You want to make money by trading futures and options. You have an initial balance of $100,000 to cover losses and option premia.

You are allowed to trade any futures on Chicago Board of Trade corn and soybeans futures contracts and Chicago Mercantile Exchange hog futures up to a year out.

You are allowed to trade options on May and November CBOT soybeans futures contracts and May and December CBOT corn futures contracts.

Trading is conducted only on Monday Wednesday and Friday.

All trades are conducted at the settlement price for the day the trade is submitted.

You can have up to five open positions at one time. You will need to close out a current position if you have five open positions and want to take a new position.

Commissions on trades = $50 per trade round turn (in or out).

Email trade to eglenn@iastate.edu. Make sure that you use the word trade in the subject heading. If you do not, your trade will not get processed.

When making the trade, be sure to specify sufficient details to execute the trade. For futures contracts specify the number of contracts, the contract month, and whether you are taking a long or short position. For options on futures, be sure to specify the contract month, the strike price, whether you are buying or selling an option, whether the option is a call or a put, and the number of contracts.

You are required to justify the position that you take for each trade. Please keep a notebook of justifications. You only need to jot down one or two sentences for each trade. You will use these notes to write a one or two page summary of the justifications for your trades during the year. You will turn this paper and your notebook in at the end of the semester.