What is a Futures Contract?
A Future is a contractual agreement to buy or sell a particular commodity or financial instrument at a pre-determined price on a specific date in the future.
Futures contracts can derive from a variety of assets, from traditional commodities like corn, wheat and orange juice, to different asset classes like government bonds, interest rates, energy and stock indices
Transparent Pricing
Futures are highly liquid exchange traded financial instruments, meaning individuals can trade on tight spreads. The transaction costs are comparatively low and their pricing is transparent due to the level of specificity found in Futures Contracts, as well as the regulations imposed by the various exchanges.
No physical delivery
Saxo Capital Markets does not support physical delivery of the underlying security on expiry of a Futures Contract. On or before the expiry of a Futures Contract, Saxo Capital Markets will cash settle a client's positions on their behalf. Read more about expiry of Futures.
Online Futures Trading
With 175 online tradable Futures contracts available, Saxo Capital Markets clients will have access to real-time pricing on oil, metals, currencies, agriculturals, bonds and indices.
Online Futures Trading is conducted using volume-based commissions and for larger monthly trading volumes, commissions start from USD 0.30 (or equivalent) per contract.
Why trade futures with Saxo Capital Markets?
As a Saxo Capital Markets client, you can:
- Trade 175 Futures across 21 global exchanges on live prices (subject to subscription) direct from the relevant exchange, access excellent liquidity and tight spreads on all Futures Trading contracts
- Receive free daily research on the Futures Trading Market - the Hightower Report published by Hartfield Management, Inc.
- Place limits, Stop-Limits, Stops and Trailing Stops at the click of a button
- Count on outstanding reliability through our Award-Winning Platform.
Trade Futures on margin
Since Futures contracts are essentially agreements to buy or sell a certain asset at a given date in the future, actual payment does not happen upfront. Instead, buyers and sellers of Futures must put up collateral for the trade. This is also known as "margin".
The size of the margin is determined by the Futures exchange and is the same for all traders. Depending on the contract you are trading, expect to be required to place between 1%-10% in margin.
Use your Stock portfolio as margin
To provide you with extra flexibility when managing your portfolio, Saxo Capital Markets allows you to use a proportion of your Stocks as collateral for margin trading. This means you have more flexibility when you spot a great trading opportunity. See all Futures Trading Conditions
Trade Contract Options with Saxo Capital Markets
To complement our Futures offering, Saxo Capital Markets gives you access to trade the world’s most liquid exchange listed options contracts. We call them Contract Options. Contract Options are a great alternative to Futures trading.
Both Contract Options and Futures are listed on a derivatives exchange and provide you with access to the most liquid markets, such as currencies, indices, commodities etc.
Read more about Contract Options.
Futures Pricing
Online Futures are traded on competitive volume-based commissions.
Trade from as little as USD 0.30 (or equivalent) per contract.
See all futures rates and conditions