Futures Trading Like The Turtles Can Make You Rich!

Financial markets are huge. Daily billions of dollars change hands in these markets when different financial instruments change hands. You can trade stocks. You can trade bonds. Ever heard of the futures market and futures trading? Well, futures are a security just like stocks and bonds. Stocks give you the ownership in part of a company while bonds are issued by governments and companies to borrow money from the investors. Futures are somewhat different than stocks and bonds!

A futures contract is a legally binding contract between two parties with a set of conditions for the delivery of the underlying asset such as a commodity or a financial instrument at some specific date in the near future.

Futures market is a very important financial market that sets the prices in the retail and wholesale markets of commodities like wheat, corn,heating oil, oil, gasoline, gold, silver, cattle, soybeans, meat, hogs, coffee and many other foodstuff. Futures market was primarily developed for helping farmers hedge their risk while growing agricultural commodities. Agricultural commodities are a very important part of the futures market. Over the decades, futures contracts become popular on a host of other commodities and contracts.

Now, futures contracts are by design time bound and expire at a fixed date. These contracts get regulated through a central clearing hours so the risk of one party backing out of the contract is minimal. This limits the time and risk exposure experienced by hedgers and speculators.

Most brokerage firms require individuals to deposit a fixed amount of at least $5,000 in their brokerage account before they can start trading futures. Now, almost all over the world, futures trading have shifted from open outcry to electronic trading.

In US, open outcry trading still takes place during the official hours at the different futures exchanges. However, most of these futures contracts also get traded electronically. GLOBEX allows electronic trading of most of these futures contracts 23 hours each day. Electronic trading provides a more level playing field, more price transparency and lower transaction costs.

The most popular futures contract that get traded on GLOBEX are S&P 500 stock index futures, NASDAQ 100 futures, Eurodollars, CME E-mini futures, foreign exchange rates, gold futures and crude oil futures. You can also trade options on GLOBEX.

Now, GLOBEX trading continues during the night after the official close of CME, CBOT and NYMEX at 4:15 PM EST. However, overnight trading can be thin and highly volatile as compared to the official hours. You can find GLOBEX quotes on CNBC and Bloomberg!

These quotes are real time. Futures trading can be highly profitable but risky as well. Before you dabble in them, you should paper trade these contracts for at least a month just to get a feel of how to do it. There are many contracts that you can trade and the possibilities of making money in futures trading are immense. Imagine the prices of crude oil going up again just like what happened in the summer of 2008!

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