FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Is there a mobile app?

Not to download yet, but you can save the site to your phone's home screen in about ten seconds and it works just like an app: its own icon, full screen, always up to date. On iPhone, open the site in Safari, tap the Share button, then Add to Home Screen. On Android, open it in Chrome, tap the three dots, then Add to Home screen. Step-by-step instructions.

What is Ticker Tape Sports Exchange?

It's a stock market where the stocks are NBA and NFL players. You buy shares of players you believe in, sell the ones you don't, and your account grows or shrinks with what other traders will pay for them, which over time tends to follow how those players actually perform. It's inspired by Wall Street Sports, the sports stock market a lot of fans remember from the late 1990s.

Does it cost anything?

No. It's free, and every dollar in the game is play money. Nothing here can be bought with real money or cashed out for it.

How do I sign up?

Sign in with a username or an email address. A new name opens a new account with $25,000 in play money, and the same name signs you back in later. During the beta there's no password, and email sign-in links are on the way.

How much do I start with?

$25,000 in play money. You can spend all of it or keep some in cash for later, and cash counts toward your account value just like players do.

Which sports and players are on the market?

The NBA, with 240 players, and the NFL, with 188: quarterbacks, running backs, receivers and tight ends, plus defensive linemen, linebackers and defensive backs. Offensive linemen and kickers aren't listed. We may add more sports, and the NHL is the most likely next one.

Why can't I find my favorite player?

We list the players who see real minutes and real snaps, because a stock needs games behind it to have a price worth trading. As roles change during the season, we refresh the list.

How do I win?

Finish at the top of a contest. Each league runs a monthly contest and a season-long contest, and every entry starts with the same $10,000, so it comes down to your picks. Right now the reward is your name at the top of the leaderboards and bragging rights over your friends.

How do I buy and sell?

Find a player or team with the search box at the top of any screen, choose buy or sell, pick an order type and a number of shares, then get a quote and confirm. Max fills in the most you can buy right now. You always see the average price, the fee and how big the position will be in your portfolio before anything goes through.

How do prices change?

Prices move only when people trade, with every buy nudging a price up and every sell nudging it down, and a game on its own doesn't move them. What a game does change is our private estimate of what the player's production is worth, and the market tends to settle near that over time, so traders who read a big game early are the ones who profit. How prices work walks through it.

My players are better than my friend's. Why is he ranked ahead of me?

Because the game is about buying low and selling high, not owning the best players. A superstar who plays exactly as well as everyone expects can sit flat all month, while a role player who steps into a bigger job can climb fast. The best trades are the ones you make before everyone else catches on.

My player had a huge game. Why didn't his price explode?

A game doesn't move a price on its own, because prices only move when people trade. What a big game changes is what he's worth, and we value a player on his recent run of games rather than his last one, so one huge night nudges his value up without resetting it. Traders who expect him to keep it up will buy, and if he does, the buying tends to keep coming.

Is there a fee?

Yes, 1% on every buy and every sell, shown in the quote before you confirm, and there's no holding fee on shorts. The fee is included in your cost, so your profit numbers already account for it.

How many shares of one player can I own?

As many as you like, as long as that player stays at or under 35% of your account value when you buy. Spreading out protects you when one player has a bad week or gets hurt.

Is there a roster size or a trade limit?

No roster size and no positions to fill, so own one player or fifty. You can make up to 30 trades a minute, which only exists to stop runaway scripts.

What are limit and stop orders?

A limit buy waits until a player's price drops to your number or lower, and a limit sell (take profit) waits until it rises to your number or higher. A stop loss sells automatically if the price falls to your number, and a stop buy buys if the price climbs to it, which is handy for catching a breakout.

Orders last 1, 7, 30 days (you choose; the default is 30), and you can have up to 50 open at once. They fill one at a time, so a run of stops can cascade just like on a real exchange.

Why did my order close without filling?

An order closes if it triggers but can't fill: you no longer have the cash or the shares, the buy would put you over the position limit, or it simply expired. Orders are also cancelled when a player goes on an injury hold.

Why can't I trade a player during his game?

