A Trading Game

I learned a rather amusing game this last weekend, so I thought I'd try spreading it:

Take a regular deck of cards and just pull out the A-10 of a given suit, the jack and the king. Allow the A-10 to be worth 1-10 respectively, the jack to be worth -6 points and the king to be worth +12 points. Have at least three players, if not more (you may need to add more cards for more players, but I think three is pretty optimal). Each person gets dealt one card and three cards are dealt face-down in the center. The players should keep their card hidden.

There are four rounds of "trading." The first round of trading each player can only see his or her own card. In the second round of trading the first center card is flipped over. In the third round, the second center card is flipped over. In the last round of trading all three center cards are exposed. The "asset" being traded is the sum of the six (or more if you have more than three people) cards that are dealt out.

A round of trading consists of each player making a market. If someone asks you for a market, you must make them a market (both a bid and an ask) with a two point spread. So, for example, you might say "29-31." Given the bid-ask spread, the others have the option of buying at the ask price and selling at the bid (lifting the offer or hitting the bid). If one player decides to trade with the market-maker, then they write down their respective positions (for example, let's say player A asked player B for a market and player B said "29-31." Player A opts to buy at 31. He writes down his buy at 31 and player B writes that he sold at 31.). All players can be asked to make a market and all players can take others' prices.

Once trading has ceased in a given round, the next card is flipped. Once all three center cards are face-up and trading has ceased, the players reveal their cards. The sum of all the cards becomes the asset value for calculating the profit and loss of each player's open positions (it is perfectly possible that some players have profit and loss but do not have open positions at the end of the game).

As you can see the prices would move according to the others hitting or lifting the market, and you gain information about the others' cards through their actions. Furthermore you can speculate on the final value given your partial information and the expected value of the remaining cards that are face down. It's quite an interesting game.

Clearly you can edit the rules to add more cards, change the values, allow different spreads, etc. I think the game is quite fun.