Futures prices are generated by public bidding in the trading hall of the exchange. Most foreign countries adopt public bidding, while our country adopts computer trading.
The main characteristics of futures:
1. The terms and conditions of a futures contract, such as commodity variety, trading unit, contract month, margin, quantity, quality, grade, delivery time and delivery place, are established and standardized, and the only variable is price. The standards of futures contracts are usually designed by futures exchanges and listed by national regulatory agencies.
2. Futures contracts are concluded under the organization of futures exchanges and have legal effect.
3. The performance of futures contracts is guaranteed by the exchange, and private transactions are not allowed.
4. Futures contracts can fulfill or terminate their contractual obligations through the settlement of spot or hedging transactions.
Futures, completely different from spot, are actually tradable goods (commodities). 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. The delivery date of futures can be one week later, one month later, three months later or even one year later.
Development of futures:
Financial innovation goes hand in hand with the reform of futures market and industry in many aspects, such as regulatory system reform, product expansion, business innovation and so on. In the aspect of supervision system reform, it is mainly to promote the reform of handling fee, hedging, arbitrage, margin and position limit in futures market to improve market efficiency; In terms of product innovation, close to the needs of agriculture, countryside and farmers, develop more securities and futures products for agriculture and farmers, and develop financial products such as treasury bonds futures and stock options; In terms of business innovation, the CSRC supports the business innovation of futures companies, promotes the pilot of overseas brokerage business and customer asset management, promotes the pilot of specialized futures investment funds, and supports qualified futures companies to issue shares.
With the deepening of the reform of futures market and futures industry, the futures industry will enter the best period of development opportunities in history. In the short term, with the expansion of the market and the improvement of market efficiency, the futures industry is expected to usher in a turning point in performance; In the long run, with the comprehensive development of business innovation, the futures industry will continue to open.