The emergence of China futures market originated from the reform and opening up in 1980s. Around 1987, some articles about the establishment of agricultural futures market appeared in newspapers. In order to solve the problem of price fluctuation and make more rational use of effective resources, the leaders of the Central Committee and the State Council successively made important instructions and decided to study futures trading. 1The government work report of the First Session of the Seventh National People's Congress in March, 988 pointed out: "Accelerate the reform of the commercial system, actively develop all kinds of wholesale market trade and explore futures trading." Therefore, the research topic of China futures market is determined.

After a period of theoretical preparation, China futures market began to enter the practical operation stage. 1990, 10 and 12, the State Council approved Zhengzhou Grain Wholesale Market in China, and introduced a futures trading mechanism based on spot trading. As the first commodity futures market in China, it has taken the first step in the development of China futures market.

The development of China futures market can be roughly divided into three stages. In the first stage, from 1990 to 1995, the number of exchanges across the country once exceeded 50, with an annual trading volume of 640 million lots, with a trading volume exceeding 10 trillion yuan, and nearly 100 futures varieties, which were very active. However, at that time, the supervision of the regulatory authorities was lagging behind, and many problems appeared. Therefore, the State Council decided to clean up and rectify the futures market in an all-round way, establish regulatory regulations applicable to the futures market, reduce the number of exchanges to 15, greatly reduce the number of futures brokerage companies, and restrict overseas futures trading.

The second stage is 1996. From 2000, the country continued to clean up and rectify the futures market. With the rapid development of China's securities market, the futures market entered a low tide. 1998, the state further reduced the number of 14 exchanges to three, namely Shanghai Futures Exchange, Dalian Commodity Exchange and Zhengzhou Commodity Exchange. In 2000, the futures trading volume shrank to 54 million lots, and the trading volume was10.6 trillion RMB.

From 200 1 to now is the third stage. The futures market has gradually recovered, and futures laws and regulations and risk monitoring have been gradually standardized and improved. In 2004, China added four new varieties: cotton, soybean No.2, fuel oil and corn. In 2005, the trading volume recovered to 323 million lots, and the trading volume reached 13.45 trillion. Sugar and cotton trade is stable, wheat varieties are relatively mature, and the functions of price discovery and hedging are gradually exerted. In 2006, China futures market will soon launch financial futures products.