Stocks Bonds Options Futures: Investments and Their Markets
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From arbitrage to zero-coupon bonds, this all-inclusive guide explains the fundamentals of investments and their markets. Covers how broker/dealer firms function, option trading, technical and fundamental futures, exchange and over-the-counter transactions, and more…. More >>
Stocks Bonds Options Futures: Investments and Their Markets
How Online Future Trading Works
A contract, which is usually an agreement between two parties to buy and sell an asset at a specified time at a specified price, is known as future trading. Future trading is generally carried out on a futures exchange. A futures contract has a standardized date and month of delivery, price and quantity.
Futures are different from forwards in the sense that margin and delivery requirements are different. The futures exchange gives certain standard features for a contract to facilitate liquidity in futures trading. A futures contract may be set before maturity by having an equal and opposite transaction, which is the way majority of the transactions are held.
Expiration date is the date specified in the options or futures contract. The price at which the futures contract trades in the futures market is the futures price and the expiration date is usually the last Thursday of the respective month. Futures contractors are available in three series, having one month, two months and three months expiry cycles. A new contract of three-month expiry is introduced for trading on the Friday following the last Thursday.
Since many types of players are involved in trading futures, it helps in the process of proper price discovery. Apart from this, futures contracts also help in hedging of price risk commodity. Futures contracts are highly useful for the producer due to the fact that he gets an idea of the price that may prevail, which in turn helps him quote a realistic price.
On line future trading assists people to trade and exchange on the futures market and online futures trading allows the traders to scan the most recent exchange offers. The trader can send an order straight away into the exchange trading engine and also get the feed back or confirmation of the contracts instantaneously through on line futures trading.
In this way the trader is able to view a live market on the screen and interact with it.
On line future trading has a lot of advantages. The prices of the derivatives traded on the futures market are updated immediately and in real time through online future trading. Due to this interactivity the individual trader gets transparency of the market and good trade speed .It is possible to access the futures market from any computer with an Internet connection through online futures trading and trade on the important electronic futures exchange, around the globe.
To ensure smooth functioning of the futures trading done at the exchange there are certain inherent systems like the futures rolling settlement. Under the futures rolling system, all the trades that are unfinished at the end of the day are settled. The buyer has to necessarily make payments for the securities bought by him and the seller has to deliver the securities sold by him.
Another system that is in vogue is the weekly settlement system cycle wherein the transactions done during the week are squared off on the last day of the cycle, which means that a trader gets a longer time to speculate. When it comes to the question of trading futures for a living, trading futures is certainly a better choice than investing in equities.
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Methods of Online Futures Trading
Nowadays, online futures trading is available and more advance which result to more benefits. The copied price deal on the futures market is always updated and because of this, person involve in trading receives clearness and speed of the market. Online futures trading is access in computer anytime and anywhere around the world and it support people to trade on the future market. Through internet, you can see the most recent information from different parts of the world with the comfort of the place where you belong and that is how online futures trading can offer you.
Futures Trading is a process used to eliminate threat from happening, when the market swings and online futures trading have the same meaning but more convenient. Futures contract is the agreement involving the buyer and seller about their asset at exact time and set-price. It also balance asset tactic to lessen failure caused by price stability. In general, futures trading passed the future exchange and future contract is consistent for the price, delivery and amount on every date and month. Futures Exchange provide definite normal characteristic contract to make a possible responsibility with no disposal of fixed assets in futures Trading.
The Major way of dealing, in futures contract is situate ahead of development by having the same and opposed transaction The Futures price in the market set by futures contract traders and has an expiration date where you can know immediately to online futures trading. Normally, expiration day is during the final Thursday of the month. There are three cycles offered by Futures Contractors, which are one month, two months and three months. The expiration of three months in a new contract established for trading and it is set during Friday that go after the Last Thursday.
