Brokers: The Stock Trading Game

Brokers is a game where players role play as an intern investing a client's retirement fund. Each round of the game, players are presented with the current market conditions and must make strategic decisions on what to buy, sell, or hold in order to increase the value of their client's portfolio. Players must push their luck to squeeze out as much money as possible before the inevitable market crash as only cash on hand is important once the market tanks. Do you have what it takes to beat out the other interns and impress the boss? Try it out in Brokers: The Stock Trading Game.

Setup includes randomly selecting 3 event cards including the Market Crash event and mixing them. Then 5 or 6 cards (depending on the number of players is add on top of these 3 cards. This is the event deck. The Stock Summary Sheets are placed in the play area and the price deck for each is shuffled and the top card of each is played face up on top of the corresponding Stock Summary Sheet. A marker token is placed on each Stock Summary Sheet for on the price listed on its current price card. The Energy stock does not have a price deck and instead has its marking token placed on 155. Each player is given a set of action cards which includes 3 buys, 3 sells, 2 praises and 2 critiques. Each player is given a starting portfolio of $150, and share of 2 Retail, 2 Venture Capital, 2 Energy, and 2 Manufacturing stock certificates. Players receive additional $150 on turns 2 and 3. One player is selected as the Lead Intern.

The game is played in up to 8 or 9 rounds depending on the number of players and each round an event is played which alters the rules of play for that round. Each round players secretly plan which 3 action cards they will play and players reveal their actions together. The player with the Lead Intern card starts playing 1 or 2 action cards for a single stock type and each player does the same taking turns going clockwise until all actions are played. The action cards players choose influence the order of decisions that the other players make. As players buy shares the price increases for the next player. As players sell share the price of decreases for the next player. If a player plays a praise card, the price increases by two values. If a player plays a critique card, the price decreases by two values.

Once all actions are played, players collect exclusive roles for fulfilling specific portfolio requirements. The Major Retail shareholder role gives the player double dividends for retail shares. The Major Manufacturing shareholder gives the player an extra sell action each round. The Major Venture Capital shareholder role gives the player a free share of Venture Capital each round. The Most Diversified Portfolio role give the player an extra $25 dividend for having at least one of each stock and the greatest number of stocks among all the players.

After roles are collected or redistributed, players collect dividends for owning the stocks in their portfolios, and then the Lead Intern card is passed to the next player clockwise. The game ends at the end of the round when the Market Crash event occurs. At that point, the player with the highest cash score (not share value) wins the game.