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- Registration Rules
- Trading Rules
- Key Limitations
- Ranking Calculation Rules
- Dukascopy Points Calculation Rules
- Prizes and Awarding Rules
- Fair Play
- 6/12 Statistics
- Charts
- Contest standings
- Other rules and policies
Dukascopy Trader Contest (the "Contest")is a of forex competition between participants using DEMO accounts for manual trading only(the "Participants"). Any forms of automated trading are forbidden. Several trading limitations are designed to make the competition more fair and analytical.
The main feature of the Contest is a requirement to comment all trading operations including a description of reasons and logic behind the trading strategy of Participants. These comments are collected into personal blogs of the Participants and on the main blog of the Contest. Visitors are offered to read, analyse and evaluate traders forecasts by rating or commenting them.
Ranking of the Participants is obtained through a summary of their trading performance, blog popularity and expert evaluation.
The Contest is conducted regularly on a monthly basis. The total prize fund is 15 000$ to be shared among the winners.
- The Contest is held by Dukascopy Bank SA ("Dukascopy") on DEMO accounts for manually trading on a regular monthly basis.
- For each respective month, registration opens on the 25th day of the previous month and remains available until the 25th day of that month. For example, registration for January 2011 is opened from 25.12.2010 till 25.01.2011
- Only persons aged 18 or over are eligible to apply for a registration in the Contest.
- Participants agree to provide true information during registration. If a Participant becomes eligible for any prize, information provided during his/her registration will be used for the opening of a live account with Dukascopy in the name of that Participant. In case of information being false, inaccurate or incomplete, Dukascopy may declare the participation in the Contest void at any time and at its sole discretion.
- Participant must register under a unique "Nickname" which cannot be used by any third person in the future. Among other, multiple registrations and/or use of proxy servers may result in the relevant Participant's disqualification.
- Participants shall acknowledge and agree that their trading history, any picture, personal data, and any other information posted on Dukascopy Bank SA's Traders Blog are accessible to the public and that Dukascopy Bank SA does not ensure any confidentiality in this respect whether or not participants already have a live account open with Dukascopy Bank SA or intend / need to open such live account. Consequently, participants shall waive expressly the benefit of Swiss Banking Secrecy and release Dukascopy Bank SA from any liability in that respect in the frame of the Trader Contest / Traders Blog.
- Participants shall acknowledge and accept that, in case they are awarded with a prize by Dukascopy Bank SA, they may be asked to participate in promotional events, interviews, public announcements in connection with the Contest and that Dukascopy Bank SA may make use of their names, trading history and references. Consequently, participants shall waive expressly the benefit of Swiss Banking Secrecy and release Dukascopy Bank SA from any liability in that respect.
- Participants further acknowledge and agree that should they refuse Dukascopy Bank SA's request to participate in above-mentioned promotional events, Dukascopy Bank SA has the right to disqualify such participants and to give the respective prize to other participants.
- It is forbidden to use any kind of links in the profile pictures. Any sort of advertisement, restricted sensible contest is also not allowed. Dukascopy reserves the right to delete the avatar upon detection of this rule's violation.
- Login names containing any trademarks of Dukascopy or its products are not allowed. Words like "Dukascopy", "SWFX", "JForex" and other brand names associated with Dukascopy are forbidden.
- Contest accounts are registered with an initial deposit of USD 100 000.
- Trading can be performed only using the Java platform (no trading possible via web or iPhone platforms)
- No market dealing can be performed without a comment from the relevant Participant.
- The minimal trading lot is 100,000 currency units.
- Only 5 instruments can be opened simultaneously by a Participant.
- Only 1 position could be opened at any instrument (if there is already an entry order, there is no possibility to open a market order and vice versa).
- The total amount of positions opened during the Contest by one Participant must be at least 10. At the end of the Contest all open positions will be automatically closed at settlement prices.
- All positions must have Take Profit (TP) and Stop Loss (SL) orders assigned.
- Take profit and Stop Loss levels should not exceed 2% from the opening price for EUR/USD. Limits for the rest instruments recalculating each settlement according to "Pip Conversion Schedule". E.g. Limits for AUD/JPY=(EUR/USD Points/AUD/JPY Points)*2%=1/1.74*2=1.15%; for EUR/NOK=(EUR/USD Points/EUR/NOK Points)*2%=1/0.17*2=11.76%, etc.
- TP, SL levels cannot initially be set closer than 10 pips either to market price, or to entry price.
- Stop-Loss and Take-Profit orders can be modified only in the direction of the trade.
- It is forbidden to cancel already set SLs and TPs.
- All contest trading accounts are subject to the same margin requirements and policies as regular demo accounts. This includes the application of end-of-week leverage (1:30) each Friday, at 18:00 GMT.
- Every Participant should have only one unique nickname and email linked with his/her personal details, which will be used for the account opening with Dukascopy in case of awarding of a Contest prize.
- Only Participants who have a positive balance more than 100 000 may claim to be awarded by any of the prizes.
- Forecast messages should be no longer than 200 characters.
