large-cap, small-cap, hi-dividend yield, etc.), 10% bonds, 10% international stocks and 20% cash). Discuss this in class based on age and goals.
• By the end of the second week the students need to have invested at least 25% of their cash following that asset allocation mix. Make the students place a couple of trades so they can see how easy the page is to use and overcome the learning curve of using the page. This will also start the class competition as they will be clicking on "Class Ranking" to see how their accounts are performing versus their classmates.
• By the end of the thirdweek the students need to have invested at least 50% of their cash following that asset allocation mix. Professors benefit from this because it buys them time to discuss various topics.
• By the fourth week the students can start buying on margin, selling short and dollar cost averaging into mutual funds. They can experiment with limit and stop orders, and diversify internationally.
• By the fifth or six week the students can start learning about options. Once students make money on a stock they can buy a protective put and lock in the profit. If student have not made money in their stocks they can write a covered call in order to bring more income to the account to help increase the position. Also, for the stocks they bought they can trade index options to hedge their stock positions.
• By the seventh or eighth week, the professor can hypothetically say Alan Greenspan is meeting this week. What do we think he will do? If the class decides he will raise rates, the students can buy stocks that will benefit from an interest raising environment.
• By the ninth week the professor can hypothetically say the Iraq issue is resolved and Osama Bin Laden is caught. The professor can ask what will happen to oil prices and the market if world peace exists. Ask the students to make some trades based on their expectations of oil and energy prices
• By the tenth week students can learn about futures. They can buy future options to hedge investments.
• By the final week students can calculate their risk adjusted return (ie, Sharpe Ratio or Jensen's Alpha) or perform other portfolio calculations.
• We don't recommend professors grade their students based on portfolio value, but rather with a written assignment based on the trades made. The students can write about what they traded, why they traded it and what they learned from the trade. Professors can see from written assignments if the students understand what is going on. Professors can also encourage their students by using a dart board account or say whoever beats me will receive 2 bonus points on their exam. If the students have a risk and a reward they will trade differently. If you have any questions or would like to discuss this further please call us.

7. STOCK-TRAK sends out statements and professor/teacher summaries on Mondays. Statements will be mailed only to professors and not each individual student. These statements are for the professors to review their students trading activity, and then to be passed out to the students. Students can also always print out their own statements 24/7 off of the webpage.

8. Professors can always manage an account or two compliments of STOCK-TRAK. Just give us a call and we will be glad to set them up for you. If you have further questions, please visit the professor help guide.

Getting your students started with STOCK-TRAK is just that simple. If you have questions or special requests, please call our Professor Helpline at 678-475-0766 or have your students call our Toll-Free Customer Service at 1-800-786-TRAK.

If you are ready to sign up click here and please fill out the Sign-Up Sheet. You will receive your STOCK-TRAK account numbers shortly.

Sincerely,

Mark Brookshire

President