Proper price discovery lean a hand to the development of futures trading that gives benefits for different people engaged where you can see fast on the online future trading. In addition, Futures Contract is much valuable for the procedure because it gives suggestion price that may succeed that can help to give a practical price.
Trading permit traders to examine the majority current exchange and traders can also arrange into the engine exchange trading and acquire the verification of the agreement which online futures trading can helps a lot for immediate results.
To guarantee the operation of the futures trading completed to the exchange, definite inbuilt method example of this is rolling settlement. Rolling settlement meaning that all the traders with uncompleted at the last part of the day are already established. The buyer and seller needs to pay for both safeties of two parties. Weekly agreement method is another method being used, meaning the traders dealings done in a week can take long time to think.
Many people learned and suggest that online futures trading can let anyone who finds it profitable to pursue but professionalism and education about it is necessary. You should know how to control emotions, have discipline, motivation, commitment towards online futures trading and non-online futures trading. Another good about online futures trading is you do not need to be physically present to purchase, sale, distribute and stock because you have the power of precise quantity of commodity without seeing them.
If you are searching for a good investment, online futures trading is a good one. It can give a positive result for an income rather than investing impartially. There are many benefits you can receive from online futures trading like the convenience where you can see on your computer screen about your position, account money and amount of margin needs for your projected trade. You can be sure about the control, accuracy and speed of online futures trading. Thousand of people are getting rich because of online futures trading where they invest small amount of money that can turn to be unexpected profit.
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What Are Futures?
In the world of finance, there are many uncommon and niche terms used, which are alien to the rest of the world. ‘Futures’ is one of those terms that is used to identify a form of a financial contract. Futures Contract is a standard contract, to buy or sell a certain asset at a certain date in the future, at a specific time. Usually futures contracts are traded on a futures exchange.
The futures contract detail the quality, quantity and the price of the underlying asset. Usually there are many motives for making a futures contract. Since it is a business agreed to be performed in the future at a specific time and for a specific price, the buyer of the underlying asset is protected against the price fluctuations of the asset in the market. This may result in profit or sometimes, a loss to the contract holder as there is an obligation to buy or sell at the specified price.
Many contracts in the financial world assign the ‘right’ to do something to the contract holder. Futures contracts differ in this aspect by assigning ‘right’ and ‘obligation’ to the contract holders (both parties) for performing what the futures contract details. Some futures contracts call for a physical delivery of the asset and others are settled in cash.
Many assets, especially commodities are subjected to futures contracts in futures exchanges. As an example, there is seller who would like to sell a high volume of corn at the next harvest. Although, the corn is not produced yet, the producer wants to make sure that a proper price is paid for the corn in the future. Then there is a buyer who is looking for corn from the next crop, who will be willing to pay the current market price for it or something similar. In this case, the seller and the buyer can form a futures contract on a specific price, through which both the seller and the buyer are protected against the high price changes.
There are two main traders of futures; hedgers and speculators. Hedgers are interested in the asset subjected to the futures contract and they seek to hedge out the risk of price changes. Speculators usually have no interest or practical use of the assets subjected to the futures contract. They usually buy futures for selling them later with profit to interested parties.
Futures and ‘Forwards’ looks the same in the finance market but they have two significant differences. Firstly, Futures are traded in Futures exchanges, but forwards are traded over the-counter. Secondly, Futures have a less credit risk while forwards carry a high risk.
Author: Zoran Maksimovic
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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The Four Key Elements of Futures Trading Success
There are four key elements to achieving success as a futures trader:
1. Self-confidence
2. Discipline
3. Ability to handle loss
4. Profitable trading system
1. Self-confidence
If you aren’t absolutely confident that you can become a successful futures trader, you might as well pack it in now and save yourself a lot of grief. Successful futures traders are bold, aggressive and self-assured. They do not lose faith in themselves when they lose. They have the courage and self-confidence to keep trading. Futures traders are risk takers. Successful futures traders are the Mario Andrettis of the Futures Exchange.
