The reasons for the popularity of futures and options markets – opportunities for the futures market investors pursuing completely different goals in the financial market. Some members of the futures market – speculators – get profit based on fluctuations in share prices without direct sale of shares themselves, others – hedgers – tend to avoid the risk of price volatility. Hedging of interest to investors who do not chase high returns, and who most importantly reducing the risks. The principle of hedging – a deal in the futures market for the supply of shares in the future by fixing the price of the transaction at the time of purchase / sale contract. Hedging strategy – to sacrifice the opportunity to benefit from favorable price changes in order to obtain protection against adverse price changes. Speculators are looking to retrieve profit from rising or falling futures prices. Gain or loss in both cases is the difference between the purchase price and sale price of the contract. Futures market attracts more aggressive speculators leverage (1:5 – 1:10) (Compare with margin trading in shares) Transactions in the futures market are more profitable than operations in the market of the underlying asset (shares).
This is due, firstly, with 'Leverage effect' – gains and losses in futures trading repeatedly reinforced by the use of so-called leverage. The presence of leverage in futures trading due to the fact that only a small amount of money (known as initial margin) is required in order to buy or sell a futures contract. Secondly, one of the attractive features of futures trading is the same ease with which one can make a profit as at lower prices (by selling contracts), and from raising prices (buying contracts). And thirdly, on the futures market there are no transaction costs that arise when conducting transactions on the stock market (fee use of credit resources and payment of custody and settlement services). Moreover, exchange fees on transactions with futures contracts significantly lower than those in the securities market. WHERE TO APPEAL FUTURES AND OPTIONS The absolute leader of Russian market of futures contracts is the RTS FORTS (Futures & Options on RTS), organized by the Russian Trading System Stock Exchange and the 'St. Petersburg' in September 2001 with April 2002 Index futures and stocks have begun to address and on the MICEX.
RUSSIAN Futures and Options Russian market than currency futures (in USD and Euro) Stock futures turn (on the stocks) and index futures (the values of stock market indices). Stock futures – contracts to buy / sell the most liquid stocks – Gazprom, LUKoil, Surgutneftegaz and Rostelecom. Futures on the indexes are futures on the MICEX index-10 index futures and S & P / RUIX index and S & P / RUIX-OIL (indices calculated by RTS). Options market represented only in FORTS. And it is not on stock options and options on futures (options, concluded on futures on shares of Lukoil, and options on futures concluded on Gazprom shares).