Who uses commodity futures and why?
Broadly speaking, there are two classes of users for commodity futures. Hedgers, who have exiting risks in the market for the underlying commodity such as producers, processors, merchants, importers, exporters and insurance companies. They can use a derivative position to that which they hold, or expect to hold. Invertors, who are prepared to bear the price risk that hedgers are seeking to avoid and profit by correctly anticipating the nature of future price movement.
