Prajna Capital - An Investment Guide

When you buy or sell a stock future, you're not buying or selling a stock certificate. You're entering into a stock futures contract -- an agreement to buy or sell the stock certificate at a fixed price on a certain date. Unlike a traditional stock purchase, you never own the stock, so you're not entitled to dividends and you're not invited to stockholders meetings. In traditional stock market investing, you make money only when the price of your stock goes up. With stock market futures, you can make money even when the market goes down. Here's how it works. There are two basic positions on stock futures: long and short . The long position agrees to buy the stock when the contract expires. The short position agrees to sell the stock when the contract expires. If you think that the price of your stock will be higher in three months than it is today, you want to go long. If you think the stock price will be lower in three months, then you'll go short. Let's ...