- Participant's forecasts and comments should be in English.
- Use of offensive or abusive language may cause disqualification from Dukascopy Forex Community and Contest.
- Official results of every month will be published during 2 weeks.
- Dukascopy reserves the right to set a 1-day ban to any contest participant or community user in case of continuous breaches of contest rules. A permanent disqualification can be applied if a serious violation is detected.
Each month winner's selection will be evaluated by four nominations, totally 300 points:
- Performance - real increase of capital. Maximum 100 points.
Pips Expert - amount of gained pips according to the scale below (basic reference standard is EUR/USD 1 pip = 1 point always). Maximum 100 points.
Popularity - summary of three ratings. Maximum 25 points.
- Total attendance of personal blog by unique ip-addresses. 1 unique IP visit brings 1 point.
- Number of comments in personal blog. Limitation: 1 comment per 1 forecast from unique ip-address is counted.
- Forecasts evaluation by "I like" system.
See recommendations for to learn some hints on popularity improvement.
- Dukascopy - Evaluation criteria based on the statistical factors defined by Dukascopy experts. Maximum 50 points. See recommendations and methodology for details.
According to the places in nominations "Performance" and "Pips expert" the
Participants will gain points from 100 till 1 in the following sequence:
(1) 100, (2) 95, (3) 90, (4) 89, ... (92) 1.
For "Popularity" points are assigned linearly: (1) 25, (2) 24, (3) 23, (4) 22, (5) 21, (6) 20, (7) 19, ... (25)
1.
In "Dukascopy" nominations the points are assigned as follows:
(1) 50, (2) 45, (3) 40, (4) 39, (5) 38, ... (42) 1.
Please notice: At equal quantity of points, the preference will be given to the trader having the best rank in a nomination "Trader's popularity".
The 4th evaluation factor in the Dukascopy Trader contest is the Dukascopy evaluation. It is meant to liquidate the misbalances arising from the excessive use of leverage to boost performance, scalping trades etc. Besides, it serves to adjust the total evaluation for the factors that Dukascopy values in the framework of the contest - i.e. reasoned trades with a high number of pips gained per position, adherence to one's forecasts (hence, closure of positions by SL/TP), justified entries etc. Finally, certain selected traders receive extra bonus points from Dukascopy in that evaluation category. With those points Dukascopy rewards the traders that were particularly outstanding overall in their activities during the contest month. The Dukascopy evaluation is by no means to be understood as an assessment of participants' trading "Quality". Instead, it is based on how the trader complies with the priorities currently set forward to the contest. These priorities are expressed in form of a set of trading statistics and subjective evaluation.
Dukascopy discloses and recalculates the Dukascopy evaluation factors on an online basis and it is available all over the month (previously, this evaluation factor was published only after the end of the contest). The total Dukascopy that a trader receives is assigned basing on the following parameters:
- Share of trades made with conditional orders (the more - the better)1 - 20%
- Maximum % equity drawdown - 20%
- Average pips gained on positive positions (the more - the better) - 20%
- Average pips lost on negative positions (the less - the better)2 - 20%
- Win/Loss ratio - 20%
- Extra bonus points from Dukascopy (received only by selected traders)
Dukascopy evaluation points can be received by a maximum of 92 participants (just as other evaluation factors). In order to get eligible for the Dukascopy evaluation points one has to satisfy the following 2 criteria:
- At least 10 closed positions
- Equity not less than 100,000 USD
All eligible users get ranked by every of the composing criterias. Then their rankings are summed up and form their total score on the basis of which they get their Dukascopy evaluation points. Points received by any participant are relative and depends on the positioning of the participant amongst his competitors.
IMPORTANT NOTE: In the end of the month, before the announcement of the final results Dukascopy will add extra bonus points to selected participant whom it considers to deserve additional reward. However, these extra bonus points may not exceed 25 points.
1 Includes pending Entry order, positions closed by SL and TP.
2 Calculated only if the average pips gain on positive positions is >= 20 pips.
- The total prize pool of USD 15 000 is distributed among 10 winners
of the Contest in the following manner:
- 1st place and nomination "The Trader of the Month" - 5000 USD.
- 2nd and 3rd places - 2500 USD
- 4th-6th places - 1000 USD
- 7th-10th places - 500 USD
- The winners may withdraw cash prize amounts from their
respective live accounts after meeting the following minimum
turnover requirements on these live accounts:
- 1st place - 10 million USD
- 2nd-3rd places - 5 million USD
- 4th-6th places - 2 million USD
- 7th-10th places - 1 million USD
- 11th-20th place winners get awarded with 100 USD motivation bonuses linked to their contest profile. As soon as they accumulate a total of at least 500 USD participants become eligible for a Live account opening.
- If the participant ends the month on a top-10 position and has already accumulated bonuses, his prize account gets credited with the sum of core prize and the accumulated amount.
- Accounts based on accumulated bonuses are subject to the same turnover requirements before any withdrawal becomes possible. The required turnover constitutes 1 million USD for 500 USD prize accounts.
