What is margin?Margin

For the same gold, how far apart should near-month and far-month futures be? The gap is 6 months of interest and storage. If the far month is too expensive, buy near, sell far, and take delivery.

Buy spot and short an equal amount of perpetual futures: price moves cancel out and you just collect the funding rate. Is it really risk-free?

Required margin = position value ÷ leverage. The bigger the position, the more margin is locked up, and the more you lose on the same move.

You don't buy the asset itself. You simply agree with the platform to settle the price difference between opening and closing.

Contracts with no expiry date use a "funding rate" to stay close to spot: longs and shorts regularly pay each other a fee.

Use a "lever" to move a big position: at full leverage, a 1% price move can swing your margin by 100%.

Drag the leverage and lot size to watch used margin, free margin, the margin call warning and the line that triggers a stop-out.

First decide the most you'll lose on this trade, then work back to the lot size from the stop distance. That's the heart of risk control.

Roll near-month futures to hedge for a whole year and the price risk is locked on paper, but every roll costs money and margin needs cash. A hedge can also die from cash flow.

The seller of an option gets paid up front but takes on an obligation. Compare the risks of a short call and a short put.

Set aside the cash to buy the stock, then sell a put and collect the premium up front. If the price doesn't drop, you keep the money; if it does, you buy a stock you wanted anyway at a cost of strike − premium.