Hey ProductHunt! We're stoked to launch Forcerank which is basically weekly fantasy sports for the stock market, a really fun market based contest for real cash.
It's the culmination of a lot of thinking about how to change the corrupt and biased Buy/Sell/Hold regime of Wall Street stock ratings by collecting data from the contests. At @Estimize we did it with earnings and economic estimates, we hope to do the same with Forcerank.
You can read more about why we built it and how it works here http://blog.estimize.com/post/14....
Use the referral code 9L89DKKZ on sign up to grab $5 in free credit when you enter your first contest.
We would love your feedback on everything from top to bottom, please leave it in the comments here.
@ldrogen Yeah I can imagine... looking forward to the launch, would be cool if there was a way to get notified when it goes up.
Report
@ldrogen Leigh, I've been following Estimize since almost the beginning and love everything you've done with the site. I wish you the best of luck with ForceRank.
Okay, so I'll buy into the argument that this isn't really considered gambling because it's skill-based. But what about the legalities of this from both a SEC and an IRS perspective? Technically, aren't you creating a class of derivatives based on stock? What about the actual money that is paid out by the company--would this be considered taxable income, or would this be considered capital gains? On the Forcerank side of things, what's the incorporation status of the company that's making the monetary payouts?
@imaznation Hey Alex. While the DFS issue is dumb, this is the better question and where we think we've innovated. We've spoken with all of the relevant financial regulatory authorities over the past 6 months and what is clear is that Forcerank isn't a swap or a derivative. We're so certain of this that we've filed a patent on it so that clones don't pop up. The contest doesn't give you exposure to any asset or basket of assets due to the format of the contest. We give you 10 stocks, or forex pairs, or commodities, etc. to rank in order of how you believe they'll perform over a 1 week period. Then, you're scored independently based on how accurate your Forcerank is compared to how the market actually behaved. Then, your score is compared to the scores of the competitors in your competition that week (let's say 21 other people). Then and only then if you have a higher score than half your competitors do you win part of the prize pool (in a 50/50 contest, tiered contests are different where the person in 1st place takes about 30% of the total prize pool). Because of this, you're about 4 steps removed from having any actual exposure to any asset or basket of assets, it really is a test of skill and can not be used to hedge other exposure in any way. The other thing is that we don't allow you to "sell out" of your contest at any point, once you're in, you're in. So your expected winnings (if we can put a probability on them) can not be sold as a derivative either as binary options exchanges allow (this is what InTrade got in trouble for, the COMEX Gold contract up there was a swap and they were not regulated by the CFTC).
We're 100% certain we've done our homework here with our council, but it definitely is an innovation for the industry which we'd like to see people not duplicate ;)
And yes, it's taxable income, we collect 1099s if they go over $600 in winnings.
@ldrogen Cool, definitely eases my concerns. It'll be awesome to have this bit on the website, possibly even as part of the onboarding flow. Given the other comments here, it seems like building trust is going to be the #1 mover of your sign-up acquisition metrics.
@imaznation great idea, definitely agree. The DFS companies really screwed things up for everyone else by doing some immoral stuff (bum hunting, insider trading, etc.). And there have been no shortage of unregulated swaps/futures markets that have been shut down for good reason (anyone remember SandHill Exchange?). The only thing I fear with that screen in the onboarding flow is that if you say there's nothing to worry about people start to question whether there's something to worry about. Wonder what % of people even consider that off the bat. The funny thing is that there's no risk to the player in any case. I think the bigger thing has been people not wanting their deposits stolen (Mt. Gox style). We obviously sequester player assets in a separate bank account we don't touch.
Interesting issues for this industry after the idiocy of our predecessors.
Hey Leigh, I entered the referral code but when entering my first contest I don't appear to have a credit. Do I need to add a credit card or something? Nice feature on PH!
@davepinke hey Dave, the way the referral credit works is that as you play in paid contest you earn the credit to use in other games. This protects against money laundering. After doing your Forcerank for a contest and pressing submit you'll be asked to enter your card info. You can also use the "Refer a Friend" system within the app to invite your contacts and earn $5 in credit for each of them that sign up and play as well.
Report
Wow, what a crazy (and awesome) idea. Legality in the states seems like it might be an issue. Wasn't there recently an issue with FanDuel and DraftKings?
@catherinetcai laws regarding daily fantasy sports (and their interpretation which is really the issue right now) don't effect what we're doing at Forcerank. We've proven that the contests are certainly skill based (unequal % of competitors winning unequal % of prizes). According to all but 7 states in the US contests of skill online are perfectly legal.
I feel like this idea has been kicking around forever, glad to see someone do it (looks like quite well I might add). Do you really think you will have no problems from a legality standpoint in the US? Wouldn't you not be just as "skill based" as DraftKings, Fanduel etc. ? All companies in which have faced tremendous legal battles.
@michael_hood hey michael. See reply above to Catherine. Very different issues. Sports is wrapped up in a few centuries of other crap along with the fact that the bum-hunting and other issues with DFS is getting them in trouble.
Report
After the latest update there is no opportunity to withdraw funds and play for the real money. Is this forever?
So I wonder, the problem with Fanduel and Draftkings was the "insider trading" that was happening since employees knew what other people have chosen. Here it seems similar in a way where any Wall ST guy that actually works for a fintech company and have all the tools in front of him, have a clear advantage over a regular Joe that only plays it for fun. I almost feel like all the professional traders have an unfair advantage over everybody else.
@ehevich all Forcerank employees are banned from playing in Forcerank games with an entry fee or prize of any kind. But it's certainly a game of skill, so yea to the best competitors go the spoils.
Forcerank
Nervous System Quotient (NSQ)
Forcerank
Nervous System Quotient (NSQ)
Play DOTA2 for the ACLU!
Forcerank
Play DOTA2 for the ACLU!
Forcerank
Play DOTA2 for the ACLU!
StockTwits
Forcerank
Forcerank
Voiceflow
Forcerank
Chatfuel
Forcerank