Futures and spot are completely different. Spot is actually a tradable commodity. Futures are mainly not commodities, but standardized tradable contracts based on some popular products such as cotton, soybeans and oil and financial assets such as stocks and bonds. Therefore, the subject matter can be commodities (such as gold, crude oil and agricultural products) or financial instruments. Initial margin is the money that traders need to pay when they open new positions. According to the transaction amount and the margin ratio, that is, initial margin = transaction amount * adjusted margin ratio. At present, the minimum margin ratio in China is 5% of the transaction amount, which is generally between 3% and 8% internationally. For example, the soybean margin ratio of Dalian Commodity Exchange is 5%. If a customer buys five soybean futures contracts at a price of 2700 yuan/ton, he must pay an initial deposit of 6 750 yuan to the exchange. In the process of holding positions, traders will have floating profits and losses due to the constant changes of market conditions, so the funds actually available in the margin account for making up losses and providing guarantees will increase or decrease at any time. Floating profit will increase the balance of margin account, while floating loss will decrease the balance of margin account. The minimum balance that must be kept in the margin account is called maintenance margin. Maintain margin: the settlement price is adjusted to positions, and the margin ratio is adjusted to xk.
When the book balance of the margin is lower than the maintenance margin, the trader must replenish the margin within the specified time, so that the balance of the margin account is ≥ settlement price x position x margin ratio, otherwise the exchange or institution has the right to forcibly close the position on the next trading day. This part of the margin that needs to be replenished is called additional margin. Still according to the above example, suppose that on the third day after the customer bought 50 tons of soybeans at a price of 2700 yuan/ton, the settlement price of soybeans fell to the additional margin. 2600 yuan/ton. Due to the price drop, the customer's floating loss is 5000 yuan (i.e.