Black Monday (1988)

A commercial edition of Sid Sackson's game "Card Stock Market," which can be played with two standard decks of playing cards. The play money and card graphics of this edition make the game a bit less abstract. Based on the stock market crash of Oct. 19, 1987.

There are four corporations. Each corporation is represented by its own suit in the deck of cards. The deck is shuffled and each player is dealt eight cards. Each player also gets $20,000 as starting capital. One card is placed on its matching corporation to establish a price for each stock. A player buys stock by placing a card in front of one’s self and paying the cost of the stock. A player changes the price of stock by playing a card on the appropriate stock.

In turn a player can change the value of up to stocks and then buy or sell up to two of one’s own stock – or – buy and sell and then change the value of the stocks. A player ends one’s turn by replenishing the hand. A player may exchange up to four cards from one’s own hand instead.

When the deck is exhausted, a “Market Closed” card is added to the deck. The deck is reshuffled and when the “Market Closed” card comes up the game ends. All stock held by the players is converted into cash and the player with the most money is the winner.

The rules of the game were published in the book Card Games Around the World. One needs two standard decks of cards, something to denote the rate board for stock payouts (available in the file section for this game entry) and play money to play this version of the game.

What you need to play the game (if you don't have a copy of the out of print commercial version):

- Two standard decks of playing cards (with at least one joker to represent the market closed card)
- A rate board (see file section for the entry)
- Play money with either ones, tens or hundreds as the base amount