FACTSim Help : Opening a Position : Selecting a Contract to Open
From the Trader Area, choose the menu item labeled "Open New Position". This will take you to the list of available commodities for each exchange.


Choose the Open New Position menu item.

Across the top of the page, you will find a list of all exchanges available to you. The list of exchanges will vary depending on your group's settings. If you are not in a group, FACTSim will allow you to trade on any exchange supported by the simulation. Clicking on the name of an exchange will take you to the list of contracts available on that exchange. You can also scroll down the page until you find the exchange you are looking for.


Click on an exchange to see its commodities.

Once you have found the desired exchange, you can choose a product on the exchange from the list. Commodities on each exchange are broken down into categories. Categories in FACTSim include:

• Commodity - Grains, Crops, Livestock, etc.
• Financial - Bonds, Interest Rate Swaps, Notes, etc.
• Metal - Gold, Silver, Aluminum, etc.
• Currency - Exchange rates with foreign currency, Pounds, Euros, etc.
• Weather - Heating and cooling degree days.
• Index - Dow, Nasdaq, S&P, etc.
• Energy - Fuels, Coal, etc.
• Chemical - Benzene, Xylene, etc.

At this point, you should see the name of the product you are looking for. Each product presents a number of options.


The product row.

Let's analyze the corn contracts a little closer. We'll take a look at the individual fields in each row.

• Product Name - This is the first entry for each item. In this case, Corn is the name of the commodity we are looking at.
• Futures Link - The second entry in each row leads to a list of available futures contracts for this product. To purchase a futures contract, click on this link. The ticker symbol for the futures contract is shown in parenthesis. In the case of corn, this is shown as (C).
• Call Options Link - The third entry in each row allows you to purchase a call option contract for the product. Products that don't have available call option contracts will display an "N/A" in this field. Additionally, some groups do not allow options trading. In this case, the Call Options Link will be grayed out and inactive. For contracts that have call options, the ticker symbol for a call option will be shown in parenthesis. In the case of corn, this is shown as (CY).
• Put Options Link - The fourth entry in each row allows you to purchase a put option contract for the product. Products that don't have available put option contracts will display an "N/A" in this field. Additionally, some groups do not allow options trading. In this case, the Put Options Link will be grayed out and inactive. For contracts that have put options, the ticker symbol for a put option will be shown in parenthesis. In the case of corn, this is shown as (PY).
• Contract Specs Link - The fifth and final field for each row is a link to the contract's specifications. This allows you to see the trading hours, ticker symbols, contract quantity, quote units, and margin requirements for each contract.

At this point, we are ready to choose a product to open. For this example, we'll choose a corn futures contract. Clicking on the Futures Link brings us to the Futures List for corn. Here we see a list of every corn contract available on the chosen exchange. Lets look at the information given for each contract.


The contract row.

We'll take a closer look at the information provided for the corn contract.

• Contract Month/Year - The first entry for each contract denotes the maturity month and year for the contract.
• Price - The second entry for each row is the current price information. If the current price is not available yet, it will be listed as "N/A".
• Open - The contract's open price. This price will not be available until after the contract starts trading. If the open price is not available yet, it will be listed as "N/A".
• Settle - The contract's settle price. This price will not be available until the contract stops trading. If the settle price is unavailable, it will be listed as "N/A".
• Previous Settle - The contract's settle price on the previous trading day. If the price is unavailable, it will be listed as "N/A".
• Quantity - The number of contracts you'd like to buy/sell in your order. You may type in a value greater than zero.
• Position - From this drop-down menu, you can choose where you'd like a long position (buy) or a short position (sell).
• Open - The button that will take you to the next step of the open process.

After entering in the quantity and position type, you are ready to click "Open", which will take you to the next screen.

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