2. Discipline
If you’re going to be a successful futures trader, you have to learn to take emotion out of the equation. Learn to trade like a robot. There’s no room for emotion in futures trading.
Futures traders learn to trust themselves and their system. If you start letting emotion rule your decisions, fear, anger and greed will undermine your carefully planned and practiced strategies. It is by persistently following your system, by dispassionately relying on what your charts tell you, by religiously following your indicators that you will succeed as a futures trader.
When you trade with your emotions, it colors your judgment. You’re no longer trading on your indicators, you’re trading on your gut. And letting your gut rule is like “letting it ride” in Vegas. Eventually, fear or greed will compel you to make that final disastrous gamble that wipes you out.
The market is an inanimate object. It has no feelings, no agenda, no emotions. If you make a bad trade, you cannot personalize the market. The market is not ‘out to get you’. Start thinking this way and you toss logic and wisdom out the window. If you feel yourself getting caught up in emotion, if you feel logic slipping through your fingers, get out.
Just stop trading until you can regain control. Every minute you keep trading on your emotions, you come one step closer to disaster. No matter how emotional you become, the market will just sit there. You cannot change the market, you can only react to it.
If you cannot maintain self-discipline, and allow emotions to rule your decisions, you’d best take your money and run before you lose it. Successful futures traders are highly disciplined, consistent and rational. They do not allow themselves to be distracted by extraneous information. They have the ability to dispassionately evaluate their system, knowing when to stick with it and when to change what isn’t working.
Futures traders are cool and collected. Successful futures traders are the James Bonds of the Futures Exchange.
3. Ability to handle loss
If you can’t handle loss, if you are easily frustrated by loss, or if you can’t afford to lose, then you’d better get out before you gamble away the mortgage money. As a futures trader, particularly in the beginning as you hone your system and skills, you will lose. Successful futures traders are not flustered by loss. They do not panic when they lose. They do not abandon their system at the first sign of loss.
In futures trading, the nature of the beast is that sometimes you lose. Futures traders learn from their mistakes, build on the lessons loss teaches, remain confident in the face of loss and work to keep their losses small so that, overall, they win. Futures traders are not defeated by loss. Successful futures traders are the Lance Armstrongs of the Futures Exchange.
4. Profitable trading system
If you don’t have a trading system that has proven to be consistent and profitable, no amount of ability is going to make you a successful futures trader. You must have an effective conduit for that ability in order to succeed as a futures trader. An effective trading system is essential to your success as a futures trader. No matter how much self-confidence and discipline you have, no matter how well you can deal with the inevitable losses, the bottom line is that futures traders are only as good as their system.
Author: William Mccready
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Futures Exchanges – Knowing Where To Do Business
Good for you! You’ve been reading, you’ve put together a trading rules to lay the foundation for your futures trading plan and you’ve even been paper trading to prove your trading plan. Now you are ready to learn more about where you will be doing your business; it’s time to talk about the futures exchanges.
General Futures Exchange Information
As you know at this point, you will not actually do business with the futures exchanges listed below. You will work with your broker who will take your futures orders to the exchange floor for you. Since you have been paper trading, you probably have already established an account for commodities trading so we won’t go over that again. While there are futures exchanges throughout the world, we will focus on the ones in the US. The markets we will outline are in Minneapolis, Kansas City, New York and Chicago.
History of Futures Exchanges in the US
The modern futures trading began in Chicago, IL in the early 1800s. Chicago, with its location at the base of the Great Lakes, is close to the farm of the U.S. Midwest which made it a natural center for transportation, distribution and trading of agricultural produce. Gluts and shortages of these products caused extreme changes in price. An exchange was needed that would bring together a market to find potential buyers and sellers of a commodity instead of making people bear the burden of finding a buyer or seller. In 1848, the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT), the world’s first futures market, or futures exchange, was formed. Trading was originally in futures and the first contract was written on March 13, 1851.