So nobody can trade on a play that already happened. Trading on a player halts at tip-off or kickoff and reopens 30 minutes after the final, at the same price it stopped at. Limit and stop orders wait through the halt and fill when trading reopens.

Can I bet against a player?

Yes, by shorting him. You sell shares you don't own, and you profit if you buy them back (cover) for less. While a short is open, cash equal to 100% of the sale is locked as collateral along with the sale itself. There's no borrow fee. Shorts follow the same price limits, daily limit and 35% position limit as everything else.

Injuries work in your favor on a short. If he goes on an injury hold you can cover at 5% below his frozen price, and if he's ruled out for the season, at 10% below it, or hold the short through and stake it like any frozen position. If a short ever loses all its locked money, which takes about a doubling of the price, it's covered automatically.

Can I trade with other people directly?

No. Every trade is with the market itself, so you can always buy or sell instantly at the quoted price, and nobody can cut side deals.

Is there a limit on how far a price can move?

Yes, two. Trading can't push a player more than 35% above or below what his play is worth, and one account can only move a single player so far in a day (about $150,000 of net buying or selling). If an order would cross either line, the quote tells you the most you can trade right now. Both limits are there so no one, and no group, can run a price up and dump it on everyone else.

What are team stocks?

Every NBA and NFL team trades as its own stock, like LAL-NBA or KC-NFL. A team stock is valued on how the team plays, not on its players: we rate each final score, adjusted for home court and the strength of the opponent, starting from ESPN's preseason projection. Trading moves the price, just like a player's, and over time it tends to settle near what the team's results are worth. An average team sits near $100. You can buy a team you think will keep winning or short one you think is overachieving, separately from any of its players. Team stocks carry the same 1% fee and 35% position limit, and they pause while the team plays. See them all on the team stocks page.

Team stocks replaced the old team funds (baskets of a team's players) on October 26, 2026. Anyone holding a fund was paid out at its full value, with no fee.

What's an IPO?

When a player earns a spot on the market during the season, he gets an IPO: a set opening time, usually noon Pacific, announced on the IPO calendar. Limit orders placed before the open wait for it, and for his first 24 hours his market is 2x as deep as usual so the opening rush can't run him up too fast.

Do stocks split?

Not currently. Prices are set to sit in a readable range, so splits haven't been needed.

What if my account runs low?

When your account value drops under $15,000, you can reload $10,000 of play money, then again under $10,000 and under $5,000, up to 3 reloads in any 7 days. Reloads count as money put in, so they keep you playing without ever helping your ranking.

What happens if one of my players gets hurt?

It depends on how long he's out. Day-to-day, questionable and doubtful tags don't change anything. A short absence keeps trading open and doesn't automatically move his price, so the market decides what a missed week is worth.

A long absence, about two weeks or more in the NBA (14 days) or more than a game or two in the NFL (10 days), puts him on an injury hold.

What is an injury hold?

Trading on the player stops and his price freezes at what it was before the injury. If he got hurt in a game, that's his price before the game started, so you're never punished for how long it takes the injury report to catch up. Your shares stay in your portfolio at that frozen value.

While he's on hold you can keep your shares and wait, or cash out at the frozen price less a 5% fee. When he's officially back, trading reopens at the frozen price and the market takes it from there.

What if he's out for the season?

Every holder gets a one-time choice, with 7 days to make it. Close now pays you 90% of the frozen price in cash. Hold through keeps your shares frozen at their full value until he returns, possibly next season, with no selling in the meantime. The choice is final either way.

If you don't choose before the deadline, your position closes on the close-now terms, so nobody gets stuck by accident. You'll see an action-needed banner on every screen until you decide.

What is staking?

When a position is frozen, on an injury hold or held through a season-ending injury or the offseason, you can stake it to borrow buying power against it: up to 50% of its frozen value, added straight to your cash to trade other players. The loan costs 0.05% a day.

It comes due when the frozen player reopens or pays out. You repay from cash first, and if you're short, just enough of the staked shares are sold at the reopening price to cover it. You can never lose more than the shares you staked, and you can repay early any time. What you owe counts against your account value the whole time, so borrowing only helps your ranking if what you buy with it actually goes up.

