​🚀 About the Hackathon

​Sponsored by Flow Traders, Jane Street, and others, the HK Web3 Quant Trading Hackathon is the largest event co-hosted by Roostoo Labs and student societies from HKU, HKUST, and CUHK. This quant trading competition focuses on the Web3 cryptocurrency market.

​Students will have the opportunity to design, build, and deploy their own quantitative trading strategies, while also connecting with top industry firms to foster the development of industry-grade algorithmic trading solutions. Contestants will code their own trading strategies, compete in live cryptocurrency markets, and present their trading ideas to a panel of judges.

​Organizers

• ​Roostoo Labs (EdTech x Web3 Startup)

• ​Horus (Data Source Provider)

• ​HKU Quantitative Research Society

• ​HKU Data Science Association

• ​Traders@UST

• ​CUHK Financial Technology Society

• ​CUHK Quant Trading Society

• ​HKUST Crypto Club

​Sponsor

• ​Gold: Flow Traders

• ​Silver: Jane Street

• ​Bronze: Kwan (Ex-BlueCrest and JP Morgan Portfolio Manager)

​Competition Timeline

• ​Oct 10 – Oct 31: Applications & Team Formation

• ​Oct 29 6pm: Online Introduction Workshop https://hku.zoom.us/j/91331588425?pwd=d1fzgLnbkbZ5DyEP6OR8WG1xtjNZeW.1

• ​Oct 31: Registration Deadline

• ​Nov 1 – Nov 10: Code Submission and Deployment Deadline

• ​Nov 10 – Nov 24: Trading Competition Begins.

  • ​During the period, you are allowed an optional One-Time Update on the Codebase and Redeployment for strategy and code iteration.

• ​Dec 1: Final Submission (Decks & Code Repos)

• ​Any Day of Dec 1 – Dec 5: Grand Finale @ HKU / HKUST – Demo Presentation day with Judges from the industry and Awards.

​Who Should Join?

​Any technical, quantitative, or engineering-curious students. We’re targeting undergraduate to postgraduate students in STEM/QFIN-related disciplines, majoring in:

• ​Computer Science and Engineering

• ​Industrial and Mechanical Engineering

• ​Quantitative Finance

• ​Data Science

​Python, APIs, algorithmic trading, AWS (EC2) experience, or any equivalent tech stack is a plus.

​​🏆 Prizes

​There are three award categories: (A) Highest Return, (B) Best Composite Score (0.4x Sortino Ratio, 0.3x Sharpe Ratio, 0.3x Calmar Ratio) and (C) Best Strategy/Technique. To be eligible, portfolios must meet both the backtesting and real-trade requirements.

​Each category will recognize the top three teams—so a single team can potentially win in multiple categories. With a total of nine award slots, every team has multiple chances to win cash prizes.

​Total prize pool reaches $HK 18,000.

​🤝 What’s in it for You?

1. ​Career Acceleration: Fast-track internship and job interview opportunities with Flow Traders and Kwan's hedge fund connections, based on your performance.

2. ​Prize Pool: ~HK$18,000 in cash prizes for the awarded teams, sponsored by industry leaders.

3. ​Elite Networking: Collaborate with top-tier students and connect with leading quant firms and startup.

4. ​Learning Experience and Bot Continuity: Opportunity to build a production-grade bot live, and own the bot going forward. Roostoo is happy to continue providing our platform afterward for your bot’s testing and improvements.

5. ​Training workshop: Technical workshops on industry level quant trading and deployment will be provided to all participants, with technical support throughout the event.

6. ​Free software subscriptions: All participants will be granted free investment data source subscription during the competition period.

​Competition Rules at a Glance

• ​Open to all HKU, HKUST, and CUHK students

• ​Teams of 1–4 students; one team per participant

• ​Strict anti-plagiarism policy—all submissions must be original

• ​Finalists must verify student status with university ID

• ​All code must be submitted as open-source (GitHub repo)

• ​Organizers reserve final rights on all competition matters

​Hackathon Problem Statement

​Requirements:

​Build a fully autonomous trading bot that:

• ​Interfaces with the Roostoo Mock Exchange API

• ​Fetches real-time market data (GET), places live trades (POST)

• ​Trades any and all listed coins on the Roostoo App —no restrictions

• ​Makes buy/sell decisions based on your team’s quantitative model, pre-defined rules, or adaptive strategy

​Leaderboard & Live Competition

• ​Bots run 24/7 in the cloud, competing on the public Roostoo leaderboard.

• ​Strategies are open—bring your creativity, from classic quant to AI agents, or create your own custom from scratch.

• ​Track your bot’s ROI, trade orders, and performance in real time on the Roostoo app.

​Technical resources:

• ​API Documentation: https://github.com/roostoo/Roostoo-API-Documents

• ​Each team receives AWS IAM credentials (EC2 for cloud-based bots/ML workloads). Usage limitation is enforced; no high-frequency trading is allowed (API Limit = 1 trade per minute maximum).

• ​Telegram channel with Roostoo engineers for tech & troubleshooting support

​Final Submission & Presentation

​Deliverables:

• ​Presentation deck (≤12 slides) covering:

  1. ​Trading idea & strategy

  2. ​Technical execution (architecture, algorithms)

  3. ​Risk management & controls

  4. ​Live Roostoo competition results (week 1 and 2 after iteration)

  5. ​Backtest & validation results

• ​Open-source code repository (GitHub)

​Grand Finale:

​Live pitch presentation at HKU or HKUST in front of industry judges, sponsors, and peers. Winners will be announced, and top teams will have exclusive networking opportunities.

​​👉 How to Get Started

1. ​Sign Up: Fill out this Luma application form to express your interest

2. ​Team Formation: Fill out this form - https://form.typeform.com/to/wEWsnwqb to confirm your team members and finalize your team.

3. ​Join Workshop: Join the introduction session and technical workshop on Oct 29. A Zoom link and the exact time will be sent to your email once you have completed steps 1 and 2 above. A recording will be provided after the session.

4. ​Hackathon Starts: On November 1st, we’ll announce the official list of competing teams and provide all the necessary hackathon materials, including documentation, technical guides, and a link to join our support channels on WhatsApp.

5. ​Grand Finale: Live pitch presentation at HKU for selected teams. Hiring representatives from Flow Traders, Jane Street, and other industry leaders will be present as judges and talent scouts!