Futures Exchanges
Different futures exchanges trade different commodities. In addition, each future exchange accepts different futures orders. Since not every exchange allows every order it is necessary to talk with you broker about which orders are permitted in the markets you trade. The following is a list of the major commodity exchanges, their commodities, and the orders that they accept:
Chicago Board of Trade
Location: Chicago, IL
Commodities
o Corn
o Oats
o Soybeans
o Soybean Oil
o Soybean Meal
o T-Bonds
o T-Notes
o Muni Bonds
o 5 Year Notes
o 2 Year Notes
o DJIA Index
Acceptable orders: Market, Market on Close, Limit, Stop, and Fill or Kill Orders
Chicago Mercantile Exchange
Location: Chicago, IL
Commodities
o Live Cattle
o Lean Hogs
o Lumber
o Feeder Cattle
o Pork Bellies
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
Index and Option Market
Commodities
o S&P 500
o Mid-cap 400
o NASDAQ 100
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
International Monetary Exchange
Location: Chicago, IL
Commodities
o T-Bills
o Euro Dollars
o Canadian Dollar
o Euro Currency
o Australian Dollar
o Mexican Peso
o Euro Yen
o Japanese Yen
o British Pound
o Swiss Franc
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
New York Comex
Location: New York, NY
Commodities
o Copper
Acceptable orders: For Copper only, acceptable are Market, Market on Close, Limit, Stop, and Fill or Kill.
Commodities
o Gold
o Silver
Acceptable orders: For Gold and Silver, acceptable are Market, Market on Close, Limit, Stop, and Fill or Kill. Stop Limits are acceptable only on a not-held basis.
New York Cotton Exchange
Location: New York, NY
Commodities
o Cotton
o Orange Juice
o Dollar Index
Acceptable orders: Market, Market on Close, Limit, Stop, and Fill or Kill.
New York Coffee, Sugar & Cocoa Exchange
Location: New York, NY
Commodities
o Coffee
o Sugar
o Cocoa
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
New York Mercantile Exchange
Location: New York, NY
Commodities
o Unleaded Gasoline
o Platinum
o Palladium
o Heating Oil
o Crude Oil Natural Gas
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
New York Futures Exchange
Location: New York, NY
Commodities
o New York Stock Exchange Index
o CRB Index
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
Kansas City Board of Trade
Location: Kansas City, MO
Commodities
o Kansas City Value Line
o Kansas City Mini Value Line
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
o Kansas City Wheat
Acceptable orders: Market, Market on Close, Limit, Stop and Fill or Kill.
Minneapolis Board of Trade
Location: Minneapolis, MN
Commodities
o Minneapolis Wheat
o Minneapolis White Wheat
Acceptable orders: All futures orders are acceptable.
Author: Stephen Bigalow
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What You Need To Know When Trading Derivatives And Futures
The Derivatives and Futures Market is the most potentially profitable market in the world. But it can be the most distructive one too!
Derivatives
A derivative is a financial term for a specific type of investment from which the price over a certain time is derived from the performance of the underlying asset such as commodities, shares or bonds, interest rates, exchange rates or indices like stock market index or consumer price index.
This performance can determine both the amount and the timing of the payoffs. The diverse range of potential underlying assets and payoff alternatives leads to a huge range of derivatives contracts available to be traded in the market. The main types of derivatives are Futures, Forwards, Options and Swaps.
Futures
A futures contract is a standardized contract, traded on a futures exchange
to buy or sell a certain underlying asset. at a certain date in the future, at a pre-set price.
The future date is called the delivery date or final settlement date. The pre-set price is called the futures price. The price of the underlying asset on the delivery date is called the settlement price. The futures price, normally, converges towards the settlement price on the delivery date.
A futures contract gives the holder the right and the obligation to buy or sell, which differs from an options contract, which gives the buyer the right, but not the obligation, and the option writer (seller) the obligation, but not the right.
