Futures Basis
Futures basis, convergence, convenience yield, contango, backwardation, and delivery mechanics.
Futures contracts, futures prices, basis, delivery months, contango, backwardation, and convenience-yield mechanics.
Futures contracts, pricing, and basis explain how an exchange-traded futures position connects today’s cash market to a later settlement or delivery date. The important questions are not only whether a trader is long or short, but which contract month is used, how the futures price relates to spot, whether storage and financing costs matter, and how margin or delivery rules can change the economics.
Use this section when the controlling issue is contract mechanics, pricing, or the spread between cash and futures markets. Futures Price explains the quoted market input, while Interest Rate Futures covers futures-implied rates and rate-quote conventions. Commodity Futures combines the market use case with the contract-specification checklist. Futures Basis explains cash-futures differences and hedge outcomes. Contango and Backwardation, Convenience Yield, and Taking Delivery cover the curve, carry, spot-month, and settlement layers.
Before relying on a futures price, verify the exact contract, delivery month, quote convention, tick value, settlement type, margin treatment, and current exchange rule. Public starting points include CFTC futures basics and the CFTC explainer on the economic purpose of futures markets.
Choose a subsection first. Deeper term pages live inside each subsection, which keeps large topic hubs readable.
Futures basis, convergence, convenience yield, contango, backwardation, and delivery mechanics.
Futures trading, contract specifications, quoted prices, notional exposure, outright positions, and exchange-traded settlement mechanics.