(1) intertemporal. Stock index futures is a contract in which both parties agree to trade at a certain time in the future under certain conditions by predicting the changing trend of stock index. Therefore, the trading of stock index futures is based on the expectation of the future, and the accuracy of the expectation directly determines the profit and loss of investors.

(2) lever. Stock index futures trading does not need to pay the contract value in full, but only needs to pay a certain percentage of margin to sign a contract with greater value. For example, if the margin for stock index futures trading is 12%, investors can trade only by paying 10% of the contract value. In this way, investors can control the contract assets that are 8 times the investment amount. Of course, while the income may increase exponentially, the losses that investors may bear will also increase exponentially.

(3) linkage. The price of stock index futures is closely related to the change of its basic asset-stock index. Stock index is the basic asset of stock index futures, which has a great influence on the price changes of stock index futures. At the same time, stock index futures is the expectation of future prices, so it also reflects the stock index to some extent.

(4) High risk and risk diversity. The leverage of stock index futures determines that it is more risky than the stock market. In addition, there are some credit risks and settlement risks in stock index futures, as well as liquidity risks caused by the lack of counterparties in the market.