Poll: Would anyone be interested in a futures forum?

Beginner Questions
1

I hope this is OK with the Administrators (and everyone else on the board) but I would like to know if anyone would be interested in or find a forum dedicated to futures, commodities, indices, etc. etc. useful?

I have found that the big ‘money spinners’ are things like Silver, DAX 30, SPI 200 (ASX), DOW, etc. etc.

Sometimes though - I have questions or comments - and I’m not sure that it is the right thing to do to ask these questions on the existing open forums (although I do appreciate the replies that I have received thus far).

Now - I just hope that I know how to set up this poll.

Edit:

OK - well - the poll thingy won’t work - not sure if you need more rights to be able to create a poll - but I don’t seem to be able to do it.

Anyway - if it’s OK with the Administrators - just post your ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers on this thread - and then I’ll add them up manually and go from there. If this is not acceptable to everyone then please let me know and I will ask for the thread to be deleted.

Regards,

Dale.

2

Hello,

I thought I’d be the first to vote:

Yes.

Only kidding.

I just thought I’d post a sample of the kind of things I had in mind.

When you are opening a Nasdaq 100 position for example you are selling USD and buying Nasdaq 100. So - one would imagine that should the USD weaken - the value of your Nasdaq 100 would increase. Not so. This appears to work inversely unlike forex pairs. The USD gains in value (because of ‘not as bad as forecast US ecomonic data’) and people start buying Nasdaq 100 NOT selling. On a forex pair - you get the opposite - USD/EUR for example - US Non-farm payrolls come out better than expected - USD up - EUR down!

In forex we trade the ‘commdolls’ i.e. AUD/CAD/NZD. Gold up - AUD up (normally) etc. etc.

There are certain relationships that exist between the price of Oil, Silver, and Gold - and understanding these relationships and tracking the prices and trends - can help when trading AUD/CAD/NZD against the USD.

Would this type of information help anyone else but me?

Let me know.

Regards,

Dale.

3

I am intrested in these corrlations and I would like to know where I can find out what makes what pair move. i.e. if I hear that pig bellies is up then I should buy what pair? Where do you get your information from?

By the way my vote is
Yes

4

Hello again,

Now - I’m not sure that a correlation exists between pork bellies and Gold but I love your example.

On the other hand - in this business - you will probably find that if you dig deep enough - a correlation probably does exist (maybe they use Gold to fill the pigs teeth so that they can eat well and the price of pork bellies goes up)! I’ll tell you though - that my example is not as far fetched as it sounds - I have been amazed at the amount of lateral thinking that is required when sizing up the market!

I mean (for example) - do you know that there are certain times during the year in India - when there are a lot of weddings (and festivals) - and would you believe that the demand for Gold from India increases during these periods to the point where the it affects the price. That may not be lateral thinking but it sure is something I would not have ever thought of! Now if Gold goes up all the ‘commdolls’ go up as well (and it’s good for the ANYTHING/ZAR pair)!!!

Anyway - thanks for the vote.

Dale.

5

I think it’s a great initiative. I would love to learn more about futures, and talk to those who trade it.

You have my vote.

6

What is a futre? Does this refer specifically to commodities?

8

I beg to differ most vigorously.

I don’t have the actual numbers at hand, but as far as I know the financial futures (indices, currencies, interest rates, etc.) trade far more volume than the commodity futures. Eurodollars (and I’m not talking about EUR/USD here) are the most active. The open interest there recently topped 12 million. That’s 12 million contracts in open positions.