which e-mini to track s&p500 ?

ok,

I'm using the e-mini's to track s&p500 movement
during the trading day [I don't trade them],
but which one is better right now, June2 or Sept2 ?
both?

I thought the June2 might expire [after June2].
Not being at all familiar with futures,
I'm a little confused.



thanks,

Mark

 

June is where the volume is right now. I believe the 21st is the expiration day and it will roll over about a week before.

-Todd

 

Looks like Thurs. June 13th is the rollover to the Sept contract.

 

How does "rollover" work... is it automatic or is it a general time that people start to trade the next contract out?

 

Mark-
the "2" in the contract refers to the year "2002", not the day in June.
for all you ever wanted to know about futures go to
www.cme.com

 

Rollover in the stock indices is 8 days before the 3rd Friday (expiration) of the quarter end months. As the Mini contracts have come online I've noticed that the new month contract is often very active during the preceding overnight session.

 

While we are on the subject let me just give a brief example of how the symbols are constructed. You take the base symbol, in this case ES for EMini S&P 500 and attach the year (2002) and the month symbol. The month symbols are as follows:

H - March
M - June
U - September
Z - December

So the symbol expiring 2002 June is ES2M, and the one that expires in Sept is ES2U.

 

The S&P's front month last trading day is always the 3rd Thursday of that contracts month. This being said, June is the current front month and the last trading day is June 20th. For price action, I would watch the June contract into expiration and then move over to the Sept.


Hope this helps,

Comp

 

When the first day of the month is a Friday, the last day of trading is the 2nd Thursday. Volume moves to the new contract a week before the last trading day of the expiring contract, so it is usually best to switch over then too.

 

I was thinking June 2nd


you learn something almost every day




thanks

Mark