Bitcoin Forum

Are there any platforms for trading bitcoin derivatives that members here have had a lot of experience with?
A short explanation of their fee structure would be greatly appreciated as well.  Links to previous threads welcomed.

Thanks

Bitcoin Futures?

Here:

http://www.coindesk.com/okcoins-bitcoin-futures-trading-aims-combat-price-volatility-risk/
https://www.okcoin.com/

and

https://icbit.se/futures

Cryptostocks and havlock are the only ones I know of other than personal IPO's offered here on the forum. Most of which are mining companies.

Right, these were a few I had seen as well.  Have you had any experience with the ones mentioned?

Are you looking for something like futures? If so then you might as well use margin trading (it really is the same thing as trading futures, with only technical differences), which is allowed at btc-e and bitfinex. If you are looking for options then you can try updown.bt which allows binary options on a number of markets.

I have read about what is called a "CFD" or contract for difference. It works very similar to a straddle in the options market as it will pay out based on how far from a certain price that bitcoin is trading at the maturity date. It does not matter if the price has gone up or down or both, if the CFD is based on a  $600 price and the price is now $500, it will payout $100, and would receive a similar payout if the price is now $700.

There are accusation of the exchanges trading against their customers and manipulate the derivative price.

Hadn't heard of updown.bt before... looks pretty interesting though.
Good recommendations, thank you.

That is a new business that has yet to establish trust and reputation. Be aware of exchange platform risk and owner running away with your bitcoin.

How is trading on margin the same as trading futures?

Trading on margin is trading on borrowed money. Trading futures is making a bet one which direction the price of the investment will go in the future.

Trading on margin required trader to pay interest on daily or monthly basis. Trading future has build in interest where the spread will become smaller as it approaches expiration date.

Both are essentially same thing with different borrowing rate.

The amount of initial money that you must put up for collateral initially is generally the same for margin and futures trading. The amount you profit or lose is generally the same for the same chance in price for both margin and futures trading. The only real difference between margin and futures trading is that you can be forced to close a trade on margin if there is not enough money available to be borrowed, however this would also affect a futures trader because other traders would be forced to close their positions, likely causing the price to decline, causing your futures positions to decline in value. In short the only read difference between the two platforms is behind the scenes and will not affect you "on the front end"

Haha yup, my first thoughts were simultaneously "looks interesting" and "looks potentially dangerous, I should learn more about it first".
I've been around the block a few times, but nonetheless a good warning for others reading.  Thanks.

I was interested in hearing about futures and margin trading as well, but more specifically: are there platforms for options (puts/calls)?

...and if you're wondering, yes, I'm that huge whale messing with the price ;)

Ah, our friend @jonmatonis has already went into this pretty recently:
http://www.coindesk.com/inching-towards-bitcoin-derivatives/

Had not seen that article before I posted the thread - looks as though put/call options aren't available yet.

OKCOIN is offering future contract on their platform.

You can also check out ICBIT for derivative trading.