In other words, the owner of an options contract can exercise (to buy or sell) on or prior to the pre-determined settlement/expiration date. Both parties of a “futures contract” must exercise the contract (buy or sell) on the settlement date.
To exit the commitment, the holder of a futures position has to sell his long position or buy back his short position effectively closing out the futures position and its contract obligations.
Futures contracts, or simply futures, are exchange traded derivatives. The exchange acts as the counterparty on all contracts and sets margin requirement etc.
Forwards
A forward contract is an agreement between two parties to buy or sell an asset (which can be of any kind) at a pre-agreed future point in time. Therefore, the trade date and delivery date are separated. It is used to control and hedge risk.
One party agrees to buy, the other to sell, for a forward price agreed in advance. In a forward transaction, no actual cash changes hands. If the transaction is collaterised, exchange of margin will take place according to a pre-agreed rule. Otherwise no asset of any kind actually changes hands, until the contract has matured.
The forward price of such a contract is commonly contrasted with the spot price which is the price at which the asset changes hands ( on the spot date, usually the next business day ). The difference between the spot and the forward price is the forward premium or forward discount.
A standardized forward contract that is traded on an exchange is called a futures contract.
Futures vs. Forwards
While futures and forward contracts are both a contract to trade on a future date, key differences include:
Futures are always traded on an exchange, whereas forwards always trade over-the-counter.
Futures are highly standardized, whereas each forward is unique.
The price at which the contract is finally settled is different:.
Futures are settled at the settlement price fixed on the last trading date of the contract (i.e. at the end)
Forwards are settled at the forward price agreed on the trade date (i.e. at the start)
The credit risk of futures is much lower than that of forwards:
Traders are not subject to credit risk due to the role played by the clearing house. The profit or loss on a futures position is exchanged in cash every day. After this the credit exposure is again zero.
The profit or loss on a forward contract is only realised at the time of settlement, so the credit exposure can keep increasing
In case of physical delivery, the forward contract specifies to whom to make the delivery. The counterparty on a futures contract is chosen randomly by the exchange.
In a forward there are no cash flows until delivery, whereas in futures there are margin requirements and periodic margin calls.
Options
An option is a contract whereby one party (the holder or buyer) has the right but not the obligation to exercise a feature of the option contract ( e.g. stocks ) on or before a future date called the exercise or expiry date.
Since the option gives the buyer a right and the seller an obligation, the buyer has received something of value. The amount the buyer pays the seller for the option is called the option premium.
Most often the term “option” refers to a type of derivative which gives the holder of the option the right but not the obligation to purchase (a “call option”) or sell (a “put option”) a specified amount of a security within a specified time span. (Specific features of options on securities differ by the type of the underlying financial instrument involved)
Swaps
A swap is a derivative where two counterparties exchange one stream of cash flows against another stream. These streams are called the legs of the swap. The cash flows are calculated over a notional principal amount. Swaps are often used to hedge certain risks, for instance interest rate risk. Another use is speculation.
Swaps are over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives. This means that they are negotiated outside exchanges. They cannot be bought and sold like securities or future contracts, but are all unique. As each swap is a unique contract, the only way to get out of it is by either mutually agreeing to tear it up, or by reassigning the swap to a third party. This latter option is only possible with the consent of the counterparty.
Author: Ricky Schmidt
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
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Future Contract Trading Concept You Do Not Want to Miss
Future Contract is a standardized contract that traded on a futures exchange, to buy or sell a certain underlying instrument at a certain date in the future, at a specified price.
The future date is called the delivery date or final settlement date. The preset price is called the futures price. A futures contract gives the holder the obligation to buy or sell. Both parties of a “futures contract” must fulfill the contract on the settlement date.
The seller delivers the commodity to the buyer then cash is transferred from the futures trader who sustained a loss to the one who made a profit such as when the price of the commodities is brought at a preset price US$ 1000 and when the settlement date it has become US$ 800, but they still need to fulfill the contract preset amount that is US$ 1000. Read more
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