Many people have heard about the Futures Market and how they can earn a substantial income by trading these markets. But many of them don’t have a clear idea of what futures are and how they can make money with them.
In short: a futures contract is a standard contract that is traded on a futures exchange. This means that the entity owning the contract can buy or sell a certain underlying instrument (a commodity most of the time) at a certain date in the future, at a pre-set price. The future date is called the delivery date of the contract or the final settlement date. The pre-set price of the commodity is called the futures price of the commodity. The price of the commodity on the delivery date is called the settlement price. Normally the settlement price converges towards the futures price on the given delivery date.




