I guess I am a moron or just need more sleep. Can someone help me with this: Trader Jim buys 3 CME Nasdaq 100 contracts in March 2003 at 1100. He holds them until April 2004, selling them at 1450. What (dollar amount) did Jim make? My math is 1450-1100=350 Tick size = 0.50, which is $50.00 per contract. 350/.50 = 700. 700 X $50 = 35,000 35,000 X 3 contracts = 105,000 $105,000 profit. Is this correct? It seems low to me, maybe I am not figuring the math correct.
The pit traded contract (ND) is 5x NQ. Thus $105,000 is the correct amount if we're talking ND rather than NQ.
a secondary question would be, say I want to deploy $60,000 towards trading NASDAQ futures. Buy 3 full size NASDAQ-100's or buy 16 E-Mini contracts? which is more bang for buck?