Index perpetual futures

Index perpetual futures track the four benchmark U.S. stock indices through their E-mini futures: the S&P 500 (ES) and Nasdaq-100 (NQ) on CME, the Dow (YM) on CBOT, and the Russell 2000 (RTY) on CME. Each contract keeps the underlying future's tick size and multiplier, so a point in NQ-PERP is worth the same $20 as a point in the CME contract.

That makes the arithmetic simple. A 100-point move in the Nasdaq-100 is $2,000 per NQ contract; a 10-point move in the S&P 500 is $500 per ES contract. The four indices behave differently: the Nasdaq-100 is weighted toward large technology companies, the Russell 2000 tracks smaller companies, the Dow holds 30 large companies weighted by share price, and the S&P 500 sits across all of them.

Unlike the E-minis themselves, the perpetuals never expire. There is no quarterly roll and no contract month in the symbol: you trade NQ-PERP, not NQZ6. Graybook prices each entry with a fixed upfront basis instead of charging funding payments, so holding through the night or the weekend adds no running cost.

Index futures react to the economic calendar (Fed decisions, inflation and jobs reports) and to earnings from the largest companies. When CME is closed, the perpetual keeps trading, then re-anchors to the official price at the reopen, so news that breaks over a weekend can be traded before Sunday evening.