A forward contract is a customized contract between two parties
to buy or sell a specified quantity of a particular commodity at a
specified price on a specified future date. Futures are
exchange-traded forward contracts, i.e., forward contracts done in
organized exchanges
期指策略 like stock or commodity
exchanges.
A futures contract is standardized. To be more specific, futures
being traded on exchanges have terms standardized by the exchange.
The standardized items in any futures contract are: the quantity of
the underlying product; quality of the underlying product (not
required in financial futures); the date and month of delivery; the
units of price quotation (not the price itself) and minimum change
in price (tick-size); and the location of settlement.