hard · FRM Part 1 Financial Markets and Products

A trader holds a long position in a futures contract on a non-dividend commodity that exhibits a strongly upward-sloping forward curve (contango). The trader funds the position and maintains it by rolling the front contract into the next maturity each month; daily variation margin is invested or borrowed at the risk-free rate.

Holding the commodity's spot price path fixed, which effect most directly erodes the total return of this rolling long position relative to the change in spot price?

  1. Negative roll yield: as each expiring contract converges up toward the higher next-month price, the trader systematically sells the cheaper expiring leg and buys the pricier deferred leg across rolls, even with spot unchanged.
  2. Convenience yield accruing to the long futures holder, which is paid away to the short counterparty and reduces the long's mark-to-market gains over the holding period.
  3. Daily marking-to-market correlation: the positive correlation between futures prices and the financing rate raises the futures price above the forward price and lowers the trader's entry cost each roll.
  4. Negative carry from storage costs that the long futures holder must pay directly to the warehouse during the life of each contract while awaiting roll.

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