- Top-3 position winners are required to take part in one broadcast of
Dukascopy Community TV.
Broadcasts are open-format and users have the opportunity of
presenting the trading strategies and principles that lead them to
success in the particular contest, taking part in the discussion of
one of the open discussion of the Live TV or suggesting another
topic of their interest related to Forex/Economics/Trading
psychology etc.
The broadcast is to be carried within one calendar month after the end of the contest month. Dukascopy representatives will be in contact with every of the winners to appoint a commonly convenient time for the broadcast.
The only device one needs to take part in the web-broadcast is a microphone and a web-cam. Broadcasts are held in English. Cases when the prize winner does not master English at a sufficient level will be solved on an individual basis: either by outsourcing an interpreter or via other individual solutions. - Cash prizes are credited to a live account in the name of the relevant Participant with Dukascopy. A Participant who is awarded with a prize is not allowed to demand crediting of the prize to any other account, including, among other, any account that is not in the name of that Participant.
- If Participant does not have a live account with Dukascopy, then he/she should proceed to the live account opening procedure in a regular way. If Participant does not comply with live account opening requirements, Dukascopy reserves the right to cancel the cash prize.
- In case of Participant's refusal to participate in promotional events, interviews, public announcements in connection with the Contest, Dukascopy has the right to disqualify such Participant and give the respective prize to another Participant.
- According to the Japanese law, the maximum prize for Japanese residents only is limited to 100 000 JPY with a turnover requirement of 200 million JPY. In case if the resultant prize of a contestant is superior to the given limit, the pay-off amount and the turnover requirement will be decreased accordingly.
- Participants acknowledge and agree to make efforts to respect the principles of Fair Play.
- Participants must refrain from any dishonest and unfair conduct even if these activities are not fully described within the framework of the Contest rules.
- Such activities include, but are not limited to:
- Registration of persons that are directly or indirectly related to other Participant
- Various team tactics that include consolidation of Participants into a group with a purpose to get a statistical advantage on one of the accounts
- Trading in opposite directions within one or more accounts
- Spamming in private messages and comments
- Any kind of manipulations with popularity points and other statistics
- Other activities used to get an unfair advantage over other Participants
- Total pip-points gained – The number of pip-points (EUR/USD pips equivalent) scored during the given statistical period.
- Avg. pip-points outcome from all positions – The average number of EUR/USD pips equivalent points gained/lost on all positions opened during the given statistical period.
- Most profitable trade – The number of EUR/USD pips equivalent points gained on the most profitable position opened during the given statistical period.
- Worst trade - The number of EUR/USD pips equivalent points lost on the most detrimental position opened during the given statistical period.
- Avg. pip-points gain on positive positions - The average number of EUR/USD pips equivalent points gained on all positive positions opened during the given statistical period.
- Avg. pip-points lost on negative positions - The average number of EUR/USD pips equivalent points lost on all negative positions opened during the given statistical period.
- Number of trades – Total number of trades conducted during the given statistical period.
- Avg. position size (USD) – The average size of a position opened during the given statistical period, in USD.
- Avg. trade time – The average duration of all positions opened during the given statistical period. From opening to closure.
- Maximum drawdown (%) – Maximum equity's consecutive depreciation, in percentage of equity at the preceding turning point.
- Number of drawdowns – Total number of consecutive equity contractions during the given statistical period.
- Share of trades conducted with conditional orders – Portion of opening or closing trades conducted via conditional pending orders. These include entry pending orders, Stop-Loss and Take-Profit orders.
- Win/Loss ratio – Ratio of positive vs. negative positions opened during the given statistical period.
- Cumulative Profit/Loss dynamics - The chart is based on the continuous sum of periodic profits & losses. Starts from zero although traders actually start their trading with an initial deposit of 100,000 USD every month.
- Instruments – Distribution of instruments the trader uses for trading.
- Performance – Historical profit & loss results along a selected statistical period. Shown in pip points (EUR/USD pips equivalent) or USD.
- Traded volumes – Volumes traded historically during a selected statistical period. Shown in USD.
- Rank – Current rank of the trader in the respective period’s (1 month, 6 month or 1 year) standings of the Trader contest.
- Profit/Loss – Cumulative Profit & Loss for the given statistical period, in USD.
- Minimal monthly P/L – Minimal monthly Profit/Loss recorded during the given statistical period, in USD.
- Maximum monthly P/L – Maximum monthly Profit/Loss recorded during the given statistical period, in USD.
- Average monthly P/L - Average monthly Profit/Loss recorded during the given statistical period, in USD.
- Sharpe ratio – classic Sharpe ratio of equity returns for a given statistical period. For simplicity the risk-free rate is assumed to be zero.
- Dukascopy reserves the right to use any kind of information posted by Participants within the framework of the Contest for its own purposes without prior coordination and approval from the authors. These purposes may include any kind of promotional activities or publicity campaigns, statistics collection etc.
- Dukascopy reserves the right to disqualify a Participant, to change the Contest rules, requirements and awards, without prior notice and at any time and at its sole discretion.
