Dallas-based gaming and esports expert Mike Rufail has been hired as CEO of Dallas-based TradeOff Financial Corp., a next-generation “fantasy stock trading” platform that seeks to find, train, and reward the best retail traders in the world.
“Today, there is no accessible entry point for learning how to trade stocks and crypto without putting personal capital at risk, which can be intimidating and prohibitive,” Rufail said in a statement. “TradeOff is going to change how financial brands reach and connect with new audiences, borrowing the best elements of what made playing and streaming video games widely popular and give people opportunities to explore trading, learn, practice and compete in fun new ways with low-risk, high-reward potential.”
An early-stage company, TradeOff said it’s building an online, multiplayer stock and crypto trading game and merit-based social network that gamifies trading education for users.
The startup said TradeOff users can earn real money and rewards by competing in online contests similar to fantasy sports or fantasy sports betting, including free-to-enter and subscription-based tournaments with prize money.
Daily contests, seasonal leagues, one-on-one challenges, and educational content will debut on the TradeOff platform this fall, the company said.
Gamification boosts investing knowledge and confidence
TradeOff, citing the Investopedia Affluent Millennial Investing Survey, said that only 37% of millennials feel knowledgeable about investing, and a lack of confidence leads to a significantly lower likelihood to own stocks compared to other generations.
TradeOff said it will feature a real-time leaderboard on which players can compare their skills against other users and follow the trades of top players.
Building a community of users openly sharing in the game’s performance data is intentional, the company said, and meant to help demystify complexity of the markets often cited as a barrier to confidence in trading. The company said that top traders on the platform will be invited to a partnership program with TradeOff that offers opportunities for monetization.
“A universal truth in gaming is that upleveling your skills requires repetition. I saw this with countless pro gamers while managing championship-winning esports teams. We need to give the next generation of great traders the opportunity for repetition,” Rufail said.
‘Building communities around emerging forms of entertainment’
During his more than two decades as a leader in gaming, Rufail helped popularize global competitive esports, consulted on video game design and competition for Activision Blizzard (formerly $ATVI, sold to Microsoft in 2023) and Epic Games, and consulted with NVIDIA on esports strategy. Most recently, Rufail was chief gaming officer and co-owner of Dallas-based OpTic Gaming and CEO of Dallas-based Envy Gaming, which he founded in 2007.
Rufail oversaw the merger of two of the most valuable and most-winning esports organizations in the world before coming to TradeOff. He will lead product design and manage teams focused on testing, corporate strategy, partnerships and marketing for TradeOff, the company said.
Rufail joins a leadership team that includes:
- Fintech and gaming entrepreneur and global managing director of GG Poker Sarne Lightman.
- Serial entrepreneur and investor Rob Kuck.
- Technology and patents expert Ram Ramanathan, formerly of HP, Intel, and Wells Fargo.
- Mark Helweg, an award-winning senior strategy developer who built trading indicators for large hedge funds and owns multiple patents for trading technologies.
“Mike’s passion as a self-taught trader paired with his roots in building communities around emerging forms of entertainment, social connection and competition make him the ideal leader for TradeOff,” Lightman said in a statement. “We believe TradeOff can be to stock trading what fantasy sports, mobile betting and online poker were to sports and gaming: an invitation to new audiences to participate and emotionally invest in and learn about the game.”
Get on the list.
Dallas Innovates, every day.
Sign up to keep your eye on what’s new and next in Dallas-Fort Worth, every day.
R E A D N E X T
-
ALY said its new platform 'democratizes access' to sophisticated design visualization. It allows developers, builders, and interior designers, and clients to interact with detailed designs via a web link—with no software downloads or high-end workstations needed.
-
As we noted in our top story today, Lee's TXSE Group plans to launch the Texas Stock Exchange (TXSE), focused on Texas and the Southeast U.S. The group says it will provide "a venue to trade and list public companies and the growing universe of exchange-traded products" as a "fully electronic, national securities exchange." That's caused buzz across the Lone Star State—and especially on Wall Street.
-
Trivie integrates brain science, gamification, and detailed analytics into its workforce engagement platform. With the acquisition, Arizona-based Quantum5 will use Trivie's solution to help automotive manufacturers and dealers upskill and reskill their workers.
-
The Plano-based video production company, which has outposts in New York and Chicago, says its new PE affiliate Launchpad Ventures aims to collaborate with creatives to produce "premium cinematic" footage for agencies and brands.
-
The new noise-cancelling software solution—called Doritos Silent—"lets PC gamers enjoy their favorite chips without distracting other players," Frito-Lay says. An AI model was trained to recognize "more than 5,000 different crunch sounds" to help achieve the breakthrough.
