Kauppalehti will soon launch the stock market game Unelmasalkku. It is an investment competition open to everyone, where each player invests imaginary money in stock exchange shares.
The playing time is eight weeks, and the goal is to make the highest possible return. The player who made the best profit in the game receives the main prize of 5,000 euros.
In addition to the main prize, Unelmasalkku is giving away weekly cash prizes of 300 euros to the player who has reached the highest profit of each week.
The game launches on September 13, but you can start a portfolio now. By setting up a portfolio in advance, you’ll be in position when the game starts.
This is how Unelamasalkku works
In the dream portfolio, each player gets 100,000 imaginary euros to invest.
The player invests the pot in the shares of the Helsinki stock exchange, in addition to which, in the autumn game round, there are one hundred popular US company shares selected by the Kauppalehti editors!
The dream portfolio game platform follows the price movements of shares on the real stock exchange, i.e. the value of the portfolio rises and falls when the prices of the shares chosen by the players for their portfolios change on the Helsinki Stock Exchange and on Wall Street.
In the dream portfolio, you can make changes to your portfolio, for example, daily, or keep the portfolio’s stock selections and stock weights unchanged – everyone chooses a strategy that suits them.
Changes to the portfolio always take place the next day when the stock market opens, so for example in the earnings season, profiting from price reactions following earnings announcements requires forethought from players.
Who is the game for?
Everyone interested in investing, from beginners to experienced investors, is welcome to Unelmasalkku.
The game offers an opportunity to familiarize yourself with the operation of the stock exchange and stock market, test the functionality of your own strategy or excel as a stock picker.
The prizes in the dream portfolio are real money, but the pot of 100,000 euros to be invested is imaginary, so playing is completely risk-free.
You can also compete against your friends or co-workers by setting up your own league in the dream portfolio.
In the game, you don’t have to worry about the costs or taxes related to trading, unlike in the real stock market.
A winning strategy
The first round of the dream portfolio was played in the spring. At that time, the victory and the main prize went to a person from Taivalkoski Matti Karjalainen65.
Karjalainen achieved a handsome, 46 percent return in Unelmasalku, leaving the second-placed player far behind. Winning required active trading and luck.
Decisive in terms of profit was the decision to invest in companies with stronger price swings and monitoring the stock market’s results period. An information security company also hit the Karjalainen’s game portfolio Nixun a takeover bid that raised the share price. Towards the end of the game, the stock market became turbulent, so Karjalainen decided to protect his portfolio by increasing its cash weight.
Betting on companies with stronger price swings proved to be a working strategy in the spring game round for several weekly winners as well.
One of the weekly winners had taught social studies and entrepreneurship at Sipoonjoki Unified School Christian Liljeroos. He originally established his Unelmasalku game portfolio as part of the course’s investment exercise.
“I follow the stock market relatively actively, at the moment also for my profession, when we do investment exercises with students. Of course, I’m also interested in how the economy and Finnish companies are doing,” he commented at the time.
Liljeroos is now working as one of the mentors of the Dream Portfolio round that will start in September. The purpose of the mentors is to bring inspiration to Unelamasalku players by telling about their own investment strategy and to act as peer support by answering players’ questions on Kauppalehti’s discussion board.
In addition to Liljeroos, the dream portfolio’s mentors include a professor of finance at Aalto University Vesa Puttonen CEO of the Stock Exchange Foundation Sari Lounasmeri and editor of Kauppalehti and presenter of Markkinaraad Heidi Huotilainen.
Train now
Game time starts on September 13. However, you can already test the portfolio and the functionality of the Dream portfolio.
When the game starts, the returns of the test portfolios are reset and all players start with a clean slate. The dream portfolio lasts for eight weeks and ends on November 8, when the player with the highest return percentage on their portfolio is crowned the winner.
Create your portfolio in advance, and you’ll be in position when the game starts. You can access the dream portfolio here.