Against Actual

  

It might sound like an irrational dedication to fantasy. But it really has to do with commodities trading.

In commodities, an "actual" is the physical thing getting traded. Oil, gold, soybeans, pork bellies, etc. However, not all commodities trading involves buying and selling actuals. Much of the action takes place on the derivatives market, where traders speculate in the prices of various commodities, but have no intention of ever receiving, say 1,000 barrels of oil or a bunch of pig meat.

"Against Actual" is a type of trade that avoids the physical delivery. In the transaction, two parties with opposite positions in a commodity make a deal to use each other to close out their contracts simultaneously. A person with a buy-side contract and one with a sell-side contract let the two cancel each other out. That way, no one has to ship any pork to anyone else.

Related or Semi-related Video

Finance: What Are Commodities?74 Views

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Finance allah shmoop What are commodities This is a comm

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owed And this is my monnet ease And neither of

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them have anything to do with commodities though if you

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say them fast enough well you'll never mind A commodity

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is something that is common like it's everywhere See the

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com o there for the big hand Like gold is

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a commodity it's everywhere oil is a commodity it's everywhere

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seven hundred fourteen page paperback copy of moby dick is

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a commodity and yes we can't resist clueless politicians are

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a commodity as well Well a commodity is basically the

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same thing no matter where and how you buy it

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That copy of moby dick is the same copy whether

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you get it at your local bookstore If a physical

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book stores even exist anymore or on amazon the serial

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killer of those aforementioned book stores So if something is

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the same everywhere well what would be the opposite Well

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how about a swim lesson from michael phelps You know

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you can't buy that on amazon Not yet anyway Or

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say you want to be the proud owner of a

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three headed dog Well you might be able to find

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one somewhere but it's going to cost you a whole

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lot of kibble Or what if you were looking to

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buy a blouse like one that was worn by j

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edgar hoover Well those are pretty uncommon and or unique

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commodities Well the basic idea is that most commodities can

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be sold by lots of people so their profit margins

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are generally low They may sell an extreme volume but

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if you have thirty people competing to sell you that

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same copy of moby dick don't don't you think the

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last guy just desperate to get it off his shelves

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will drop the price really low and you'll take it

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Yeah unfortunately then you have to read that book That 00:01:41.357 --> [endTime] book really will be your way

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