Speculator is a live action, highly realistic Wall Street stock market simulation that lets you invest in any of over 1500 stocks in 70 industries, or 15 sector ETFs, starting with a $100,000 inheritance. Initially, as a novice investor, your broker will only allow you to invest in stocks and bonds, including convertible bonds, but as you increase the net worth of your (simulated) brokerage account, you will be successively allowed to engage in ever more sophisticated (and risky) trading strategies, beginning with trading on margin (borrowed money), then short-selling, and eventually, if you do well enough, put and call options trading, and at the highest level (if you grow your account to $500,000), you will be allowed to trade commodity futures and stock index futures. (You can configure the simulation for U.S. dollars, or any of 18 other currencies, including Euros, Pounds, Swiss Francs, etc.)

All play takes place in a simulated 'real-time' environment where stock and news tickers scroll by constantly, and the financial world changes from second to second, as you react to news, anticipate economic developments, and research possible investment opportunities. Stock and bond price behavior and the news events you see scrolling by on the news ticker are so realistic that you'll feel like they are the real markets and economy you are doing your investing in and coping with!

If you can't beat the market (or the 1 to 9 computer or human players you will be playing against), there are also "cheat" features that will provide you with "inside information" on upcoming corporate mergers or earnings turnarounds that you can make a quick profit from, before the news is public. However, since "insider trading" on such information is highly illegal, you will run the risk of prosecution and massive fines that can bankrupt you if you use such cheats.

Speculator is a Windows program, which runs on Windows versions from XP through Windows 10, on either 32-bit or 64-bit systems.

The registered version allows games of up to 30 years in length (only 3 years in the free "shareware" version) and you can save games on disk during play (up to 50 games). The registered version also includes a 'Customizer' utility program, which lets you change company names and stock symbols to those of companies in your region or country.