Students at Carnegie Mellon Qatar trade on first-of-its-kind virtual Doha Stock Market

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    {
        'caption' => 'Carnegie Mellon Business Administration juniors Saad Al-Matwi (left) and Siddharth Arora (second from left) conceived of the idea for the virtual Doha Stock Market. They partnered with Computer Science sophomore Kaleem Rahman (second from right) and sophomore Information Systems Khalid Al-Sooj (right) to create a Web site where teams could trade virtual stocks. More than 20 teams signed up to participate in the month-long stock trading competition.',
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        'url' => '/1/56541-stockmarket.jpg'
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'We wanted to give Carnegie Mellon students what they deserve - something new, interesting and fun,' says Siddharth Arora, junior Business Administration student who came up with the idea with classmate Saad Al-Matwi.

'There are a lot of games that simulate the U.S. Stock Market, but we wanted to make it more relevant to our classmates and that's why we created the first virtual simulation of the Doha Stock Market.'

Arora and Al-Matwi took their idea for a local stock market competition to Business Administration professor J. Patrick McGinnis. He encouraged them to collaborate with Computer Science students to bring their idea to fruition. 'When we put Business Administration and Computer Science on the ground together in Qatar, this was this kind of real-world collaborations that we hoped would form,' says McGinnis.

'This original idea grew out of need and interest. It's an excellent opportunity for students from two different disciplines to collaborate in a way that approximates a situation they could encounter in their professional lives. This is what the Carnegie Mellon education is all about.'

Arora and Al-Matwi came up with the competition rules and worked with Computer Science majors to create the software and develop the Web site where trades would take place. The game was based on the actual Doha Stock Market, which consists of 42 local companies. Teams were given initial capital of QR 150,000 to buy or sell stocks in real time. 'We felt that was a reasonable amount of money for a team to start with,' says Arora.

Though the real Doha Securities Market is only open from 10 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., stocks in the virtual game could be traded 24 hours a day on the Web site. Exactly like on the real Doha Securities Market, each trade was subject to a QR 30 commission. 'We did that to make it as real as possible and so that people would take it seriously,' says Al-Matwi.

Interest in the game was so overwhelming that it was extended from two weeks to more than one month. As an incentive, the team who has the most money and used the best strategy would be awarded prizes. In addition to their studies, Carnegie Mellon students were sending their teammates text messages about their holdings, and they were also truly studying the Doha Stock Market and how it works, which is the real goal of the project.

'Everyone who played the game gained a whole new realization of the value of money and what it takes to earn and maintain a lucrative stock portfolio,' Arora says. 'People were studying the Doha Securities Web site and have begun taking a more active interest in the local economy.'

Team mystery took home the first place trophy with a net worth of QR176268. Team members are Eman Tag, Aisha Al Sada, Buthayna Mohammed Al-Madhadi. Second place went to team twopointfive, with a total net worth of QR 164971.7.

Twopointfive team members are Imran Karim, Mustafa Hassnain and Mohammed Abu Zeinab. Team HNR came in third with a total net worth of QR 164662.5. Team members are Hanoof Al Thani, Nida Ilahi and Reem Al Muftah.

Arora and Al-Matwi, who are both members of cmBA, the Carnegie Mellon Business Association club, kept data on the competition and hope to make it an annual event. They are even considering offering the program to other universities in Qatar and using it as a tool to teach local high school students about stock trading.

The Doha Stock Market game had a scoreboard so that all teams could keep track of their earnings and see how they stacked up against the other teams. To make it more interesting, the scoreboard was turned off one week before the close of the competition to create suspense.

'The Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University is where business and technology intersect, and this is the perfect example of that,' according to McGinnis.

'Students took the initiative to create a new idea that would not only be fun but would also provide them with an opportunity to expand their education in a way that has local impact. They had the idea, sought out the people with the right skills to do the job, gave them good guidance and made good decisions. The students were excited because it's been so well received. And I hope this is the first of many collaborations between Computer Science and Business Administration students.'