Why did trading pause on a player after a news headline?

When a breaking headline names a listed player with serious injury news, like surgery or a torn ligament, we pause trading on him for 30 minutes while the injury report catches up. It stops anyone who saw the news first from selling to everyone who hadn't.

How do contests work?

Each league runs a monthly contest and a season contest, and you enter one from the contests page. Joining gives you a new portfolio with $10,000, separate from your all-time portfolio and from any other contest, so a contest result is never mixed up with anything else you hold.

A contest portfolio trades only that league's players and team stocks, and it can't be reloaded or staked. The bar at the top of every screen shows which portfolio you're trading in, and every order confirmation says it again, so you always know where a trade is going.

How am I ranked?

In a contest, by the percentage return on your entry budget, counting both profit you've locked in and profit on shares you still hold. The all-time board ranks your all-time portfolio by its return on the money you've put in, with reloads counted as money put in, so taking one can't lift your rank.

When a contest ends, everything still open is settled at fair marks (shares at the lower of their price and 24-hour average, shorts at the higher), so a last-minute spike can't decide it.

When will I show up on a board?

Once you've made at least 1 trade in that contest's portfolio. Boards refresh every few minutes.

Why does my rank jump around so much?

Early in a contest everyone is bunched together, so a small move can carry you past a lot of people. The boards settle down as the month or season goes on and the gaps open up.

Can I join in the middle of a contest?

Yes, you can join any time before a contest ends. You start with the same $10,000 as everyone else, though you'll have less time to grow it, and there are no reloads once you're in.

How do private contests work?

A private contest is a leaderboard for you and up to 49 friends. It shows each contest ranked among the members who entered it, plus everyone's all-time return. Custom rules (your own dates, budget and settings) are coming next. Share the invite link and anyone who signs up through it lands in your league.

Are my trades public?

The live tape and each player's page show trades without names: just the player, buy or sell, the size and the price. Your profile lists your all-time trades and holdings unless you make your portfolio private from your portfolio page; then it shows only your return.

Contest trades are never shown publicly, during or after the contest. Everyone can see each entrant's return and how much they have invested against cash, and the final results once it ends. Your email address is never shown.

Who are the traders marked [BOT]?

They're our about 1,000 house traders, automated accounts that keep the market lively while it grows. Each follows its own published rules, like buying bargains, chasing hot players or backing one team, and they trade through exactly the same market as everyone else. Most are patient and hold for weeks, they trade more often in short contests, they're always labeled, they can never win anything, and every leaderboard can hide them. Meet all of them, with the exact rules each one follows.

Some house traders trade on value, which helps keep prices orderly, and the market fills every order itself, so there's always a buyer and a seller.

Can I have more than one account?

Yes, you can run more than one portfolio if you'd like to try different strategies. Each account will need its own verified email address once email sign-in arrives. What isn't allowed is using accounts together to push a player's price around or to feed one account at another's expense, and we'll remove accounts and results that do that.

What happens at the end of the season?

When a league's regular season ends, every player in it freezes at his closing price: the lower of his last price and his 24-hour average, so a last-day pump doesn't count. You then have 7 days to choose, once, for each player you hold: close at the closing price, or hold over the offseason. Held shares stay frozen at full value and can be staked for buying power. Anything you don't decide on closes at the deadline.

Trading reopens about one to two months before the next season starts, with every held player opening at his frozen price. From there traders take over, and his value starts from where last season left off, so holding is a bet on what he does next year.

What's the Long Haul board?

It's a view of the season contest for buy-and-hold traders. Returns are measured the same way, but if you sell any player or team stock within 7 days of buying it, you aren't ranked there. You can also start a league with the Long Haul rule so your friends play the same way.

What happens if a player retires or leaves the market?

A player can become a retired stock: if you own him you can keep him or sell him, but nobody can buy new shares. If a player is removed from the market entirely, every holder is paid his current price in cash, with no fee.

Where do the stats and injury reports come from?

Box scores, schedules and injury reports come from public league and ESPN feeds, usually within minutes of the final whistle, and headlines come from major sports news feeds. We're not affiliated with the NBA, the NFL, their teams or their players.